As Salvatore LoGrande fought cancer and all the pain that came with it, his daughters promised to keep him in the white, pitched roof house he worked so hard to buy all those decades ago.
So, Sandy LoGrande thought it was a mistake when, a year after her father’s death, Massachusetts billed her $177,000 for her father’s Medicaid expenses and threatened to sue for his home if she didn’t pay up quickly.
“The home was everything,” to her father said LoGrande, 57.
But the bill and accompanying threat weren’t a mistake.
Rather, it was part of a routine process the federal government requires of every state: to recover money from the assets of dead people who, in their final years, relied on Medicaid, the taxpayer-funded health insurance for the poorest Americans.
This month, a Democratic lawmaker proposed scuttling the “cruel” program altogether. Critics argue the program collects too little — roughly 1% — of the more than $150 billion Medicaid spends yearly on long-term care. They also say many states fail to warn people who sign up for Medicaid that big bills and claims to their property might await their families once they die.
I don’t see why this is so outrageous. Why should someone with tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of assets receive free medical care?
Because we pay taxes our entire fucking lives to still have EXTRA stolen from us for “healthcare.”
EVERY OTHER MAJOR DEVELOPED COUNTRY HAS SINGLE PAYER.
Why are you people so fucking shortsighted and fucking selfish? You’re enabling the Republican thieves to bleed us dry because you aspire to be as greedy as they are. Absolutely insane.
Socialized health care was first instituted by Otto von Bismark in 1883.
It’s going on 141 years strong in Germany to this day, surviving two world wars and the cold war.
Anyone who tells you health care isnt feasible is lying to you. Anyone who says it’s too expensive for the country is spreading misinformation, at best, and is a useful idiot who swallowed shareholder propaganda. Disinformation at worst, as they probably own said shares, and volunteer their time to deny old ladies cancer treatment while taking a break from suffacating service puppies.
Insurance, is singularly the only industry that benefits the most the larger it gets, it’s literally the founding premise of insurance. Literally. Any insurance that isn’t national is less effective and more costly to the consumer, end of story. There is no debating it, that’s HOW it works, if you think otherwise, youve swallowed someone else’s Kool-aid.
All insurance should be nationalized. All of it.
Insurance is designed to give people peace of mind against life’s many what-ifs.
What if my house burns down? It’s not likely but I have insurance to cover the cost of rebuilding it and replacing my stuff. What if get into a car crash? It’s not likely, but I have insurance to cover the cost of repairing or replacing my car and (depending on fault) the other vehicles involved in the crash. What if I need medical care? This is not something that insurance is really designed to handle, and the entire American health care system has twisted itself around this fucked up premise. We don’t need to nationalize health insurance, we need to abandon the idea that going to the doctor for routine care is something that you need insurance to pay for.
- A house is not an asset if it’s the one place you can live cost-free in retirement.
- We all pay into the system with our taxes - including someone who earned enough to afford a home. Why should anyone not benefit from the taxes they paid?
- Anyone can be sick and in long-term care as they age, including ourselves. As we age, we may not be able to keep working. Those costs add up fast in our healthcare system. And we don’t get to make those choices up front for ourselves or our families. The bills come months if not years later. No one says what you owe until it’s too late. Why should anyone pay a cost they weren’t told would be coming?
I can’t argue that the way the US provides many services based off wealth is fair - I believe we should have a universal system that we all benefit from. Why should someone making less than me get better services than me because my job offers worse insurance than they get? We should all benefit.
But, if the choice is that no one benefits or that of our current system. I’ll choose our current system. Because I don’t know if I’ll be the one on the other side 40 years from now.
