NYT : Insurance premiums could spike as much as 40 percent next year

[TexasTowelie]

25. Oh geez.

In the past month there were three times that I would have gone to the doctor/hospital if I was a hypochondriac. How can M4A come up with a budget if there were 330 million hypochondriacs? The fact that people do have to pay something to receive care keeps the system sustainable for people that have a legitimate need rather than for someone like me who needed some Pepto-Bismol because I ate something that disagreed with my digestive tract. Government (and M4A) is not our Savior.

If I am bleeding, was in severe pain, or had a severe infection, then yes I will seek medical care. If the cure for my "ailment" can be found by opening the medicine cabinet to take some Tylenol or ibuprofen, or by bandaging my own wounds then I've been saving the health care system tremendously for over five decades. Despite all the studies that were made about the cost for M4A, none of them could really account for the increased utilization that would occur if people could get something "for free." Since nobody can really project how much the increased utilization is, any budgetary figures are meaningless. While you might be willing to pay more taxes for health care (with unlimited services), most of the population isn't.