Over and over again we hear that one of the biggest issues facing the United States today is the lack of healthcare being provided to the American people. Today, there are approximately 40 million people in the United States who are without jobs and health care. Considering our neighbor, Canada, and other highly industrialized countries in Europe provide their citizens with a Universal Healthcare System, based on one insurance provider, the question is: would a Universal Healthcare system benefit the United States? What about those who are healthy? Should they have to carry the unhealthy? Do Baby Boomers who are weighing heavily on our healthcare system deserve the coverage they are entitled to receive? Below are some of the pros and cons as to why this may or may not be a good idea for the United States.
It is 2009. Did you know that in the US, health care premiums continue to grow at several times the rate of inflation? Many businesses are simply choosing not to offer a health plan. Or, if they do, they pass on more of the cost to their employees. Right now businesses and individuals who choose to keep their health plans have to pay a higher premiums. Health care is actually preventing the country from making a robust economic recovery because the more money citizens spend on these premiums, the less money they spend on rent, food, and consumer goods.
Let’s take into consideration the people who take care of themselves and are healthy? Should they be burdened with the health care costs for those who have brought about illness due to smoking or obesity? Universal health care means the costs will be spread among all Americans, regardless of individual health or need for medical care. This seems to be fundamentally unfair. However, with a universal healthcare system, patients can focus on preventive treatments instead of re-active treatments. They would be able to have more regular check-ups which could enable them to prevent diseases. In the long run, this could lower costs for the entire country.
Members of the post-World War II era, those born between 1945 and 1965, are the “baby boomers.” Baby Boomers represent the largest group of health care consumers in the country. This group is taxing the American health care system like none before because of raised expectations of health care providers and the sheer magnitude of their numbers. The impact of this group becomes even more daunting when one considers the fact that over 60% of working adults between the ages of 50 and 64 have been diagnosed with at least one chronic disease such as arthritis, cancer, or diabetes.
According to recent reports over 20% of the baby boomer’s have no, or inadequate, health insurance. A large majority, approximately 70%, would like to start to receive Medicare before the age of 65. However, Medicare is currently at the breaking point with many physicians limiting or refusing to take on new Medicare patients due to confusion over the amount of reimbursement by the Medicare system. As it is right now, Medicare is a barely effective mechanism to ensure health care for elderly citizens, and it is likely to be broken by the hordes of baby boomers just now becoming age eligible for participation.
This dilemma becomes even more frightening when coupled with the problems already facing the Medicare system due to the current economic climate. Many of the Baby Boomer’s who are just reaching retirement age no longer have the savings they had 12 months ago because of the recent market collapse. Since the past 12 years of financial gains have been erased in the last 12 months of financial collapse, many Boomer’s simply will not have the money or resources to afford full coverage for health care. All of these factors combine to create the perfect storm of an already battered healthcare system attempting to take on the largest generational population in American history. This is happening at the same time said generation’s wealth and retirement accounts are being depleted to the point that many are now facing a very different reality than they envisioned only 12 months ago.
Another important factor of a universal healthcare system is the systematic record keeping operation for the entire country. Many people spend limitless time filling out their insurance information, medical history, etc every time they see a doctor. In fact, most doctors’ offices tend to maintain separate record-keeping systems. If there was a universal system, every doctor would be able to view a patient’s past records and be able to make a more accurate diagnosis. The one main argument against this database is a privacy issue. Certain insurance providers might deny coverage based on past medical problems. However, if the government is paying for everything, then the record- keeping should never be a problem. This type of data would also assist in liability issues allowing doctors to have total access to a patient’s history. It could also be a tool used by collaborative doctors in order to provide correct and most efficient care for patients. Think of a universal data base as infrastructure. We not only need traditional infrastructure projects such as roads, water, and communication systems, but we must build future infrastructure needs around technology.
A universal healthcare plan would allow us to build one centralized system, where there would be no need for maintaining insurance information or wasting time submitting claims. This would also give doctors more time to actually heal patients rather than worry about insurance procedures or malpractice liability. Doctors currently are taking classes to simply understand all of the insurance plans out there. They are often restricted by insurance practices, such as, what tests are allowed to be ordered. Doctors now must practice defensive medicine to avoid getting sued. Under a simplified universal health system doctors, nurses, and other medical professions would be allowed to simply focus on doing what’s best for the patient.
