Thanks for taking the time to break down the issues and discuss them one at a time- we can now see where we agree and where we disagree.
We seem to agree that CEOs make lots of money in their positions and that high paid CEOs are needed for the health insurance companies to function. We also agree that (as unfortunate as it may be) CEOs (and companies) need to either be aggressive in denying claims (lawfully or unlawfully) to keep premiums down or they’ll either go bankrupt or put out of business by the competition. (It’s wrong, I know, but that’s the only way it can function.) We finally seem to agree that a physician should be doing everything for the best interest of a patient and setting aside how his / her decision will affect the bottom line of the company.
What we seem to disagree on is who should be running the healthcare in this country.
Despite all the problems going on with corporations running healthcare as a business I still think it’s the lesser of the two evils. Just because there are decisions that are being made that are morally wrong doesn’t mean the alternative is better.
A government probably could run an efficient healthcare system but the United States is decades away from that happening. The catastrophic implosion of the ACA proves that the government is nowhere near ready to take over the entire system. Even if the Government knew what they were doing, for such a system to work the culture of citizens needs to change- they need to take more responsibility for their health and actions and realize that just because they’re not paying for something doesn’t mean that it’s free (i.e. not costing anyone anything).
If the US Government would suddenly take over all aspects of healthcare it would turn into a crisis like the public school systems in many cities and states. Tuition is free, many schools have entire grades where not a single student is proficient in English or Math, truancy is rampant, teachers couldn’t care less about what goes on but use the unions to inflate their salaries and parents blame the teachers and schools when their kids fail (while they didn’t know or care that their kids weren’t even going to school). Everyone (who pays taxes) pays for the public school systems with their taxes and if someone wants a quality education for their kids they need to pay for a private school on top of that.
Imagine the same with public healthcare run by the government- doctors’ offices, hospitals and emergency rooms would be full of people expecting the system to take care of them while they refuse to follow the directions given to them, show up for follow-ups or do anything to improve their health. Taxes would shoot up to pay for this and anyone who seriously wants to take care of their health would need to pay out of pocket (above what they’re already paying in extra taxes) to go to a doctor that’s not part of the system.
So down the road it may be possible but it doesn’t look promising as the country is headed full throttle in the wrong direction.