Yeah, except that you’d be married to a single doctor’s practice, as opposed to a government-regulated single payer health insurance plan, which lets you go to any general practitioner in town that you like for just €10 any quarter year that you need one.

But I suppose that this is evil and socialist. Woe is me; I suffer under the yoke of a totalitarian dictatorship over here…

Because room and board are cheaper? After all, this is about saving the insurance money, isn’t it? Because the places where US military are stationed isn’t near any metropolitan municipal hubs. (At least around here in Grafenwöhr they’re definitely not, and Ramstein/Landstuhl isn’t exactly Manhattan, either.)

So I can think of a few reasons…

You prepay for 200 office visits, one for each weekday for the year. If you don’t visit taht day, you forfeit your right to that visit. Evrey visit can include a same-day return, no additional charge.

Problem solved.

So you would be ok with doctors peddling snake oil to people who don’t understand the difference between a double blind study and an anecdote?

It’s fine to say that people have to take responsibility for themselves but most people, even if they have the knowledge, don’t have the time to thoroughly check out the claims of everyone they buy a product or service from. Telling people to sue after the damage is done is not a practical option and the likely consequence of such a regime is less economic activity because people would avoid risk by refusing to do business with people they don’t trust.

I also don’t understand why people are ok with the government passing laws which set the rules for settling law suits but have a problem with the government setting some rules that prevent the need for lawsuit. The latter is often the least costly way of dealing with the problem.

The problem with your logic is you are assuming that someone using the service has access to the information required to judge whether he will be able to meet his obligations. This information gap is the reason why the government does have a role levelling the playing field for consumers. Saying that people with limited means should just sue his after the fact does not help because there is no guarantee that the business will be able to pay for any settlement (this is exactly the problem with AIG).

Now you could argue that the government role should be limited to making sure the consumer has access to the information required to assess the risk and that the information is presented in a way that a non-expert could understand the risk. However, once the government does this it does not make sense for the government to allow a business to run if the risk is large enough that an expert would recommend that a consumer not use the service.

1.) Lack of profitability is not an indication of Ponzi schemes and 2.) One more time – the services he promises to provide are his own labour.

If he doesn’t do what is promised, then the government does have a role – to run the court system in which you sue him.

If you’re so stupid that you need government to look over every contract you enter into, then perhaps you should have yourself declared incompetent and allow it to do that for you. I’m not incompetent and I don’t think government has a role in making decisions for me. Unless there’s reason to believe that he’s committing fraud, forcing this doctor to raise his fees protects you from what? Lower costs? Brilliant.

and this team is at it again. obama has indicated his intention to close the tax “loophole” for charitable giving, but, oddly, only for the rich, who do most of it. the explanations given are so silly as not to warrant discussion. i suspect the real reason is simple: he does not want private competition with his social programs. why else make it harder for individuals to give in support of goals clearly outlined by your administration like feeding homeless, education, health care, etc?

seems a really ugly (and possibly evil) way to consolidate power.

That said, I don’t necessarily believe that this plan is problematic – I just wanted to make the point that the government does have a role when it comes to protecting the public from scams before the victims are created.

It’s all designed to crowd out the private market and eliminate alternatives to universal government health care. Politicians are determined to make medical care so expensive and complicated that nationalizing it will be the only option left.

I’m sure it will work great! As long as you don’t get old or sick…