Yes. Medicare is a form of socialized healthcare, and in many ways it’s the most efficient in the country – it certainly is the most popular. That’s why for years people laugh at Tea Party signs demanding, “Keep the government out of my Medicare!” … the government IS Medicare! It astounds me that so many people who rage against government continue to be the very groups who benefit most from it.
Learn More: What it means to privatize Medicare, Social Security.
While we’re on the point of the importance of social programs adding the stability of nations: Social Security is also a socialist program. Yes, another “socialist” program that is loved by the emotionally-driven far right. And note: neither Medicare nor Social Security have destroyed the moral fabric of America or capitalism. They help capitalism and country, because good social programs create stability, and stability facilitates economic growth. Medicare is a socially-minded program – socialist – just like Social Security. The more the GOP pushes policy and rhetoric to privatize these programs – the less stable the economy will become. Privatizing either Medicare or Social Security will harm not only the programs, but will negatively impact the economic stability they help create.
I don’t like to give the impression that I’m one of those “old timers” who gets all riled up about the lack of education in this country… but I get riled up by the sad lack of education in this country – especially when it comes to anything political in the post-Obama era. Due to the fact that politics is a profit-driven business (especially in Republicanland), I’ll do my best to give leeway that one’s knowledge of facts is directly related to which media outlets they watch. It’s not your fault if all you watch is Fox News (everyone enjoys a pretty blonde), but you are a little lazy and therefore building your opinions on bad information. (Studies have shown that Fox viewers are worse informed than those who watch no news at all). At least some Fox viewers out there are searching online for, “is Medicare socialize healthcare” and seeking out the truth. In that there’s hope.
Cable news has done a very good job and muddying the waters on the “socialist programs” issue. We need to clarify Care vs. Insurance. Insurance is who pays (Medicare, Medicaid, Private insurance companies). Care is the actual care and services provided to the patient. Medicare is NOT the care. It’s poorly named. Medicare is the insurance payout that covers costs of health care services. All the hoopla about Obamacare from the extreme right wing intentionally blurred that distinction to make people scared that their doctors would all disappear. That’s not how the system works. Again: Medicare is who pays not the care itself, and the person who pays when you have Medicare coverage is the U.S. government.
Is Mediare Socialized Healthcare?
Yes. Medicare is socialized healthcare insofar as the U.S. Government pays the bill. Medicare is a mode of paying for healthcare costs by a single entity (i.e. a single payer system). The U.S. government pays for the costs out of a trust (simplified explanation) that all citizens pay into. The world’s largest insurance group. It’s the same fundamental model as Social Security: we all pay in, and when we need it later in life – we get it... SOCIAL security.
Medicare is a single payer program for those who qualify. In the name of repetition: Who is the single payer in Medicare? The U.S. Government – who the Tea Party wants out of their lives. Thusly we laugh and cry when we see Tea Party protest signs saying “Get the government out of my Medicare!” – the government IS Medicare, and privatizing it means forcing senior citizens to go back to private health insurance companies in hopes of getting coverage with a coupon.
The VA Compared To Medicare
We can learn from the major difference between the VA and Medicare. In the case of the VA, the US Government pays for the care and the VA has its own hospitals and doctors, whereas with Medicare, the U.S. Government acts as the health insurance provider (the entity that pays the bills) while the service – the care – is given by the private sector. The VA health system encounters all sorts of problems – not on the payment level – but on the services level: the hospitals and care givers.
We can learn from that: is the government good at guaranteeing payment for healthcare? Yes. People love Medicare. Is the U.S. Government good and providing health care: No. The VA backlog is a mess. The difference between who pays and who provides the service is important. One option works, one encounters many problems. So let us LEARN from that lesson. Medicare (single payer insurance) isn’t perfect, but it works, it’s efficient, and it keeps costs under control, whereas the VA (single-provider care) isn’t perfect and when confronted with too many patients it becomes overwhelmed. What does that teach us? Public should pay, and private should provide. Just like Medicare.
Back to required repetition: Medicare is a single payer program: socialized healthcare – but only for those who are qualified to receive it based on age. Similar to Canada, the UK, and pretty much every other post-industrialized nation in the Western World, but other countries offer it to all their citizens.
Are there restrictions? Yes. Medicare doesn’t cover everything — which leaves plenty of room for private health insurance providers to provide premium coverage and make loads of money. Why? Because the US healthcare system is the most expensive in the world — not because it’s good, but because it’s a total mess due to being based on private insurance, profit demands, and staying put at a single job so that group insurance rates becomes affordable. US healthcare is 35% more expensive than the next closest country (Norway) and for reference, more than TWICE as much as the United Kingdom. Why? Because the United States set up the business of whether or not people die based on profit. If hospitals don’t profit, they go out of business, and most hospitals are owned by publicly traded companies: they MUST show a profit or the stock plummets. The death panels of which Sarah Palin loved to preach are the board members of hospital conglomerates, not the government.
Americans love their socialized healthcare – so long as it’s called Medicare. The problem is most of us are too stupid to see through the marketing extravaganza against healthcare reform. Just like the gun lobby, the “health profit” lobby worked tirelessly to increase what all are companies are meant to: their profits. You CAN have very strong capitalism within a society that has a socialized healthcare system… but it can’t be all about profit for hospitals. Doctors still get paid, health insurance companies still sell their super-rich policies, they just don’t make quite as much money in that particular industry. They will have to diversify, and not be burdened by shareholder dividend demands.
Do you like your Medicare? Then that means you like socialized medicine. What the most progressive in the country want is “Medicare for all” which is a sinlge payer system (the government) for all citizens. Do you like Medicare? Then you should be fighting to make Obamacare stronger; a real single payer system, not merely public exchanges that have very little hope of reducing costs in any significant way. You need the government to have the same kind of buying power in healthcare as Walmart does for cleaning supplies – that’s the only way to get costs down and finally the quality of life of patients more important than profit of the health insurance companies
