It's a service, it's funded by what it sells. http://247.newsvine.com/_news/2009/11/20/3525491-taxpayer-bailout-needed-for-the-post-office The quasi-government agency announced this week that it lost $3.8 billion in the most recent fiscal year, which ended September 30th. It also delivered less mail - 26 billion fewer pieces less, a nearly 13 percent drop from the previous year. The bad news follows losses totaling $7.8 billion in 2007 and 2008. The Postal Service, as it is quick to point out, is legally prohibited from taking tax dollars. But in order to stay afloat, the agency has been actively borrowing from the U.S. Treasury: At last count, according to Postal Service spokeswoman Yvonne Yoerger, it owes the government $10.2 billion.
The taxpayers pay the postal service to deliver mail for free for charities and such, to the tune of ~$100 million per year. Maybe technically that is fee-for-service, but it is tax dollars going to the postal service. I still don't see what this has to do with healthcare. You might as well argue that food stamps should be self supporting. barfo
I'm sure they could. But healthcare doesn't cost $100M, because healthcare doesn't actually consist of delivering fliers for charities. If people could be kept healthy by having mail delivered, you'd have a really excellent point. barfo
The post office charges $.44 for a stamp. The govt. health insurance company can charge $1000 or $2000 per person, most of them won't use anywhere near that amount in services. I'd prefer we actually try a public "option" that is an actual option and one that competes. If it offers health care at cost, it should have a price advantage to consumers, right? Let's see it.
I agree with you on the public option - and so far I don't see any reason to believe that isn't what is being proposed - but you seem to be ignoring the fact that the cost of this bill comes at least in part from subsidizing the costs for those who cannot afford healthcare. It's a completely different issue than the public option. barfo
If they subsidized it such that it cost only $1, would they need to subsidize that last dollar? No, probably not. I'm not seeing your point, however. barfo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Veterans_Affairs The VA budget is for 26M men and women who've served in our military, $38B went for health care. "In the United States Federal Budget for fiscal year 2009, President George W. Bush, requested $38.7 billion - or 86.5% of the total Veterans Affairs budget - for veteran medical care alone." That's about $1400 in health care costs per person, for guys who've been shot at, shot, parts blown off, subjected to whatever chemicals and radiation on the battlefield, and PTSD type disorders. We owe the soldiers care as it's part of the social contract we make with them in exchange for going through all that. The more outrageous claims are 45M are uninsured. If we subsidized them all, it'd cost $63,000,000,000. Surely we can find $63B in a $3.6T budget. If we charged people half that $1400 for govt. quality health care, we'd only need to find half that $63B in the budget. If we look at the more realistic figure of 30M without insurance, we need to find 2/3 those amounts in the budget. If we consider that just because 30M or 45M people don't have insurance doesn't mean they are unable to afford it, you'd have to find even less money in the already bloated budget. I think we're being bamboozled.
According to the VA, they serve 6.1 million patients per year. I'm not sure where your 26 million number came from, or where the other 20 million went (maybe they didn't need any medical care?). VA medical budget for 2010 is $47 billion. That works out to $7700 per patient. Now, if you want to provide healthcare for 30 million people at $7700/person, then that's $231B. Per year. Cost from 2014 to 2019: $1.386 trillion. Cost of senate bill: $848B. Seems to be in the ballpark. barfo
Yes, it is a strawman. I, and many others in opposition to the proposed healthcare bills have said we can't afford it. The fact that all of these taxes will be imposed on an already weak economy is just proof that we can't afford it. We have all been saying that taxes would go up with these healthcare bills (because I don't trust the governent to actually cut spending elsewhere to provide healthcare), this thread is just real, hard fact that proves what we have been saying. You're the one saying that the only way to have healthcare services is by raising taxes. Here's a thought, cut spending elsewhere. The government should spend the ridiculous amount of money it already has on the most important services. If healthcare isn't one of those most important services, so be it. Again, you built a strawman.
There's 26M veterans total. That's from WWI, WWII, etc. They're all entitled to VA care. Yet by your figures, only 6.1M of them show up. Sounds about right, because that's how insurance works. Most people are healthy and pay premiums and use some tiny fraction of what they pay, and the rest subsidize those who pay premiums and use more than what they pay. That's what insurance is. 6M out of 26M? Sounds about right. It's still $1400 per.
I'm not sure how the existence of taxes proves we can't afford it. Yeah, that's what I've been saying too. Good that we agree on something. I see. You are correct, one could (in theory) cut other services to pay for this. But that's not something that is currently being considered (other than certain cuts in medicare). That is, in fact, a strawman, although if you want to propose which other services to cut, I'd be interested to read it. The actual decision for congress to make is healthcare for the uninsured plus these various tax increases, or not. Not some completely different proposal that you'd prefer. barfo
BTW, from the Wikipedia link: In May 2006, a laptop computer containing in the clear (unencrypted) social security numbers of 26.5 million U.S. veterans was stolen from a Veterans Affairs analyst’s home. The analyst violated existing VA policy by removing the data from his workplace.[9]