On the flip side, a universal health care system may not necessarily be beneficial for the United States. Even though the government may say that it is “free healthcare”, we know that nothing in this world is free and the government will have to pay for this healthcare somehow. What good would it do to wipe out a few hundred dollars of monthly health insurance premiums if that means our taxes go up by that much more? Another issue is if the government pays for everything under one plan, a person could, in theory, go to any doctor. However, some controls are going to have to be in place in order to keep costs from exploding. For example, would “elective” surgeries such as breast implants,and Lasik eye surgery be covered too? Although most of these procedures are not necessities it will be important to note who decides what is elective and what is required? People usually get breast reductions due to back problems, people get hysterectomies for fibroid problems, and some people get their nose fixed due to a septum problem caused by an accident. The universal system in Canada forces patients to wait over 6 months for a routine pap smear. Canadian residents often will come to the United States or offer additional money to get the health care they need.
Clearly, something needs to be done to rectify this problem or we will be left with a generation without access to healthcare at the time in their lives when they need it most. A generation that no longer has the resources to provide adequate health care for itself is calling for help. This generation is the victim of an economic storm that is unprecedented in the last eight decades. Perhaps now is the time to drastically overhaul our outdated healthcare system and replace it with nationalized health care, the likes of which is provided in every other first world industrialized nation . This impending crisis may just provide the pressure that we need to look in the mirror and ask the question: why are we the only wealthy nation in the world that does not ensure that all of our citizens have access to adequate health care?
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Saturday, February 21, 2009
9/11 and Michael Corleone
A Glance at Financial Terrorism
A quick glance at the list of the top wealthy, successful and influential political and economic figures in the world reveals that a disproportionate number of people on the list attended one of the top universities in the United States. These academic institutions are training students on the US’s economic and business systems to provide them with knowledge to become the “captains of industry” and the “titans of Wall Street” in the future. The knowledge of our economy is readily available to those who attend these universities. On the flip side, this information is also available to those who wish to take this same knowledge and use it for much more devious ends.
What is stopping those who wish to destroy the proverbial “western societies” from gaining this same knowledge? What if this knowledge, coupled with the access to resources, was being used to damage the economy in a form of “economic terrorism?” What if the overriding desire to see western nations fail is stronger than a personal desire to acquire wealth? This is bone chilling knowledge particularly if those who might desire to see an end to western dominance have large amounts of capital and resources that are not tied into the performance of financial markets.
It is possible to take the information that we disseminate freely –available at all top universities-and use that knowledge to work against our economic structure. It is the belief of our nation that with hard work and a good education (at a top school) anyone can achieve greatness in our society. This dream is in theory open to anyone who is willing to put in the time and has the resources to accomplish it. This actualization is immortalized by the media and entertainment world. Perhaps no piece of art personifies this more so than Francis Ford Copula’s film, “The Godfather.” “The Godfather” tells the story of an American family (The Corleone’s) and their dream of success for their son, Michael. Peel away the crime, drama, and extravagance of the film and the story boils down to Vito, striving to provide a better life for his son Michael. It is Vito’s dream for Michael to attend one of our elite universities (Dartmouth) and become an influencer in the corporate world. If you cannot take down a power through sheer might and force, what better way to ensure your ends than to facilitate the crumbling of a society from within by turning its own knowledge against it?
The keys to the economy are in essence up for grabs by the most ambitious among us. However, the same people who are attaining the knowledge may also negatively influence the economic systems of the United States. Not to mention the foreign markets who do not have to follow the same rules as the US. Those are self-regulated markets, unlike the US market, which has been “babysat”by the SEC who dictates its every move. Are there enough bandwidth and resources in the US, with agencies such as the SEC regulating and legislation systems such as the Patriot Act and Anti Money Laundering (AML), to track all of the foreign activities? Are we dependent on our banks to report this activity and if so, then to whom ?
This situation is a parallel to 9/11. Instead of bringing down buildings, economic terrorists may be bringing down the financial system.
A quick glance at the list of the top wealthy, successful and influential political and economic figures in the world reveals that a disproportionate number of people on the list attended one of the top universities in the United States. These academic institutions are training students on the US’s economic and business systems to provide them with knowledge to become the “captains of industry” and the “titans of Wall Street” in the future. The knowledge of our economy is readily available to those who attend these universities. On the flip side, this information is also available to those who wish to take this same knowledge and use it for much more devious ends.
