We let them get away with it and it all started with the Smokers!

The minute we let Employers, and Insurers start treating smokers differently we screwed ourselves…..

A little preface.. I remember a time when auto insurance and health care insurance was not mandatory (imagine that)
I remember a time when I was working a low wage job and could still afford health insurance.

BOOM something happened.
All of a sudden healthcare went up, and up and up, coverage went down, and down and down. Then it started becoming mandatory.

Then the first people they targeted were smokers. Let me tell you I can’t stand smoke. Smoking killed my mom.
I still think what we all allowed to happen to smokers was planned. They started with something the public for the most part didn’t like.
It was almost too easy. They convinced everyone that smokers used up so much healthcare money (I actually never believed it, I think the biggest cost is from overweight/diabetes/heart issues etc.)

So now we have Covid, and the vaccines and the looming mandates. You see where this is going. It was a slippery slope.
Pretty soon it will be oh, you can’t drink soda or have this BMI or you don’t floss enough….because you cost “everyone” too much.
It will be never ending.

Now back to when insurance companies were affordable, yes it is possible. Just like right now they are trying to jab every single American and we don’t hear about cost!!!

you will own nothing and be happy
because
you will pay for insurance to cover it all.
Health insurance, car insurance, food insurance, home insurance.
Insurance will cover everything.

And the government will cover it all with single payer insurance.
You go to work and your entire paycheck goes to pay the insurance.

a reply to: JAGStorm

The cost to the tax payer never counts when it comes to transferring wealth from the public purse to the private sector.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Smokers did use up all the healthcare money, and they still are massive contributors. Not just because of lung cancer. Smoking actually
Can cause type 2 diabetes. It can cause high blood pressure, and other heart conditions.

Not to mention smokers on average tend to be less physically active, causes obesity.

Healthcare rates were also affected by the same thing any market is affected by...supply/demand.

Once the baby boomers got older, they began to overrun our healthcare infrastructure, which then needed massive upgrades. Which cost alot of $$. That cost was then passed on to us.

Then you have a huge culprit. Our culture here in the US. Ask anyone abroad and the stereotype of Americans is that we love to sue people. As time has gone on, our legal system has had a direct effect on healthcare costs.

Doctors are regularly sued into oblivion, causing malpractice and professional liability insurance to SKYROCKET.

That is actually the #1 contributor to our healthcare costs here in the US. Insurance. Doctors have to pay sometimes upwards of 75k a year in insurance.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Another nail in that coffin might be mandatory seat-belts. Seat-belts, a wise choice for everyone in a speeding car. But mandatory?

Insurance companies pushed that law along with helmets for motorcycle riders.
Safety they said, save lives they said. Balls I said.
Insurance companies could have just written into their standards that injury due to not wearing a seat belt would not be covered. Not wearing a helmet and sustaining head injuries would not be covered. Wouldn't that have worked ?

Or it all might be true. Our elected representatives in state and federal government wanted to help those citizens not smart enough to wear a seat-belt and wear a helmet. Mandate it by law.

I no longer ride a two wheeler so cannot report on motorcycle helmet habits. I do however drive and every time I get in the car now I buckle up without even thinking about it. And I was so pissed that they made me and infringed on my ''rights''...

a reply to: JAGStorm

I think this has a lot to do with the work-offered insurances. I'm starting to sway to the side that it's just not necessary to offer it at all via work, at least not anymore. This is something that is akin to auto insurance, but for the Hairless Monkey Meat Sack. If work does not need to provide an auto insurance option as commonplace as heath insurance for us (or better yet, homeowner/rental), then I'm not sold on them needing to offer health insurance anymore either.

All leaving healthcare in employer hands like this does is turn some of them into total I OWN YOU tyrants. The go-to claim is that employers meddling in private off-clock life choices leads to better health & better employee ROI, but does it? Since when is higher turn-over rates and a hostile workplace for not acquiescing "better"?

the disgusting photos put on cigarette packets here are a particularly loathsome tactic. i have my personal, image-free pack into which i decant cigs from each new packet i buy. i consider the images borderline obscene. by the logic employed with this ruse, all cars should have images of mangled corpses on them. sweets should have pictures of rotten teeth on them. food packaging should have pictures of morbidly obese people on it. et cetera et f***ing cetera.

it stinks.

originally posted by: RoScoLaz5
the disgusting photos put on cigarette packets here are a particularly loathsome tactic. i have my personal, image-free pack into which i decant cigs from each new packet i buy. i consider the images borderline obscene. by the logic employed with this ruse, all cars should have images of mangled corpses on them. sweets should have pictures of rotten teeth on them. food packaging should have pictures of morbidly obese people on it. et cetera et f***ing cetera.

it stinks.

