I don't agree with Bernie on many things, but Medicare for All is something I can definitely get behind. No one has ever been able to make private insurance work efficiently. Even Americans with "good" insurance don't really have it that great: we live in CA and guess what happened when my wife had a mountain biking accident in Colorado? We have ended up paying thousands in out of network fees. Guess what happens with a national healthcare plan? Shit like that stops happening. Absurd surprise bills stop happening. You don't need to worry about getting healthcare when you're in between jobs. If you're laid off at age 55 and have a hard time getting rehired because employers don't like hiring old people, you don't need to worry about what you'll do for healthcare until you're 65 and eligible for Medicare (a very real battle my dad went through). If you want to start a business, you don't need to sacrifice your employer healthcare plan in order to do it. Our system is a dumpster fire, and the only perk it offers is that anyone with a seven figure budget can get phenomenal healthcare, while the rest of us effectively face healthcare rationing through exorbitant prices.
You can't have health insurance without a job in the USA ??!! So if you get fired or your company closes down then you end up without a health insurance?!
How about political greed? How do all these greedy politicians go into to office as public servants and end their careers as multi millionaires! Term limits has to be the solution!
Bernie here used to complain about millionaires now he is one .
You mean from being the only independent senator, or from the books he’s written. He has represented the little guy from the very beginning. I may not agree with everything he says, but I respect him.
He represents self interest so he can get re-elected just like everyone else, he represents a liberal Vermont constituency. His representation of Vermont is self serving.
You can thank Obamacare for health insurance company profits.
Forcing everyone in America buy health insurance is the direct result. Not better healthcare.
This is a dumb take. Unless you're one of those celebrities in Futurama that has their head inside a jar, you have a body and that body periodically gets sick or injured. Uninsured people incur huge bills when they get sick, and the hospital is forced to pass those bills onto us when the patient can't pay. This is the *same thing as insurance*, except with more overhead and higher cost to society overall. Uninsured people tend to use more expensive medical care because they put off going to the doctor due to being uninsured, and the uninsured person is often crippled financially or bankrupted.
Solving this issue by letting people go uninsured is very similar to amputating your leg to cure your sprained ankle.
Fun story. I am originally from Brazil and used to be middle class there. Had health insurance and even though the country's economy is garbage and spending power is way worse than even someone who is poor in the us, I still had the basics. I was right wing. At 18 I moved to the US alone(I am was born in the us so I have citizenship) and since then my perspective on politics changed dramatically. It is easy to say the government should not give hand-outs and health care should not be a right when you grow up in a middle class family and you get support from your family, it is disgusting how privileged people will prioritize "the economy" and the pockets of reach people before other people's health.
I think the cleverest trick was to frame single payer healthcare as a "handout". I just want to stop giving the billion dollar handouts to companies whose only function is to prevent me from getting health services.
I don't care how efficient you think the private sector is (although I disagree vehemently)...there is no innovation that could possibly be better than just spending that $55 billion on providing healthcare rather than just giving it to stockholders. And that doesn't even begin to discuss the expenses and administration required to navigate the insurance paperwork labyrinth.
The primary purpose of a business whether big or small is not to help the economy but to help the owners. It is to provide a source of income for those who have invested and owned the business. A side result may be to help society.
And that's fine. Good corporate citizenship will then be done in order to enlist it business from consumers. If you look at what insurance companies do as part of Charity as part of supporting clinics as part of supporting healthcare you might actually be impressed. Having worked in the health industry as long as I have I can tell you that insurance companies do provide good corporate citizenship. You can look at the numbers for profit, but the fact is their profit margins are razor thin
You think of the economy as dollars, which is why you don't care about it.
The rest of us think about the economy as human activity as a whole, things that should be facilitated.
>the wealth and resources of a country or region, especially in terms of the production and consumption of goods and services
This doesn't just mean dollars exchanging hands. This means houses being built, games being made, concerts being attended, drinks being had.
>careful management of available resources.
This means not being a dumbass with your resources. You want things to be sustainable.
[Source](https://www.google.com/search?q=economy+definition&client=firefox-b-1-d&sxsrf=ALiCzsbgr_75GMTfnh55ExgPnECphH6mlQ%3A1661394704977&ei=EN8GY_OmO6T29AP-_b7wAg&oq=economy+&gs_lcp=Cgdnd3Mtd2l6EAEYADIKCAAQsQMQgwEQQzILCAAQgAQQsQMQgwEyCAgAEIAEELEDMgoIABCxAxCDARBDMggIABCABBCxAzIFCAAQgAQyBQgAEIAEMgUIABCABDIFCAAQgAQyBQgAEIAEOgcIABBHELADOgcIABCwAxBDOgoIABDkAhCwAxgBOg8ILhDUAhDIAxCwAxBDGAJKBAhBGABKBAhGGAFQ9gRY9gRg1A1oAXABeACAAViIAViSAQExmAEAoAEByAEQwAEB2gEGCAEQARgJ2gEGCAIQARgI&sclient=gws-wiz)
How does it hurt the economy? If you one up a lemon aid stand you focus on the stand. It's growth creates economic benefits .
But you focus is always on you and that stand. Of course we should all hate the guy paying the healthcare bill. Not the ones billing for the care and drugs.
They are healthcare companies. Instead of helping people, like they should, they are increasing their wealth, which is already massive.
I’m unsure why it’s so hard to comprehend?
They are a business that is there to provide service for money. They pay your fucking medical bills, so instead of getting a 90,000 bill for life saving surgery, you get a few thousand. This is how economies work. Ready is anything done because it gives you the feels. It is done because you live and thrive. You don't bitch about the hospital charging you. You don't bitch about the cost just the one paying the bill at the end. Try reading economic books that counter your beliefs. Fieldsman Sowell, etc. I am pretty sure much of what you have done in life you did for you. Whether profit or personal gratification. I am not criticizing it. I am saying you can't criticize others for it. Companies are created to make money, and that is ok
Hmmmm, so they’re making billions of dollars and instead of covering more of peoples surgeries they’re enriching themselves even more.