What is stopping those who wish to destroy the proverbial “western societies” from gaining this same knowledge? What if this knowledge, coupled with the access to resources, was being used to damage the economy in a form of “economic terrorism?” What if the overriding desire to see western nations fail is stronger than a personal desire to acquire wealth? This is bone chilling knowledge particularly if those who might desire to see an end to western dominance have large amounts of capital and resources that are not tied into the performance of financial markets.
It is possible to take the information that we disseminate freely –available at all top universities-and use that knowledge to work against our economic structure. It is the belief of our nation that with hard work and a good education (at a top school) anyone can achieve greatness in our society. This dream is in theory open to anyone who is willing to put in the time and has the resources to accomplish it. This actualization is immortalized by the media and entertainment world. Perhaps no piece of art personifies this more so than Francis Ford Copula’s film, “The Godfather.” “The Godfather” tells the story of an American family (The Corleone’s) and their dream of success for their son, Michael. Peel away the crime, drama, and extravagance of the film and the story boils down to Vito, striving to provide a better life for his son Michael. It is Vito’s dream for Michael to attend one of our elite universities (Dartmouth) and become an influencer in the corporate world. If you cannot take down a power through sheer might and force, what better way to ensure your ends than to facilitate the crumbling of a society from within by turning its own knowledge against it?
The keys to the economy are in essence up for grabs by the most ambitious among us. However, the same people who are attaining the knowledge may also negatively influence the economic systems of the United States. Not to mention the foreign markets who do not have to follow the same rules as the US. Those are self-regulated markets, unlike the US market, which has been “babysat”by the SEC who dictates its every move. Are there enough bandwidth and resources in the US, with agencies such as the SEC regulating and legislation systems such as the Patriot Act and Anti Money Laundering (AML), to track all of the foreign activities? Are we dependent on our banks to report this activity and if so, then to whom ?
This situation is a parallel to 9/11. Instead of bringing down buildings, economic terrorists may be bringing down the financial system.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
What happened to our net worth?
From Assets to Liability: Are the Boomers now a burden on our government?
What happened?
How did the most monitored, tracked and watched generation go from the government’s and country’s largest asset base to being on the verge of becoming the greatest liability the nation will have? This is the same generation who from the time they were born has participated in so many changes in our society. From birth through what is now viewed as retirement, this generation has followed paths of investment and asset accumulation recommended by various administrations and financial institutions. Now, as they approach retirement, their savings and assets have been wiped out. They are now faced with decisions on how they will live out the remainder of their years with some dignity.
Unlike their parents, “the Greatest Generation”, the boomers, or “the ‘B” Generation (do they want to carry the moniker of baby?) is facing financial disaster. True, the greatest generation faced the Great Depression and then the Second World War. However, they were in their early 20’s when these events happened and they had time to recover. How much more resilient are you at 20 than you are at 60? So the boomers, who grew up with their parents migrating to the suburbs, followed in the same tradition. They first saw a home as a home, then as an investment. They purchased homes when prices were reasonable and had the appropriate credit checks done prior to purchase. They paid their debt and were rewarded with a decline in housing values.
Change is the buzz word of today. And yes, the boomers were the generation of change. Change was clearly the boomers mantra. After all it is this generation that gave the world Woodstock, Watergate, Sexual Revolution and Civil Rights. Now boomers have been handed an economic crisis that threatens whatever prosperity they have earned. Due to reasons yet not understood, they want for the information explaining “why aren’t we doing better?” This generation resisted the Vietnam War, demanded change after Watergate, and invested in 401ks because they were told it would ensure their financial security. This same generation now wants, no needs, to exert its force once again to get back the standard of living it earned.
Once the dust settled and the boomers got through sewing their wild oats, they went to work. They worked in the financial industry, in the fields, in the factories. They paid their taxes. The taxes they paid went into government and local programs, to support the current and future generations. These taxes they paid have long been allocated and spent. They financed Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and a slew of other entitlement programs meant to promote socio economic equality. More important it was these taxes that became the financing vehicle enabling economic equality. The government warned the boomers that social security was not enough. That government encouraged savings first through IRAs, then 401Ks, then a multitude of programs encouraging personal responsibility in order to reduce retirement liability. Companies were built around this wealth accumulation. In fact, some even had the audacity to call them” wealth accumulation programs”. Money was handed over to firms, and portfolio and money managers bloomed. But did it help boomers achieve their goal of financial security?
