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Old 30-01-2018, 16:42   #121
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

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No, you have it wrong. The US military has a separate health system. The VA system is for US veterans no longer in military service. Are you from the USA?
Yes, I should have said ex-miltary. The point is it is a single payer system.
So promoting this one as good and some other countries single payer as inherently bad as some from the US do does not make sense.

.
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Old 30-01-2018, 17:01   #122
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

"if your 65 or older your in the the Medicare system which is similar to Canada and other Western countries. It's a single payer system that is Government funded"

You have paid into this system with every pay check you receive, from the time you start working. I started working at 16, and have paid into it for 59 years. The Medicare fund has been the piggy bank to help balance budgets for years, so when a certain political party calls it an entitlement, it makes me seethe. It has actually helped fund the government. How is it an entitlement when it is called Medicare Insurance, and I have paid into it for 59 years, while also paying for my own healthcare, which at times was up to $1800 per month for two until I hit 65, 5 years ago.
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Old 30-01-2018, 17:16   #123
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

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Yes, I should have said ex-miltary. The point is it is a single payer system.
So promoting this one as good and some other countries single payer as inherently bad as some from the US do does not make sense.

.
Some percentage (maybe as many as 49%) of ~330,000,000 potential taxpayers is not a single payer system. Maybe a singe aggregator system (the US gov't), but not a single payer. You have been consuming the Kool-Aid. I suppose some call it "free" health care too. TANSTAAFL apples. The questions are really about costs, quality, and conditions of delivery. I am interested in those in which a major condition would be being a cruiser, even a stranger in a strange land. [Apologies for both Robert Heinlein references.]
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Old 30-01-2018, 17:35   #124
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

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>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> so when a certain political party calls it an entitlement, it makes me seethe.
When anyone says it...
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Old 30-01-2018, 17:50   #125
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

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Some percentage (maybe as many as 49%) of ~330,000,000 potential taxpayers is not a single payer system. Maybe a singe aggregator system (the US gov't), but not a single payer. You have been consuming the Kool-Aid. I suppose some call it "free" health care too. TANSTAAFL apples. The questions are really about costs, quality, and conditions of delivery. I am interested in those in which a major condition would be being a cruiser, even a stranger in a strange land. [Apologies for both Robert Heinlein references.]
The VA system is a single payer system. You can call it something else If You want but that'll doesn't change the fact.
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Old 30-01-2018, 18:16   #126
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

I was killing time on Youtube, and this mini-doc popped up for me. Creepy Google at work, no doubt. But says things very clearly for those of you unclear on the facts and the challenge:

https://youtu.be/gXBPKE28UF0
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Old 30-01-2018, 20:57   #127
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

""if your 65 or older your in the the Medicare system "
Actually, you are NOT.
You must manually JOIN Medicare, select plan options, and begin making payments within a specific time window. If you don't, then you can still join the system later, but you are penalized with an additional surcharge forever. Well, for the rest of your life anyway.
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Old 30-01-2018, 21:33   #128
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

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The VA system is a single payer system. You can call it something else If You want but that'll doesn't change the fact.
Ditto, back at you. But I agree to the extent that payments to the providers are actually made by a single entity. How is that any form of advantage? And why is it meaningful or even special?
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Old 31-01-2018, 00:50   #129
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

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Ditto, back at you. But I agree to the extent that payments to the providers are actually made by a single entity. How is that any form of advantage? And why is it meaningful or even special?
It is a single payer, the goverenment, without any insurance company intermediary. Remarkably similar to the way health care is paid for in many industrialized countries.
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Old 31-01-2018, 04:50   #130
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

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Ditto, back at you. But I agree to the extent that payments to the providers are actually made by a single entity. How is that any form of advantage? And why is it meaningful or even special?
'Single-payer' means that there is ... just one payer. If the clients of the VA system have all their medical bills picked up by the VA... it's a single-payer system. I don't understand why that would be in dispute.

Advantages:
  • no "pay & claim & wait for reimbursement" cycle for client
  • no coordination/conflict between multiple payers
  • the single-paying entity has fantastic leverage to negotiate lower costs
  • in a universal single payer system (eg Canada) every primary-care provider is in, you can choose your Dr
... net result is a system with lower overhead costs

Why is mentioning that "VA is single-payer" meaningful? I imagine that it's to underscore the fact that single payer is not some unworkable socialist unicorn, but a practical and viable system of delivering health care that's already being applied successfully in the US.

(Anyway, I think we've all made our points. This tangent doesn't really advance the thread about health care for boaters.)
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Old 31-01-2018, 05:15   #131
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

Medicare, they do suggest enrolling 4 months before one hits 65 in order to get a better rate.
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Old 31-01-2018, 10:22   #132
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

For a typical medical office visit, the office has to file paperwork, check for coverage and compliance, do all the paperwork and research, for at least one payer and with some patients often for TWO payers, i.e. Medicare and a secondary. They also need to be aware of what each will cover, in advance, in order to properly care, bill, and get paid. Multiply that by perhaps 30 or 40 payers they may accept, and that's a LOT harder than just complying with the terms of a single payer. One set of terms instead of 10, 20, 40.

With a single payer, I suspect there are also many fewer games being played. Something like 15-20 years ago a former Blue Cross executive went on the record saying that their claims department staff had been told to simply reject every 5th claim that was put in by policy holders. Don't even look at it, just reject every 5th claim. Because they knew that 2/3 of the claimants would not appeal the rejection, and that was a big amount they no longer would be paying out in claims!

That's on the patient side, imagine what goes on with the "provider" side. I hear it from a friend who has a practice, all the time. He's gotten good at filing complaints with state authorities and getting his bills paid.

Single payer? They can only play the games *once*.
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Old 31-01-2018, 12:02   #133
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

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His $22 a month "plan" is not sustainable. If too many do it they would have to shut it down.

I am curious though do you know what your monthly cost "tax" was for medical in Canada?
Not knocking, I'm sure it's more reasonable than what I pay.

If that subsidy still exists after my kids finish school that is the plan for my wife and I. Become "working"/retired poor or just not be in the USA.
If you look at early retirement sites this is a common way to get insurance. Unless they add asset rules to the ACA it should stay around in some form.
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Old 31-01-2018, 18:17   #134
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

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This link has some comparisons between the US and Canada, including malpractice costs.
Reading that it is easy to understand why USA healthcare is more expensive than other countries.

What we really need here is tort reform and more competition among the insurers. The latter could be achieved by allowing carriers to sell across state line like other insurance carriers already do.

I pay the monthly fee for Medicare but don't use it as I am able to receive healthcare from the VA. The VA here is great although we have all read about the horror stories in other parts of the country. For me the VA is not free but there is no monthly premium and the co-pays are very low.

FWIW Medicare is far from free because, as has been pointed out, every worker pays into it as long as they work even though they can't use it until they are 65 at which point they continue to pay into it if still working and also pay the monthly premium.

Amazon has just announced they are getting in the healthcare business on a "non-profit" basis. That will be interesting to watch.
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Old 01-02-2018, 05:06   #135
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Re: Early retirement and health care for boaters

Brentolsen, a married couple does not qualify for a group plan in a corporation. As the 2 employees, you as a couple are NOT eligible. I have tried that as both wife and I work separate divisions of our corporation. The law sucks!!!
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