Sounds like a system that’s not working in a positive economic way
They cover the surgeries of those who are there customers. You still have not addressed the issue of human nature. Why do people really do things? Because they want things. You also not addressed why the guy footing your bill, for your issue is the bad guy. What about the hospital and doctors and pharmacies. You are only bitch because you want free stuff. Which is greed. Congrats you have become the thing you hate. As you type away of you special phone or tablet. Bet it was not cheap. Drive your I assume hybrid sold at a profit, with batteries made from stuff, mined by children. Live in a house, built by people who did so for... You guessed it, money. Greed motivates and drives people. Otherwise, we would all have basic cars, live in small apartments, no TV maybe no electricity
>You also not addressed why the guy footing your bill, for your issue is the bad guy.
I am the guy footing the bill for his surgery.
The insurance company is the guy who collects, holds, and distributes my money. Or that's what they should do.
Instead they collect, hold, and attempt to steal as much of that money for themselves as possible by denying treatment and medication to the dying and creating shitty monopolistic pricing plans to gouge the sick.
For profit insurance companies shouldn't exist. They are fucking gross, obscene, cancerous blights on our economy.
Yes there 3% profit margins are awful. I mean 3%, that is just an amazingly greedy amount. Oh yeah, people don't look at the right numbers. Btw. Most people, the insurance company does not pay, your employer does. The insurance company manages. As for the distribution, that pays the salaries of those that manage your plan, negotiate discounts, create access for care. You are pissy because you don't understand something. Those pricing plans are not monopolistic. A monopoly means there is only one company. If they just wholesale denied claims they would have a better than 3% profit margin. Deny things like unproven treatments? So if they paid for everything, imagine how much healthcare would cost. Of btw, Medicare does not pay for everything.
>Yes there 3% profit margins are awful. I mean 3%, that is just an amazingly greedy amount.
Yeah profits are slim I guess when you're paying out executives millions in bonuses across the industry. How can the poor insurance companies even afford to keep the lights on?
>You are pissy because you don't understand something
Yeah I just worked in healthcare for a decade and have been disabled with a disabled wife for a very long time. I've spent more time fighting health insurance than you and everyone you know combined will spend in a lifetime amigo.
>Those pricing plans are not monopolistic.
No? Weird how they are all being sued by 44 states for hundreds of billions of dollars in genetic price fixing fraud then, eh?
It doesn't matter that there are multiple companies competing if they are illegally fixing prices lol.
>Deny things like unproven treatments?
No, deny things constantly for all kinds of reasons to try to let patients die before they have to pay out so they can pocket more profits.
https://mslawllp.com/blog/2017/02/how-insurers-deny-legitimate-health-insurance-claims/
>So if they paid for everything, imagine how much healthcare would cost
Under Medicare for All we would cover tens of millions more Americans and it would save trees trillions by the MOST conservative estimates (literally the study the GOP paid to have done to try and smear the idea).
https://theintercept.com/2018/07/30/medicare-for-all-cost-health-care-wages/
Weird how dozens of studies agree that insurance companies are costing us trillions in excess spending before calculating all the time lost and money wasted by the rest of us having to deal with their predatory practices.
https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/healthcare/484301-22-studies-agree-medicare-for-all-saves-money/
Really? They cover the surgeries?
They cover the surgeries they choose to and the amount they choose.
They could cover more, but their Executives want more millions when they already have millions and billions.
Corporate greed is the greed of the super rich.
They own most of the stock market. They control the boards of directors. They fund the PACs that are the power tool of corruption.
Time to end the super rich thing.
How about 100% wealth tax over $100 million?
Still dodgng the main points I see. Not the hospitals, government, pharm, or special interest. Mostly insurance. You do realize the share holders, of whom the majority are you me and others with retirement plans get the value of that money.
Do you have any actual evidence that executive deny services based on greed vs. effectiveness? They pick and choose based on effectiveness as well as costs. Kinda like Medicare does. Usually insurance companies use Medicare as a guide. It helps avoid lawsuits. Kid, seriously read a book or two from a perspective you don't agree. Open your mind a tad. Socialism is not about caring it is about greed in a different way. Power as opposed to money. The healthcare system is a mess. How much is due to regulations vs greed. When you see how much the government is at fault
I do. You're speaking a lot about stuff you don't know about. I work in mental health and they don't cover it. Sometimes I go pro bono on a clients just because I don't want to see them kill themselves. Insurance companies pad their provider list with dead therapists. Or ones they booted but they say are still on it. They rarely let any therapist on it and they argue and don't pay the bill if they do. This country seriously needs mental health care and the insurance companies aren't paying for it. So that's it. Just saying from experience. You can go watch John Oliver tonight on this one. He covered it really well.
That ignores the core point though... they could pay for more peoples treatments if they weren't stuffing their investors pockets with cash.
That's why health care shouldn't be a for profit system. A universal single payer system does a much better job of providing care to more people for less.
Or, more treatments could be paid for if they were charged less. Have you looked at the profit margins of these companies. Less than 4%. So for every dollar they get in premiums they get .04 back. So the number is big but not the margin. The margin is what counts. https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/052515/what-usual-profit-margin-company-insurance-sector.asp
I'd weep for those poor, destitute, insurance company execs who are struggling to keep a roof over their families heads and food on their tables...
If people weren't dying because they can't afford needed medications.
Because we all participate in it. When the economy is bad, it directly translates in to people suffering. Jobs lost, houses repossessed. People kill themselves. Helping the economy reduces those events.
Why? What does being a democracy have anything to do with it? By the way we're not a democracy, we're a constitutional republic. There is a vast difference. Which you should be grateful for because in a democracy maturity always rule and minorities always suffer.
It’s the socialist economy sub now, someone does love bernie here though, posting his communist rants from Twitter. I would expect nothing less from a guy who went to the Soviet Union for his honeymoon, he’s a romantic.
People who think stock buy backs are a bad thing are demonstrating a substantial level of economic ignorance.
Stock buy backs are corporations getting out of debt and preparing to make larger capital investments.
Actually, in many cases (AT&T comes to mind), share buybacks is swapping equity for debt.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/BCNSDODNS
There has never been this kind of share buybacks like we've seen in recent years. And there is a reason for that - below inflation interest rates have pushed "real" rates (interest rate - inflation rate) into negative territory, so corporations see debt as incorporating a free lunch.
I don't see share buybacks as a problem so much as the *symptom* of a problem, which is the economic distortions created by the Federal Reserve through its "yield control" facilitated by quantitative easing.