The boomers continued to work accumulating funds to offset the high cost of education for their children. Having been warned that their children would not live as well as they did, the boomers responded. The boomers responded strongly by making sure their children did in fact live a better life. They did this by working hard and saving through it all.
As this wealth was being accumulated, the boomers stayed in the work force. As health care costs sky rocketed, boomers remained on the job for benefits. After all, there were very few alternatives to medical coverage other than employer supported programs. Even these benefits dwindled in time. Employee contributions increased and companies cut back on benefits, yet this still remained the best alternative to health care. After all, the job insured the boomers some sort of benefit coverage. Sometimes the goal was to work until they reached Medicare eligibility in order to have continuous coverage.
So the boomers worked diligently through national crises after crises: Savings and Loan failures, runaway interest rates, defense spending, and wars. The boomers fought so hard to remind a nation of past failures, yet kept working and saving.In the end the boomers prepared for retirement. They saved for their sunset years and prepared to cash out over time. Their houses had theoretically increased in value and the money was “safe” in the banks.
Then it happened, the crash or the financial meltdown of 2008/09. Now had their ‘wealth “ disappeared? More importantly, what will happen going forward? The government talked of stimulus packages, but a couple of hundred dollars per individual could not make up the devaluation of each individual. What will be the government’s or society’s responsibility to this segment of the population? Ours is not a society that prepares for the keep of their seniors. In fact, over the past 65 years, this group has been told numerous times to prepare themselves for their senior years.
How can you prepare? How do you take matters into your own hands? How do you recover any of the lost wealth? These are questions that the boomers have got to start answering now. The generations that followed the boomers, X's or Y's, do not have the boomers in their site. They are preoccupied with their own issues. They are starting to feel the effects of the boomers’ deflated wealth in as much as grandchildren aren’t going to get the same rewards their own parents got from the boomers. Yes, the Babies r Us will survive, but the amount of disposable income will get less.
So what is the next move? Clearly the changing financial environment is starting to tell the boomers that it’s time to take their life into their own hands. They have to do their own planning. To date, the planning that has been done by the government and financial world has taken them down a path of possible disaster. This disaster is looming on an individual basis as well as at a society level. What programs are in front of the current group of legislature? Will these programs “insure” the generation that has supported this country through 40 plus years of work and taxes or will this government wait until it’s too late and the senior citizens are pushed aside and eventually become a liability to a new working class? Will this liability be such that social and financial programs will not be supported by the “me generation”? What happens then? Picture this, instead of 20- somethings standing on food and shelter lines as in the 30’s, we could have a much older group repeating this process. Their endurance will be far less than the “greatest generation”, and as a result, there could be a collapse of family and organization structures . So many questions are on the horizon for the boomers. Although well educated and instrumental in creating the culture that has become America, will it be too late to recover their financial wealth, homes, jobs, and health care? Or is it just too late and will they be put out to pasture?
What happened?
How did the most monitored, tracked and watched generation go from the government’s and country’s largest asset base to being on the verge of becoming the greatest liability the nation will have? This is the same generation who from the time they were born has participated in so many changes in our society. From birth through what is now viewed as retirement, this generation has followed paths of investment and asset accumulation recommended by various administrations and financial institutions. Now, as they approach retirement, their savings and assets have been wiped out. They are now faced with decisions on how they will live out the remainder of their years with some dignity.
Unlike their parents, “the Greatest Generation”, the boomers, or “the ‘B” Generation (do they want to carry the moniker of baby?) is facing financial disaster. True, the greatest generation faced the Great Depression and then the Second World War. However, they were in their early 20’s when these events happened and they had time to recover. How much more resilient are you at 20 than you are at 60? So the boomers, who grew up with their parents migrating to the suburbs, followed in the same tradition. They first saw a home as a home, then as an investment. They purchased homes when prices were reasonable and had the appropriate credit checks done prior to purchase. They paid their debt and were rewarded with a decline in housing values.
