Comment Re:Fuck Obamacare (Score 1) 723
> I don't know why forcing everybody in the United States to buy managed healthcare plans would improve the situation at all.
It's not; it's more of a deal with the devil, if you will. Forcing people to buy insurance is mostly the corporate handout part of the bill, made in exchange for things like the insurance companies loosening pre-existing condition restrictions, etc. (Whether it's a good deal is certainly up for debate, but I don't think it was.)
As I mentioned above, hospitals must help people too poor to pay, and they loose a lot of money; by forcing people to buy insurance, they can get paid. And, of course, the insurance companies are paid too, because they ultimately change more than the cost (that's how insurance works). Because the poor get subsidies, it's mostly taxpayer money fueling that machine. Additionally, it forces young people to buy insurance which is a generally quite profitable area since problems in young people are generally much less frequent and expensive to treat.
At the end of the day, though, it doesn't really do anything to fix the anti-free-market effects that created the problems to begin with. It just cements the protection racket in place (particularly with the pervasive deductible plans): pay an insurance company or pay 3x the fair price when you see a doctor.