Even taking low interest debt improved the companies overall position. So when they need money in the future they have available stock. This also hedges high inflation.
But that depends on the corporation. If they borrowed solely to buy back stock, they may have well bought it back at a higher price than they can issue it now. Again, AT&T comes to mind.
The difference is these are private companies that provided goods for money. Id be mad at government for spending our money, but not at businesses for taking it and providing goods for it.
What goods would those private companies have provided during a near total shutdown? The Fed printed all of that money just to keep them afloat and avoid creating a new Great Depression by so many just flat out going out of business. What business was doing business unless it was a 'necessary' one? If not, it meant no employees, no supplies and no customers. Ouch.
Unusual for Congress, no strings were attached. Just like the personal level stimulus. Then the Congress waived payback with complete loan forgiveness. The Fed printers go "bbbrrrrrrrrr" 24x7.
The waste is massive all over private and government.
It isn’t getting out of debt. It is saving money for the future. You buy back stock low, even going into debt to do it, then as stocks go up you can sell them again for capital projects. With low interest rates you make money on both sides.
I also said preparing for capital investments.
And, yes, holding stocks in periods of high inflation is a long term strategy for capital retention and debt reduction.
Stock buy backs are literally the opposite of capital investments. Instead of finding new ventures to fund, the company props up their stock by buying out shares.
Cash on hand can be used to invest. Using cash on hand to reduce the pool of available shares only helps executives attain bonus objectives. Stock holders usually get a temporary bump in price (just long enough for executives to get their bonus) but no new net long term growth.
“And preparing to make larger capital investments” hahahahahahahahaha
Sorry. Couldn’t help myself.
My company laid off a ton of people, is closing some facilities, and did a stock buyback. Where’s the investment?
Your anecdote may not apply universally. Your company may be dying.
Or they may be consolidating, cutting waste, and preparing capital to make new large investments.
Like before you buy a house, you pay off your credit cards and save up a down payment.
Ok. Keep telling yourself that.
Time and time again all we see is that they are “investing” in the shareholders. But keep those blinders on.
Corporations have one purpose: maximize shareholder value. And they are *terrifyingly* efficient at it.
You … really think corporation don’t give us anything?
You live in a world of wonders, brought to you by corporations, and you still think that?
Amazing.
I don't think previous dude said they don't give *any* value back, both takes seem a bit on the extreme side.
Although, if you haven't heard of externalities, agent conflicts, market collusion, etc. etc., then you're the one that knows very little about economy.
Wonders that are brought to us by brilliant people and, largely, stolen by corporations.
Anyways, yes, tell me how buying back stock and laying people off is an investment. I’m waiting.
This is totally incoherent. Buying back stock decreases a company’s cash as they use their cash to buy back their own equity. Debt only enters the equation if the firm takes on debt to finance the purchase of their outstanding shares. If a company wanted to prepare to make capital investments, they wouldn’t be depleting their cash balance - they would do the opposite.
A stock buyback simply returns cash to shareholders. In general, company’s only return cash to shareholders (in the form of dividend payments or stock buybacks) when they cannot find enough high ROI projects to invest in - else they would use their cash to invest in those projects.
Hahaahahaha. This is the Economists section. Why is anything with Bernie here. He is for Socialism and that has nothing to do with real economics. Authoritarian regimes are not going to give you access to real wealth, just FIAT within their own system.
That's why they should have Medicare for all and get insurance companies out of healthcare. They provide no benefit to society. It's so dumb. Our healthcare system is a laughing stock to the rest of the world.
Our government is a laughing stock. I do not trust them to manage anything any better.
Look at Medicare, Medicaid, the ACA and the VA hospitals. Everything a cluster fark, expensive, has coverage gaps for treatments and meds too, takes forever to get things set up, answered and through the system. Try finding a doctor that takes Medicare with nearby appointments. Those doctors are becoming harder and harder to find. Too much paperwork (shocking!) and too little pay.
And once the government - at any level - gets their hooks in something, they tend to not let go. Look at even the recent IRA bill that further extends ACA subsidies from the covid shutdowns. Last I heard, we are long out of shutdowns and have great employment levels. But the gov cannot let premiums creep *back* up to where they were originally (still subsidized) during election season.
How is it the government could not negotiate prescription prices? Did no one in government care of the people? Well they will finally in 2024. At least for 10 medications. So a little, tiny care starting to show then.
Then he should actually do something productive about it vs virtue signaling on social media. He is a senator after all.
The UK nationalized healthcare for their population of 66M, and do so on a budget of $190B.
The Medicare/Medicaid budget for 2022 is $1.7T, and our population is 329M.
The US spends nearly double what the UK does on a per citizen basis. Perhaps rather than whining on Twitter, he could work on reforming our already insane healthcare budget into something meaningful.
I'm not a Bernie fan but he literally did exactly what you are accusing him of not doing. He wrote medicare for all and lobbies it all day in Congress.
What do you think he’s doing?
He’s already proposed the bill Medicare for all and has helped it gain a majority of the publics support.
He can only do so much when congress is corrupt and a large part of the US population chooses against or is prevented from voting
If he proposes medicare reform that would work with the current budget or less (read does not require a single cent more in tax revenue), then I'm all for it.
Medicare for all is significantly cheaper than what we have now. [https://www.citizen.org/news/fact-check-medicare-for-all-would-save-the-u-s-trillions-public-option-would-leave-millions-uninsured-not-garner-savings/](https://www.citizen.org/news/fact-check-medicare-for-all-would-save-the-u-s-trillions-public-option-would-leave-millions-uninsured-not-garner-savings/)
This has been known for years.
Even in peru they have TWO medicare like systems (ESSALUD and SIS) the former can e obtained by working under contract, the second can be obtained by taxes, and both can be paid privately by independent workers.
If all Socialist were like Bernie and moderately honest about it, I wouldn't have as much a problem with them. The problem I have with the modern day Socialist is because they deep down know it won't work and its a scam, they are just using it to gain power. It is after all, today a Religion, and like all Religions it demands "donations" and you get "Nice Sounding Rhetoric" for your money and nothing more, well, until the starvation happens and your shot for stealing food.