I totally agree.
Solid point you raise Rosco.

originally posted by: RoScoLaz5
the disgusting photos put on cigarette packets here are a particularly loathsome tactic. i have my personal, image-free pack into which i decant cigs from each new packet i buy. i consider the images borderline obscene. by the logic employed with this ruse, all cars should have images of mangled corpses on them. sweets should have pictures of rotten teeth on them. food packaging should have pictures of morbidly obese people on it. et cetera et f***ing cetera.

it stinks.

Imagine Tammy from My 600lb life on a pack of donuts!!!

or.........

A photo of a horrible disease on birth control package.

MY GOD, what would be on a Taco Bell wrapper?!!!!

Sounds like you're for tort reform. Which would go a long way to sorting out the high malpractices insurance and the litigy associated with it.


a reply to: [post=26033081]Lucidparadox[/pos

a reply to: JAGStorm

Sin tax them damn smokers, that'll teach 'em. Yaaah! Taxes!

Now that that is out of the way.

The CEOs of 178 health care companies collectively made $3.2 billion during the coronavirus pandemic, which was 31% more than 2019, according to an Axios analysis of financial filings

www.axios.com...

It has always seemed to me, on an intuitive level, that multiple people who aren't medical professionals in any way whatsoever are allowed to rake off billions before a single aspirin or band-aide is dispensed is rather a waste of limited funds.

it all started
when you were convinced that
you are not smart enough
to manage your own life.

And ever since, you have been proving them right.
You can't manage your own health
You can't manage your own wealth
You can't manage your own spending
You can't manage your own personal risk and reward.

Have you figured it out yet?
No one else can either,
but they can get rich
if they can convince you they will.

a reply to: sraven

Sounds like Canada and Sweden, two of the highest taxed nations on earth. With the recent implementation of the carbon tax in Canada, you make a whole 17.2 cents of every dollar you earn, if you are in a median tax bracket of $40-$60k per year. BTW, this includes all of the taxes spread out as they might be used, excise taxes, duties, federal/provincial taxes, licenses, carbon taxes, sales taxes (PST/HST/GST) and all the other hidden taxes. I think Sweden is in the same range.

And this BS is coming to the US as well.

Cheers - Dave

Insurance companies and big pharma run things now. They are the 2 of the strongest lobbying forces right now, and who is pushing the globalist agenda

The smoking analogy is spot on JAG, good thread!

There is a hell of a lot of lung cancer now, and the majority of people do not smoke anymore. These people are getting lung cancer and never smoked. The problem with blaming all cancer on smoking is that the real reason is not found, they should have been researching other things instead of just saying that smoking caused so much cancer.

Precedence has already been set, now we are in trouble, they will find something in people's lives to raise prices up on healthcare or make them uninsurable. Pretty soon they will be using genetics to charge people extra money on insurance, which is wrong, because ninety five percent of the people never get the disease that have the genes. They were shown how to eat by their parents and grandparents, this info was passed on for many generations, a diet that protected those people from the disease. But now more people are ignoring that ancestral diet and people are winding up sick. To stay healthy most people cannot eat certain foods because they cannot properly metabolize it and get rid of the toxins.

Very few of the genetic diseases cannot be controled by diet.

Smokers should get paid 15% less than everyone else. They take breaks every hour. It's absurd it's allowed.

a reply to: JAGStorm

As an ex-smoker (I quit 13 years ago) and someone who can do simple math, I fully understand why insurance companies should increase rates for people who are willingly harming their bodies in ways that knowingly cause more health problems.

IMO, health insurance should be based on your health and health history alone. I literally go to the doctor for an annual check up and that's it, unless I need surgery or something drastic. I'm pretty sure that based on my own health and the fact that I have VA access, my private insurance would be absolutely minimal.

And we don't hear about the cost of jabbing everyone with a COVID shot because it's all taxpayer funded, and the out-of-sight-out-of-mind mentality kicks in when taxes pay for things.

a reply to: jjkenobi

That's a management issue.

originally posted by: RoScoLaz5
the disgusting photos put on cigarette packets here are a particularly loathsome tactic. i have my personal, image-free pack into which i decant cigs from each new packet i buy. i consider the images borderline obscene. by the logic employed with this ruse, all cars should have images of mangled corpses on them. sweets should have pictures of rotten teeth on them. food packaging should have pictures of morbidly obese people on it. et cetera et f***ing cetera.

it stinks.

For once I agree with you.

I seriously think that our purchases will be monitored and when you get to the checkout with your bottle of whatever you will be refused with "Warning! Weekly alcohol units exceeded!'

Or sugar. Or salt. Etc.

Mind you, when you see a fat bird at the checkout laden with junk food I can see the sense in "Put the pie down and step away!".

Maybe.

a reply to: JAGStorm

well the tobacco companies probably paid off the health department & insurance comapanies make a killin. cause i dont know anyone dumb enough to put 100 chemicals in somethin most need 20 a day of than blame withdrawals on nicotine. its a farce ya to get more hospital bill. try arsenic dabs in the amount cigs. provide & youll withdraw after a few weeks of use.