[Moonliner]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

I don't know. If you don't run a business at a profit, you run a business at a deficit. The government would not try to turn a profit, per se (and very, very quick research showed profit margins of HMOs from 2.1% to 4.2% - not high by any stretch of the imagination....sometimes their profits are reported as a "profit increase of 50%", but if you are making a 2.1% profit margin and increase it by 50%, it's still only a 3.1% profit margin), and based on the profit margins I've found for HMOs (again, very quick research), that doesn't allow for a whole lot of cost reduction to the consumer to run at 0%. Consider the propensity of government to be bloated and wasteful, I would guess they would run at a HUGE deficit, constantly increasing the cost through taxation to the consumer. As I believe we are ridiculously overtaxed as it is, that to me doesn't sound appealing. To avoid running at a deficit or increasing taxes, this means care would have to be rationed, and my guess is that it would very shortly be worse than anything the private sector is doing now.

Are either of the candidates proposing socialized health care? I think both plans still involve the use of HMO's. It's just a question of how you can reduce the cost of them to the point where everyone (or almost everyone) can afford them.