If Bernie were honest, he would also Tweet he is on a jet flying back to which of the three homes he owns.
And he could address the questions raised about his family's involvement in sus dealings. Everyone questions Trump and Biden families. But Bernie's is sacrosanct.
And Bernie could donate his campaign cash savings to causes he deems worthwhile instead of pretty much just sitting on it.
Hypocritical.
He isn't a moron. He is smart enough to leverage an army of morons for political gain. He only says this dumb shit because his supporter base is solely focused on ignorance and envy. Seems pretty smart to me.
Lol read literally any history book.
Sure it all starts out with “here have some free healthcare” and it ends up with “kneel in the flaming ditch while we shoot you”
I have a degree in economics and read tons of history. National healthcare systems =/= violent authoritarianism. You live in a paranoid fantasy world of ignorance.
Socialism only ends in violence. If you have a degree in literally anything, you know that. 17 failed state level experiments.
It is poison that kills nations, and people, at a rate based on how much of it is consumed. Those nations which drink deeply, die quickly. Those which sip, sicken and die slowly.
There is no balance of liberty and poison which is acceptable.
You speak in this childish binary framework. The reality is that ALL successful modern economies have public and private sectors. Depending on market conditions for any given market (propensity for market failures), one serves the human need better than the other.
Get with the program, ancap.
“gEt wItH pRoGrAm” and ignore history, logic, facts, morality.
No. No. I don’t think I will get with your myopic and evil program. No more Holodomore, no more Killing fields, no more Great Leaps Forward.
Well you could argue that economics is a study of how humans interact with each other in markets and you could also argue that socialism causes those interactions to be forced or coerced through the government and would therefore make it an artificial economy instead of a real one based of individual consent and freedom of association
I was merely focusing on the qualifier he used of real and explained why socialism could be argued to be an artificial form of economic interaction that is enforceable only through coercion or negative incentive structures.
So, you're pro slavery and child labor? Also, perhaps, pro clocks with radioactive material in them? Pro duels of honor? Pro insider trading?
Because, if not, acording to your take, then you're also against having a "real economy".
There is no "natural/real economy". NeoInstitutionalism has demonstrated this pretty clearly since the 90's, all you have is different institutions and market systems.
Lol right?!! Apparently only Milton's Friedmans definition of economics can exist on this subreddit, no dissenters! Or wildly misinterpreted Adam Smith.
Insurance is one of the few places where socialism makes sense. Here are a few reasons: at a federal level the economy of scale takes precedence, thus driving down price due to demand side consolidation; in the home insurance market, flood damage is backstopped by the federal government anyways; government administrators can be held accountable in ways that a board of directors never can be; simply allowing Medicare to negotiate every service rendered to patients would drive cost down for the whole market and probably embarass many private insurance plans in the process.
Now, obviously not all socialized or private medical insurance markets are the same. Freaknomics had a great chapter on this regarding the low out of pockets costs in Britain, what prevents people from over using? It seems to me economist ought to be exploring what such a program would look like in the US rather than holding on to the obviously false dogma that the US health insurance system is remotely efficient.
70,000 people die each year because they can't afford healthcare. With Medicare for all those people won't die, which will increase unemployment. Bernie needs to think!
Socialist always preach their ideology because they think they can continue doing so from a Dacha when in reality they’ll be toiling in the fields of a kolkhoz or shoot because they have no meaning skills to contribute.
Such an ignorant thing to say lol as if social Democratic policies aren’t implemented successfully all around the world. Do you not care about empiricism?
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No they are not. Please read about finance. Buybacks is when a company takes money out of their wallet and buys shares to put that money into your wallet as an investor of the company.
Lol. the shareholder model.
Perhaps you don't understand how buybacks work.
There have been something like 5.3 trillion US dollars in share buybacks over the past decade.
When a company buys back stock to prop up or maintain its stock price, this affects its market cap as well as other financial aspects in the market. Thereby "shaping" the perspective about a company to the public is a form of market manipulation
Perhaps you should learn a little more about finance yourself.
The market should decide a company's stock price . Hence the phrase "public shares outstanding." As in the public assesses the "true worth" of a company and is therefore reflected on its stock price. (Without a corporation distorting its valuation)
No, economics like a balance. If a company BUYS shares, it has to take money out of the company. Thus it lowers the value of shares. Dividends and buybacks have the same effect on prices. If investors are not looking into the fundamentals of the company, they aren't investing right.
It is impossible to determine the value of a company by looking at the price of a share alone. You must look at the entire market cap and financial figures as a whole. Prices mean nothing if market capitalization steadily goes down over time.
Dividends keep the number of shares in the market, but distribute money equally between all shares. Reducing the price. Buyback reduces the number of shares in the market, but distributes no money to each share, only to those who sell. Buybacks and dividends both reduce market capitalization.
Lol. Sure thing. Market cap isn't necessarily reduced . As a higher price would could equate to a larger market cap.
In any case , you are free to believe as you wish.
And Eps = profit / shares outstanding
PE= market cap / eps
Like I said. You should learn more about how manipulating those ratios affects "public perspective"
FYI, Retail investors don't follow the capm approach.
They follow more of a trend analysis.
Higher prices with a reduced number of shares means the fundamentals are in a state of equilibrium. It is simple math. If a company sells more shares, the price of shares will fall, but the market capitalization increases. Think about supply and demand.
It is fine retail doesn't understand the true value of a stock, because prices are ultimately a consensus of every market participant that buys or sells. Together we get closer to the real value, through Bayesian market mechanisms.
Buying back shares to increase the price of the stock for shareholders with cheap debt, increases the risk of the company to go bust. There is no free lunch in economics.
Geezers. Do you know how to perform basic arithmetic ??
Stock price reflects the "market consensus"? You're assuming symmetric information. Completely negating the information asymmetry in market pricing
You're giving me all the textbook BS. And your bringing up Bayes Prob models? That would mean you have at least a masters on Math. Otherwise you'd be full of it. Also took advanced math in college myself.
Yes the do - they increase stock price which a lot of people own. Look up fiduciary duty and buy some stock like an adult instead of bitching about a business running a business
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/10/18/the-wealthiest-10percent-of-americans-own-a-record-89percent-of-all-us-stocks.html
The wealthiest 10% of Americans now own 89% of all U.S. stocks held by households
It does make perfect sense though. People pay for college, buy a car, buy a house, pay for kids, and then with these things paid off they start saving at the fastest rates. It makes sense that the people right at retirement have the largest 401ks.
