3 Responses to “Why Is It Good To Keep Health Care Tied To Jobs?”

1. David Carrington Jr. Says:
   November 17th, 2009 at 11:04 pm

   It’s not. It’s also not good to keep rationing it out via private insurance companies.
   Edit: John Terry, slight correction:
   “That enables the insurer to establish premium rates for the 100 of us that will in turn enable the insurer to pay for the care of the 3 of us.”
   It enables insurance companies to pay for the 3 heart attack victims, PLUS the cost of fighting back thousands of claims each year, in an effort to avoid paying, PLUS a very substantial profit. Neither of which does anything to make citizens healthier.

2. Jose Bosingwa Says:
   November 18th, 2009 at 5:43 am

   Most full-time jobs do. The reason this is the case is that after WWII, Truman kept wartime wage and price controls in place, and employers, who weren’t allowed legally to give their employees raises, started offering “fringe benefits” to retain their best talent (yes you read that correctly – it was illegal to give their employees raises, so employers found a way around the law to increase compensation – not because they were such nice people but so that they could retain talent, because that’s how the market works).
   This worked for insurance companies because the actuarial tables work only with respect to populations – i.e., you need a broad pool of insureds, otherwise the tables don’t work. The odds of my having a heart attack are X%. Say 3%. That doesn’t mean I’m going to have 3% of a heart attack. It means out of 100 people similar to me in some respects, it is likely that 3 of us will have cardiac arrest. That enables the insurer to establish premium rates for the 100 of us that will in turn enable the insurer to pay for the care of the 3 of us.
   It so happens that a large workplace is also a large pool of insureds.
   There are other potential pools of insureds – but this is why the concept basically works and this is how it came to be that we get our insurance through our jobs.
   Perhaps getting it through our schools would make more sense, IDK.

3. rrm38 Says:
   November 18th, 2009 at 8:03 am

   Health care isn’t tied to jobs. Anyone who wants can go out and get health coverage. There are plans already in place to assist those who are disabled, and the elderly/retired as well. I know people, my mother being one, who are self employed and have health coverage.