Change is the buzz word of today. And yes, the boomers were the generation of change. Change was clearly the boomers mantra. After all it is this generation that gave the world Woodstock, Watergate, Sexual Revolution and Civil Rights. Now boomers have been handed an economic crisis that threatens whatever prosperity they have earned. Due to reasons yet not understood, they want for the information explaining “why aren’t we doing better?” This generation resisted the Vietnam War, demanded change after Watergate, and invested in 401ks because they were told it would ensure their financial security. This same generation now wants, no needs, to exert its force once again to get back the standard of living it earned.
Once the dust settled and the boomers got through sewing their wild oats, they went to work. They worked in the financial industry, in the fields, in the factories. They paid their taxes. The taxes they paid went into government and local programs, to support the current and future generations. These taxes they paid have long been allocated and spent. They financed Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and a slew of other entitlement programs meant to promote socio economic equality. More important it was these taxes that became the financing vehicle enabling economic equality. The government warned the boomers that social security was not enough. That government encouraged savings first through IRAs, then 401Ks, then a multitude of programs encouraging personal responsibility in order to reduce retirement liability. Companies were built around this wealth accumulation. In fact, some even had the audacity to call them” wealth accumulation programs”. Money was handed over to firms, and portfolio and money managers bloomed. But did it help boomers achieve their goal of financial security?
The boomers continued to work accumulating funds to offset the high cost of education for their children. Having been warned that their children would not live as well as they did, the boomers responded. The boomers responded strongly by making sure their children did in fact live a better life. They did this by working hard and saving through it all.
As this wealth was being accumulated, the boomers stayed in the work force. As health care costs sky rocketed, boomers remained on the job for benefits. After all, there were very few alternatives to medical coverage other than employer supported programs. Even these benefits dwindled in time. Employee contributions increased and companies cut back on benefits, yet this still remained the best alternative to health care. After all, the job insured the boomers some sort of benefit coverage. Sometimes the goal was to work until they reached Medicare eligibility in order to have continuous coverage.
So the boomers worked diligently through national crises after crises: Savings and Loan failures, runaway interest rates, defense spending, and wars. The boomers fought so hard to remind a nation of past failures, yet kept working and saving.In the end the boomers prepared for retirement. They saved for their sunset years and prepared to cash out over time. Their houses had theoretically increased in value and the money was “safe” in the banks.
Then it happened, the crash or the financial meltdown of 2008/09. Now had their ‘wealth “ disappeared? More importantly, what will happen going forward? The government talked of stimulus packages, but a couple of hundred dollars per individual could not make up the devaluation of each individual. What will be the government’s or society’s responsibility to this segment of the population? Ours is not a society that prepares for the keep of their seniors. In fact, over the past 65 years, this group has been told numerous times to prepare themselves for their senior years.
How can you prepare? How do you take matters into your own hands? How do you recover any of the lost wealth? These are questions that the boomers have got to start answering now. The generations that followed the boomers, X's or Y's, do not have the boomers in their site. They are preoccupied with their own issues. They are starting to feel the effects of the boomers’ deflated wealth in as much as grandchildren aren’t going to get the same rewards their own parents got from the boomers. Yes, the Babies r Us will survive, but the amount of disposable income will get less.
So what is the next move? Clearly the changing financial environment is starting to tell the boomers that it’s time to take their life into their own hands. They have to do their own planning. To date, the planning that has been done by the government and financial world has taken them down a path of possible disaster. This disaster is looming on an individual basis as well as at a society level. What programs are in front of the current group of legislature? Will these programs “insure” the generation that has supported this country through 40 plus years of work and taxes or will this government wait until it’s too late and the senior citizens are pushed aside and eventually become a liability to a new working class? Will this liability be such that social and financial programs will not be supported by the “me generation”? What happens then? Picture this, instead of 20- somethings standing on food and shelter lines as in the 30’s, we could have a much older group repeating this process. Their endurance will be far less than the “greatest generation”, and as a result, there could be a collapse of family and organization structures . So many questions are on the horizon for the boomers. Although well educated and instrumental in creating the culture that has become America, will it be too late to recover their financial wealth, homes, jobs, and health care? Or is it just too late and will they be put out to pasture?
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
We Were All Born Bankrupt - Now What?
Stay tuned for a new important document that will address how you can resuce your quality of life after being born bankrupt.
Discover what you are not thinking about the revelations in this white paper everyone needs to read.
Discover what you are not thinking about the revelations in this white paper everyone needs to read.
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