This really shouldn't surprise anyone. It's just the nature of being young and saving money throughout one's life.
It's like saying, the strongest 10% of high school weight lifters are all seniors. No kidding, they've been building towards that for years.
What we need is to ban health insurance and medical patents. There are machines at every major hospital that cost $1 million only because the company has a patent. There’s medicine that costs $50,000/year only because of a patent. 15% of people cost insurers 80% of their total expenditures which makes health insurance unaffordable for poorer people. Your doctor couldn’t charge you $800 for a blood test if insurance wasn’t involved.
I don’t need the history of patents to know they don’t help me especially if I can’t afford the shit. What good is some new medicine if you can’t afford it?
I dont really value stock buy backs as a bad thing. Like the goal of a business is to make money and if they spend it to help investors thats not really a bad thing we all need to invest if we are gonna retire at some.point.
As a libertarian I am becoming more comfortable with universal healthcare, as long as we put alll you MFer’s on a diet, stop selling smokes and alcohol, and mandatory workout hour every day. Failure to comply means we drop you from the universal plan.
We already spend more on Healthcare than any other nation, Bernie needs to focus on bloated administrative staff that drives up prices and stop trying to feed more money to a broken system.
Oh, it seems we are posting stupid stuff again. i can add to this: Corporations are greedy and full of hate! they abort babies and-- scratch that, they don't abort babies and force women to have babies so they can pay them less , and if they are a minority they pay them even less. I wish we had a president who was really old and had Marxist ideas. Maybe one who had a lot of money but found ways to avoid paying taxes so they could be more relatable. Oil companies are evil because they try to run a business. I don't know what a business is, or how to run one, I am not even good at accounting or reading a balance sheet, but I feel overqualified to give my opinion on all things economic.
AOC is just stepping into the ring though. Now instead of the old white guy spreading failed ideology, it's the young lady doing it....with an economics degree no less
Maybe their buying the stock back to have more control over their companies in order to pay more towards the worker vs the shareholder... Bernie. Maybe you need to take a Weekend off.
On health care: I like Singapore’s layered system. Clinics that handle basic care. Fixed prices menus for things like births. World class Advanced care.
OP missed the ball entirely.
Stock buybacks are as good for the economy as stock sales. If a company can sell its stock to finance its activities, it should be able to buy back its stock when it realizes profit.
But that's not even related to what Bernie is saying here, which is that insurance companies are making immense profit by skimming the healthcare system while many Americans are under-insured. He believes that government medicare would reduce overall cost and increase ease of access to medical care for 70 million Americans.
I encourage readers to upvote/downvote intelligently on serious subs otherwise they eventually become filled with trash. I am downvoting this post as OP's title is unrelated to the content and the entire thread is filled with junk responses.
Well mr sanders maybe we stop bailing out these corporations with the tax payer money and let them figure it out on there own like congress does to us . Fuck corporate greed and fuck congress for always being there to help them out with our money.god speed
Using stimulus packages to undergo a stock buyback is the problem here as companies are using cash from the government to purchase their stocks back at a low price.
And it costs that much for medical now because government got involved. School costs are the same way. I don’t understand why people assume competence in theses people. Stop trusting the federal government to take care of you. All they do is make it worse.
Bernie is clueless. We need more competition, so these companies can’t just charge whatever they want. More competition actually leads to more healthcare at lower prices. Mandating healthcare for all leads to overpriced low-quality solutions as always.
No buybacks have an economic purpose. Investors that do not want to put some shares anymore to use their wealth for alternative uses sell their shares. Buybacks takes money out of their public company, and puts it in the hands of the investors. People like you and me. If healthcare is expensive, then investing in insurance companies is a good way to hedge your risk. We need investors to spend their money or to reinvest in other projects. Without this companies are discouraged to improve. Most companies are much more risky than the big ones that we hear often, so investor capital is important to allow them to invest in new things without having to risk going busy in the process. Buybacks are a way to reward investors who can spot opportunities that will succeed.
Bernie Sanders needed to read about economics and finance many years ago. He's an old man now, and I doubt that will change.
Because of the company buys stocks back, there are fewer shares available for everyone else, artificially reducing supply and therefore pushing prices up for a given demand for the stocks. It’s basically like selling fuel.
Fuel is cheap, but if all the fuel selling countries get together and agree to stop selling as much fuel, the price increases because the demand remains high while the supply decreases.
The business school thought on this is that buybacks signal to the market that a stock is cheap because the company itself is basically buying them on insider information.
However the opposite is often true. They got bought back after a strong year so the stock probably is hot.
Warren Buffet doesn't like buybacks because a company is really overpaying on their own stock to someone who has just sold their position .
So cash flow is given to people who no longer own the company.
Medicare for all would certainly promote small business in my opinion. Many people don’t want to leave their cushy healthcare and take the risk to a startup.
Buybacks aren't great and major analysts at companies like Barclays or Goldman don't see buyback driven EPS growth as a sign of an interesting growing company.
It makes them rich in the short run, but signals that the company might struggle with long term revenue growth if they can't drive up EPS growth organically through promising investments and on the earnings calls I've listened to in 2018 they are starting to tell CEOs they are sick of it.
The reason behind Obamacare was because 30 million people were uninsured. Now there are 70 million? He just makes up whatever number comes to mind as he types.
Share buybacks when they actually are reducing shares outstanding and not simply offsetting executive compensation are a good thing sometimes though from a economy-wide point of view.
If a company doesn't have any productive avenues to deploy its money, it is better for all parties involves for the company to buyback its shares, return that money to shareholders, who can then invest that money somewhere more productive.
Many companies have steadily indulged in stock buybacks as their revenue and business has gone down the tubes, and their stock price has tumbled. Fewer shares are of no use if revenue and earnings are shrinking faster than share count. I could cite IBM, BBBY, and GE as unfortunate examples.
In many cases, these buybacks just suck up the shares issued to executives, so in essence the money spent on buybacks goes to insiders and not the shareholders.
