The Best of Captain Capitalism - Can't Afford Health Care Insurance? THEN DON'T BUY IT!

This was a little ingenius idea I had. Instead of paying health insurance, why not take the money instead and pay down your house with it. Then if an emergency ever occured you could pull out the money from your house and pay for your medical bills. Of course, that would require people to break their addiction to home equity loans, but the idea has merit.

OK, stupid check here people.

I'm mightily sick and tired of hearing about how health care is becoming so expensive.

How you can't afford it for "you and your 4 children" that you apparently gave little thought about while you were schtooping in the back of a Camaro at the age of 20 without a condom.

How you are an "old" person and didn't know that it would cost this much, that health care costs just snuck up on you and you thought that everything would be magically hunky dory and be taken care of if you could only live to 65.

Time to bitch slap you SOB's upside the head with a little adult and economics reality.

OK, ONCE AGAIN HERE PEOPLE, the simple Economics 101 lesson of supply and demand;

You see, there is only a certain amount of resources in this country to provide health care. This is denoted by the supply curve (S1)

When you have an entire generation of Baby Boomers entering Old Fart age and they've voted in programs like Medicare and Medicaid that effectively make health care free, thereby breaking the association of having to pay for what you consume SURPRISE SURPRISE, DEMAND FOR MEDICAL SERVICES GO UP! This is denoted by D1 moving to D2.

The result is not only an increase in the quantity of medical services provided (now consuming 15% of GDP), but also an increase in the price of medical services, denoted as P1 to P2.



Now, brainwashed dolts who watched waaaay too many after school specials and never had the slightest bit of strife in their lives, and therefore never bother to look ahead and have a contingency plan for the future will no doubt take a break from their candle light vigil to come in and say, "Why, that's so mean! How can you be so cruel to your elders!?"

Well because;

1. Our elders (Baby Boomers mind you) have fumbled the ball with the fiscal austerity and financial planning (or lack thereof) of the country's financial future.

2. It just so happens to be true that the old farts consume the vast majority of medical services. Not that this is necessarily their fault, mind you. As you enter Old Fart age your body poops out, breaks down and naturally needs more medical attention. Regardless Old Farts consume the majority of medical services, even though they don't make up the majority of the population.


I further simplified this chart for all you public school educated kids out there.


Now, what gets me and why I'm in a particularly irate mood today is how people fail to make the connection between the aging of Americans and the increasing costs of health care. They somehow think the cost of health care is going up universally for everybody.

No, that's just the insurance.

You see, if you are younger when you pay for health insurance it doesn't go to help you out. It goes to help subsidize the costs the old farts are putting on the system (and this says nothing about the manditory taxes you must pay for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security). Seriously, think about it, do you really consume $400 a month in health care services? I'm a healthy 30 year old that runs and eats right and doesn't smoke. I'm told full coverage would be $385/month. that's an X-Box 360 EACH MONTH! In short, on the average it would be waaay cheaper for you to just pay cash.

"But what if something bad happens? Like an emergency!? I need health care."

Oh you stupid freaking Americans.

For there is another way to insure yourself;

Your house.

"My house?" you say.

Yes, your house.

You see, why pay $400, $500, even $700 a month for health insurance for you and your children are not likely to use (and will inevitably just go to Old Farts anyway) when you can throw that money into your house. This will built up equity in your house on top of any appreciation in the value of your house. Then, in the unfortunate and unlikely event you have an emergency like an appendix needs to be removed or surgery, you can take out a home equity loan to pay for it.

This has many advantages;

1. By making additional principal payments on your house you will save yourself a large amount of interest expense in the future.
2. Your health insurance payments are no longer wasted. You no longer subsidize the insurance and health care of old people, you only pay for the medical services you use. Furthermore, you do not pay for the mark up in health care costs that the insurance companies tack on to pay for their employees and operations.
3. You can afford the most expensive surgeries should the unfortunate happen.

Of course, this requires a bit of financial maturity on your part. Alas I think Americans are tapped out of financial maturity. For they'll take out a home equity loan to pay for an SUV. They'll rack up credit card debt to pay for what ultimately amounts to crap and then consolidate it with a home equity loan. They'll take out a home equity loan to pay for a vacation or their childrens' worthless college education in communications. They'll squeeze every freaking penny of equity out of that house so you can afford that new TV and entertainment system.

But will they take a home equity loan out for health care costs???

Oh, no! They'd rather be the bitch of the health insurance industry forking out $400 a month so they can have that new plasma TV.

I just don't want to hear them complain about the cost of health insurance increasing when they do.