how do US professional runners (like at least sub 2:16 marathoner types) get health insurance?

haha YO (super cereal) wrote:

more expensive than if you took a job at a grocery store and joined a group plan?

No. That's not what I said.

More expensive compared to paying medical costs out of pocket. If insuring me is very profitable to the insurance company, that means I'm paying the insurance company more than the cost of the medical services. If I just skipped the insurance and paid cash, I would be paying less.

buffet rule not wrote:

a form of revenue to help pay for the government. i think you missed the part about REDISTRIBUTION of wealth that didn't start until just over 100 years ago. in 1800, if you were lazy and/or stupid, you lived in a shack and hopefully were good with a gun to shoot your meals. there were no handouts. in 2012, if you are lazy/stupid, you get free healthcare, free food, free education and even free outright money.

You take my property and give it to some other entity = confiscation and redistribution.

Concerned Citizen wrote:

buffet rule not wrote:

a form of revenue to help pay for the government. i think you missed the part about REDISTRIBUTION of wealth that didn't start until just over 100 years ago. in 1800, if you were lazy and/or stupid, you lived in a shack and hopefully were good with a gun to shoot your meals. there were no handouts. in 2012, if you are lazy/stupid, you get free healthcare, free food, free education and even free outright money.

Tariffs take away money from certain more competitive industries and prop up less competitive ones. It's more redistributive than the income tax.

And poor relief is not a recent invention - it has been around, to varying degrees, since Biblical times, probably before. Even some wild animals have been known to help out weaker individuals in their group.

which part about there not being any redistribution of wealth in 1800 did you not understand? it's not complicated. tariff revenue was used to run the government (eg, maintain a military, a pony express, a treasury, etc). would you care to identify which social programs existed in 1800 that gave away handouts to people for doing nothing?

buffet rule not wrote:

which part about there not being any redistribution of wealth in 1800 did you not understand? it's not complicated. tariff revenue was used to run the government (eg, maintain a military, a pony express, a treasury, etc). would you care to identify which social programs existed in 1800 that gave away handouts to people for doing nothing?

If I'm bringing in commercial goods into the US c. 1800, the government took away a portion of my property and redistributed as they saw fit. Redistribute means to distribute again. The government confiscated my property and did with it what it saw fit.

By the way, in addition to taking people's money on imported goods and spending it on ventures without that person's consent, the government also charged:

property taxes

excise taxes

sales taxes

You don't think there were any handouts in the 19th century? By 1870, every state had "free" public education. Is that not taking someone else's property and handing it out to someone else?

Jeff Wigand wrote:

buffet rule not wrote:

which part about there not being any redistribution of wealth in 1800 did you not understand? it's not complicated. tariff revenue was used to run the government (eg, maintain a military, a pony express, a treasury, etc). would you care to identify which social programs existed in 1800 that gave away handouts to people for doing nothing?

If I'm bringing in commercial goods into the US c. 1800, the government took away a portion of my property and redistributed as they saw fit. Redistribute means to distribute again. The government confiscated my property and did with it what it saw fit.

this really isn't complicated. to REDISTRIBUTE, there has to be someone on the other end getting the property. if the government taxes me (ie, takes money from me) and then uses the money to pay for a military, there's no REDISTRIBUTION. however, if the government instead takes my money and gives it to someone else in the form of food stamps, voila, there is a REDISTRIBUTION. perhaps if you take a deep breath this rather simple concept will start to sink in?

Jeff Wigand wrote:

By the way, in addition to taking people's money on imported goods and spending it on ventures without that person's consent, the government also charged:

property taxes

excise taxes

sales taxes

You don't think there were any handouts in the 19th century? By 1870, every state had "free" public education. Is that not taking someone else's property and handing it out to someone else?

um, no. everything the government does isn't a redistribution of wealth. when the government builds a bridge, it's not "redistributing" wealth even though some people who will use it didn't pay anything for it. same thing with a school that the government builds and maintains for everyone in a town/county/state to use. those are projects/services that EVERYONE can access. why are you having such a difficult time differentiating between those aspects of a government and the pernicious ones that actually are a redistribution of wealth (eg, social security, medicaid, food stamps, welfare, etc)? again, this really shouldn't be that difficult to master. what's your issue?

buffet rule not wrote:

this really isn't complicated. to REDISTRIBUTE, there has to be someone on the other end getting the property. if the government taxes me (ie, takes money from me) and then uses the money to pay for a military, there's no REDISTRIBUTION.