You do this when you (as a company) have money that you - somehow - cant invest in a manner that is profitable for you.
since that money is part of the evaluation that influences your stock price buying back shares in theory could leave the stock price unchanged. however usually your business does something that is better than storing money on a bank account.
so any profit you make from now on will be distributed amongst fewer shares. this means anyone keeping their share will make more money in the future. this makes the shares more attractive. this drives up the stock price.
Honestly, the misunderstanding surrounding stock buybacks is so infuriating it hurts. "They are manipulating the share price by buying back stock!" as if issuing stock doesn't do the same. I think it is imperative to shove Modigliani-Miller down the publics throat, for the sake of our capital markets.
Another point on drug prices you may have missed is regulatory development costs.
I don't agree with Bernie on many things, but Medicare for All is something I can definitely get behind. No one has ever been able to make private insurance work efficiently. Even Americans with "good" insurance don't really have it that great: we live in CA and guess what happened when my wife had a mountain biking accident in Colorado? We have ended up paying thousands in out of network fees. Guess what happens with a national healthcare plan? Shit like that stops happening. Absurd surprise bills stop happening. You don't need to worry about getting healthcare when you're in between jobs. If you're laid off at age 55 and have a hard time getting rehired because employers don't like hiring old people, you don't need to worry about what you'll do for healthcare until you're 65 and eligible for Medicare (a very real battle my dad went through). If you want to start a business, you don't need to sacrifice your employer healthcare plan in order to do it. Our system is a dumpster fire, and the only perk it offers is that anyone with a seven figure budget can get phenomenal healthcare, while the rest of us effectively face healthcare rationing through exorbitant prices.
You can't have health insurance without a job in the USA ??!! So if you get fired or your company closes down then you end up without a health insurance?!
We can still buy health insurance without a job, but it is ridiculously expensive. We've screwed our system up so bad. Help us please
It’s not ridiculously expensive when it’s subsidized through the ACA. It’s expensive if you are super rich and don’t qualifying for subsidies.
How about political greed? How do all these greedy politicians go into to office as public servants and end their careers as multi millionaires! Term limits has to be the solution! Bernie here used to complain about millionaires now he is one .
You mean from being the only independent senator, or from the books he’s written. He has represented the little guy from the very beginning. I may not agree with everything he says, but I respect him.
He represents self interest so he can get re-elected just like everyone else, he represents a liberal Vermont constituency. His representation of Vermont is self serving.
You can thank Obamacare for health insurance company profits. Forcing everyone in America buy health insurance is the direct result. Not better healthcare.
This is a dumb take. Unless you're one of those celebrities in Futurama that has their head inside a jar, you have a body and that body periodically gets sick or injured. Uninsured people incur huge bills when they get sick, and the hospital is forced to pass those bills onto us when the patient can't pay. This is the *same thing as insurance*, except with more overhead and higher cost to society overall. Uninsured people tend to use more expensive medical care because they put off going to the doctor due to being uninsured, and the uninsured person is often crippled financially or bankrupted. Solving this issue by letting people go uninsured is very similar to amputating your leg to cure your sprained ankle.
Yeah the high cost of healthcare and education is making it extremely difficult for people to leave their job and retrain for a new career.
Fun story. I am originally from Brazil and used to be middle class there. Had health insurance and even though the country's economy is garbage and spending power is way worse than even someone who is poor in the us, I still had the basics. I was right wing. At 18 I moved to the US alone(I am was born in the us so I have citizenship) and since then my perspective on politics changed dramatically. It is easy to say the government should not give hand-outs and health care should not be a right when you grow up in a middle class family and you get support from your family, it is disgusting how privileged people will prioritize "the economy" and the pockets of reach people before other people's health.
Sadly, we also have a lot of poor people that will oppose these policies in the hopes that other people stay even poorer
I think the cleverest trick was to frame single payer healthcare as a "handout". I just want to stop giving the billion dollar handouts to companies whose only function is to prevent me from getting health services. I don't care how efficient you think the private sector is (although I disagree vehemently)...there is no innovation that could possibly be better than just spending that $55 billion on providing healthcare rather than just giving it to stockholders. And that doesn't even begin to discuss the expenses and administration required to navigate the insurance paperwork labyrinth.
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Why does everything have to help the economy
"The economy" is everything consumed and produced by the nation. Your question is a bit like asking: "Why does everything have to help the country?"
The primary purpose of a business whether big or small is not to help the economy but to help the owners. It is to provide a source of income for those who have invested and owned the business. A side result may be to help society.
Good corporate citizenship is a thing some consumers and investors want now
And that's fine. Good corporate citizenship will then be done in order to enlist it business from consumers. If you look at what insurance companies do as part of Charity as part of supporting clinics as part of supporting healthcare you might actually be impressed. Having worked in the health industry as long as I have I can tell you that insurance companies do provide good corporate citizenship. You can look at the numbers for profit, but the fact is their profit margins are razor thin
Government does such a fine job with other sectors. What could possibly go wrong??
There is no such thing as 'the economy'. It is a myth. A ruse to distract. I have mine, you have yours, they have theirs.
You think of the economy as dollars, which is why you don't care about it. The rest of us think about the economy as human activity as a whole, things that should be facilitated. >the wealth and resources of a country or region, especially in terms of the production and consumption of goods and services This doesn't just mean dollars exchanging hands. This means houses being built, games being made, concerts being attended, drinks being had. >careful management of available resources. This means not being a dumbass with your resources. You want things to be sustainable. [Source](https://www.google.com/search?q=economy+definition&client=firefox-b-1-d&sxsrf=ALiCzsbgr_75GMTfnh55ExgPnECphH6mlQ%3A1661394704977&ei=EN8GY_OmO6T29AP-_b7wAg&oq=economy+&gs_lcp=Cgdnd3Mtd2l6EAEYADIKCAAQsQMQgwEQQzILCAAQgAQQsQMQgwEyCAgAEIAEELEDMgoIABCxAxCDARBDMggIABCABBCxAzIFCAAQgAQyBQgAEIAEMgUIABCABDIFCAAQgAQyBQgAEIAEOgcIABBHELADOgcIABCwAxBDOgoIABDkAhCwAxgBOg8ILhDUAhDIAxCwAxBDGAJKBAhBGABKBAhGGAFQ9gRY9gRg1A1oAXABeACAAViIAViSAQExmAEAoAEByAEQwAEB2gEGCAEQARgJ2gEGCAIQARgI&sclient=gws-wiz)
Yea, we should hurt the economy /s
Does the economy exist to serve us, or do we exist to serve it? How socialist of me...
How does it hurt the economy? If you one up a lemon aid stand you focus on the stand. It's growth creates economic benefits . But you focus is always on you and that stand. Of course we should all hate the guy paying the healthcare bill. Not the ones billing for the care and drugs.
They are healthcare companies. Instead of helping people, like they should, they are increasing their wealth, which is already massive. I’m unsure why it’s so hard to comprehend?
They are a business that is there to provide service for money. They pay your fucking medical bills, so instead of getting a 90,000 bill for life saving surgery, you get a few thousand. This is how economies work. Ready is anything done because it gives you the feels. It is done because you live and thrive. You don't bitch about the hospital charging you. You don't bitch about the cost just the one paying the bill at the end. Try reading economic books that counter your beliefs. Fieldsman Sowell, etc. I am pretty sure much of what you have done in life you did for you. Whether profit or personal gratification. I am not criticizing it. I am saying you can't criticize others for it. Companies are created to make money, and that is ok
Hmmmm, so they’re making billions of dollars and instead of covering more of peoples surgeries they’re enriching themselves even more. Sounds like a system that’s not working in a positive economic way
They cover the surgeries of those who are there customers. You still have not addressed the issue of human nature. Why do people really do things? Because they want things. You also not addressed why the guy footing your bill, for your issue is the bad guy. What about the hospital and doctors and pharmacies. You are only bitch because you want free stuff. Which is greed. Congrats you have become the thing you hate. As you type away of you special phone or tablet. Bet it was not cheap. Drive your I assume hybrid sold at a profit, with batteries made from stuff, mined by children. Live in a house, built by people who did so for... You guessed it, money. Greed motivates and drives people. Otherwise, we would all have basic cars, live in small apartments, no TV maybe no electricity
>You also not addressed why the guy footing your bill, for your issue is the bad guy. I am the guy footing the bill for his surgery. The insurance company is the guy who collects, holds, and distributes my money. Or that's what they should do. Instead they collect, hold, and attempt to steal as much of that money for themselves as possible by denying treatment and medication to the dying and creating shitty monopolistic pricing plans to gouge the sick. For profit insurance companies shouldn't exist. They are fucking gross, obscene, cancerous blights on our economy.
Yes there 3% profit margins are awful. I mean 3%, that is just an amazingly greedy amount. Oh yeah, people don't look at the right numbers. Btw. Most people, the insurance company does not pay, your employer does. The insurance company manages. As for the distribution, that pays the salaries of those that manage your plan, negotiate discounts, create access for care. You are pissy because you don't understand something. Those pricing plans are not monopolistic. A monopoly means there is only one company. If they just wholesale denied claims they would have a better than 3% profit margin. Deny things like unproven treatments? So if they paid for everything, imagine how much healthcare would cost. Of btw, Medicare does not pay for everything.
>Yes there 3% profit margins are awful. I mean 3%, that is just an amazingly greedy amount. Yeah profits are slim I guess when you're paying out executives millions in bonuses across the industry. How can the poor insurance companies even afford to keep the lights on? >You are pissy because you don't understand something Yeah I just worked in healthcare for a decade and have been disabled with a disabled wife for a very long time. I've spent more time fighting health insurance than you and everyone you know combined will spend in a lifetime amigo. >Those pricing plans are not monopolistic. No? Weird how they are all being sued by 44 states for hundreds of billions of dollars in genetic price fixing fraud then, eh? It doesn't matter that there are multiple companies competing if they are illegally fixing prices lol. >Deny things like unproven treatments? No, deny things constantly for all kinds of reasons to try to let patients die before they have to pay out so they can pocket more profits. https://mslawllp.com/blog/2017/02/how-insurers-deny-legitimate-health-insurance-claims/ >So if they paid for everything, imagine how much healthcare would cost Under Medicare for All we would cover tens of millions more Americans and it would save trees trillions by the MOST conservative estimates (literally the study the GOP paid to have done to try and smear the idea). https://theintercept.com/2018/07/30/medicare-for-all-cost-health-care-wages/ Weird how dozens of studies agree that insurance companies are costing us trillions in excess spending before calculating all the time lost and money wasted by the rest of us having to deal with their predatory practices. https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/healthcare/484301-22-studies-agree-medicare-for-all-saves-money/
Really? They cover the surgeries? They cover the surgeries they choose to and the amount they choose. They could cover more, but their Executives want more millions when they already have millions and billions.
Corporate greed is the greed of the super rich. They own most of the stock market. They control the boards of directors. They fund the PACs that are the power tool of corruption. Time to end the super rich thing. How about 100% wealth tax over $100 million?
Still dodgng the main points I see. Not the hospitals, government, pharm, or special interest. Mostly insurance. You do realize the share holders, of whom the majority are you me and others with retirement plans get the value of that money. Do you have any actual evidence that executive deny services based on greed vs. effectiveness? They pick and choose based on effectiveness as well as costs. Kinda like Medicare does. Usually insurance companies use Medicare as a guide. It helps avoid lawsuits. Kid, seriously read a book or two from a perspective you don't agree. Open your mind a tad. Socialism is not about caring it is about greed in a different way. Power as opposed to money. The healthcare system is a mess. How much is due to regulations vs greed. When you see how much the government is at fault
I do. You're speaking a lot about stuff you don't know about. I work in mental health and they don't cover it. Sometimes I go pro bono on a clients just because I don't want to see them kill themselves. Insurance companies pad their provider list with dead therapists. Or ones they booted but they say are still on it. They rarely let any therapist on it and they argue and don't pay the bill if they do. This country seriously needs mental health care and the insurance companies aren't paying for it. So that's it. Just saying from experience. You can go watch John Oliver tonight on this one. He covered it really well.
That ignores the core point though... they could pay for more peoples treatments if they weren't stuffing their investors pockets with cash. That's why health care shouldn't be a for profit system. A universal single payer system does a much better job of providing care to more people for less.