How? They took my money and gave it to the military. That's redistribution.

i'm done trying to explain this to you. what level of education have you completed?

buffet rule not wrote:

um, no. everything the government does isn't a redistribution of wealth. when the government builds a bridge, it's not "redistributing" wealth even though some people who will use it didn't pay anything for it. same thing with a school that the government builds and maintains for everyone in a town/county/state to use. those are projects/services that EVERYONE can access.

Like single payer health care?

buffet rule not wrote:

why are you having such a difficult time differentiating between those aspects of a government and the pernicious ones that actually are a redistribution of wealth (eg, social security, medicaid, food stamps, welfare, etc)? again, this really shouldn't be that difficult to master. what's your issue?

Redistribution is taking one entity's property and redistributing it to another. They might distribute my property to the poor in the form of food stamps, or to Lockheed Martin for an F-22. The government is taking my property and deciding what to do with it.

buffet rule not wrote:

i'm done trying to explain this to you. what level of education have you completed?

I don't know what the issue is.

redistribution means: To distribute something again or differently

It does not necessarily mean to give to the poor.

that would be more expensive wrote:

haha YO (super cereal) wrote:

more expensive than if you took a job at a grocery store and joined a group plan?

No. That's not what I said.

More expensive compared to paying medical costs out of pocket. If insuring me is very profitable to the insurance company, that means I'm paying the insurance company more than the cost of the medical services. If I just skipped the insurance and paid cash, I would be paying less.

Well then i guess youre of the belief that you should never buy insurance because your premium payments will be a waste of money if you never get injured.

Blowing.Rock Master wrote:

Reducing government regulation combined with tax credits to buy insurance would solve the problem for most people.

I've heard this before, but I don't think enough people are smart enough or forward thinking enough to use the money saved from tax deductions to buy health insurance. I could easily see people spending it on stuff they don't need instead of health care plan, and then when times get tough, there they are in the ER again for something that could have been prevented, and we have no way of stopping them from sticking the bill to everyone else.

haha yo (super cereal) wrote:

Well then i guess youre of the belief that you should never buy insurance because your premium payments will be a waste of money if you never get injured.

You don't seem to be reading my posts before responding. I didn't say anything about never getting injured. My point is that if your idea is very profitable for the insurance company, the average customer is spending a lot of extra money. This is true regardless of the number of injuries I suffer. It could mean paying $1,000 per year and needing $0 per year of treatment. It could be paying $2 million per year and needing $1 million per year of treatment. If I am very profitable to the insurance company, I am paying a lot more than I need to.

I'm fine with paying some premium to eliminate risk, but there is a limit. I'm fine with providing the insurance company with some profit, but if my policy is very profitable, I'd be better off to just pay my bills out of pocket.

It seems like your mommy pays your bills anyway, so the whole idea doesn't make sense for you. As long as you've got your metaphorical lips on your mom's metaphorical titties, you've got no need for insurance.

What would be your limit on what you'd pay for monthly premiums?

If I choose not to work a real job because I'm fortunate enough to have money, why can't I get an individual plan? Because as my COBRA Was running out, I was seeing too many docs for running injuries. This information which was accessible to the underwriters led to them rejecting me from buying individual insurance

PS - My mommy doesn't pay my bills. But it's not like i can easily afford a 4000 MRI for pelvic stress fx, at least not without withdrawing from my tax deferred Vanguard.com accounts and then paying all kinds of fees and penalties.

I guess you're right that it most likely won't be so profitable for insurance companies. If We distance runners took advantage of every micro injury we ever got including getting massages paid for in full for a simple calf strain, it'd be an awesome deal and a shitty one for insurance. I'm just saying in the extreme example that you get a stress fx and they want to do MRIs or you need surgery, you do Not want to have to Self pay for that out of pocket. Even calcium and vitamin D blood tests I had to pay out of pocket.

not having health insurance can still wreak havoc on financial situations of even those in the top percentiles ncome in US.