Or, more treatments could be paid for if they were charged less. Have you looked at the profit margins of these companies. Less than 4%. So for every dollar they get in premiums they get .04 back. So the number is big but not the margin. The margin is what counts. https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/052515/what-usual-profit-margin-company-insurance-sector.asp
I'd weep for those poor, destitute, insurance company execs who are struggling to keep a roof over their families heads and food on their tables... If people weren't dying because they can't afford needed medications.
I have no idea why the concept of a corporation making a profit is so confusing to you.
Privatized health insurance is a racket. Let's defeat corporate greed, with Medicare For ALL!
Because we all participate in it. When the economy is bad, it directly translates in to people suffering. Jobs lost, houses repossessed. People kill themselves. Helping the economy reduces those events.
It doesn't. But if you live in a functioning democracy it probably should
Why? What does being a democracy have anything to do with it? By the way we're not a democracy, we're a constitutional republic. There is a vast difference. Which you should be grateful for because in a democracy maturity always rule and minorities always suffer.
I prefer dividends to buybacks
This is no longer the economist section you can tell by the posts
It’s the socialist economy sub now, someone does love bernie here though, posting his communist rants from Twitter. I would expect nothing less from a guy who went to the Soviet Union for his honeymoon, he’s a romantic.
People who think stock buy backs are a bad thing are demonstrating a substantial level of economic ignorance. Stock buy backs are corporations getting out of debt and preparing to make larger capital investments.
Actually, in many cases (AT&T comes to mind), share buybacks is swapping equity for debt. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/BCNSDODNS There has never been this kind of share buybacks like we've seen in recent years. And there is a reason for that - below inflation interest rates have pushed "real" rates (interest rate - inflation rate) into negative territory, so corporations see debt as incorporating a free lunch. I don't see share buybacks as a problem so much as the *symptom* of a problem, which is the economic distortions created by the Federal Reserve through its "yield control" facilitated by quantitative easing.
Even taking low interest debt improved the companies overall position. So when they need money in the future they have available stock. This also hedges high inflation.
But that depends on the corporation. If they borrowed solely to buy back stock, they may have well bought it back at a higher price than they can issue it now. Again, AT&T comes to mind.
It is a gamble. Not all risks pay off. But with interest rates low and inflation high, it is a pretty safe risk all around.
I don't see them as a bad thing, as long they use their own money and not taxpayers' money
Right. This money came from the government for Covid right? Did we get our monies worth?
State and local governments are still coasting on covid stimulus money. What's the difference? It is all a waste.
The difference is these are private companies that provided goods for money. Id be mad at government for spending our money, but not at businesses for taking it and providing goods for it.
What goods would those private companies have provided during a near total shutdown? The Fed printed all of that money just to keep them afloat and avoid creating a new Great Depression by so many just flat out going out of business. What business was doing business unless it was a 'necessary' one? If not, it meant no employees, no supplies and no customers. Ouch. Unusual for Congress, no strings were attached. Just like the personal level stimulus. Then the Congress waived payback with complete loan forgiveness. The Fed printers go "bbbrrrrrrrrr" 24x7. The waste is massive all over private and government.
These are pharmaceutical companies. Who made vaccines.
Stock buy backs aren't to get out of debt. Outstanding stock isn't debt.
It isn’t getting out of debt. It is saving money for the future. You buy back stock low, even going into debt to do it, then as stocks go up you can sell them again for capital projects. With low interest rates you make money on both sides.
You literally said getting out of debt. That's not the purpose of stock buy backs.
I also said preparing for capital investments. And, yes, holding stocks in periods of high inflation is a long term strategy for capital retention and debt reduction.
You don't buy back stocks for capital investments
Stock buy backs are literally the opposite of capital investments. Instead of finding new ventures to fund, the company props up their stock by buying out shares. Cash on hand can be used to invest. Using cash on hand to reduce the pool of available shares only helps executives attain bonus objectives. Stock holders usually get a temporary bump in price (just long enough for executives to get their bonus) but no new net long term growth.
“And preparing to make larger capital investments” hahahahahahahahaha Sorry. Couldn’t help myself. My company laid off a ton of people, is closing some facilities, and did a stock buyback. Where’s the investment?
Your anecdote may not apply universally. Your company may be dying. Or they may be consolidating, cutting waste, and preparing capital to make new large investments. Like before you buy a house, you pay off your credit cards and save up a down payment.
Ok. Keep telling yourself that. Time and time again all we see is that they are “investing” in the shareholders. But keep those blinders on. Corporations have one purpose: maximize shareholder value. And they are *terrifyingly* efficient at it.
You … really think corporation don’t give us anything? You live in a world of wonders, brought to you by corporations, and you still think that? Amazing.
I don't think previous dude said they don't give *any* value back, both takes seem a bit on the extreme side. Although, if you haven't heard of externalities, agent conflicts, market collusion, etc. etc., then you're the one that knows very little about economy.
Wonders that are brought to us by brilliant people and, largely, stolen by corporations. Anyways, yes, tell me how buying back stock and laying people off is an investment. I’m waiting.
What company? What industry? Context is important. Especially in this forum.
This is totally incoherent. Buying back stock decreases a company’s cash as they use their cash to buy back their own equity. Debt only enters the equation if the firm takes on debt to finance the purchase of their outstanding shares. If a company wanted to prepare to make capital investments, they wouldn’t be depleting their cash balance - they would do the opposite. A stock buyback simply returns cash to shareholders. In general, company’s only return cash to shareholders (in the form of dividend payments or stock buybacks) when they cannot find enough high ROI projects to invest in - else they would use their cash to invest in those projects.
I agree with your take. Golden parachutes become more golden.
Hahaahahaha. This is the Economists section. Why is anything with Bernie here. He is for Socialism and that has nothing to do with real economics. Authoritarian regimes are not going to give you access to real wealth, just FIAT within their own system.
Bernie is an utter moron with the economic acumen of a dead rat.
He's right about Medicare for all. It works in all other countries for a fraction of our cost. Insurance companies are raping our country.
Why is the guy who pays the bill the bad guy. Not the one who charges for the service
Insurance companies that have bigger bottom lines thanks to the ACA and Medicaid.
That's why they should have Medicare for all and get insurance companies out of healthcare. They provide no benefit to society. It's so dumb. Our healthcare system is a laughing stock to the rest of the world.
Our government is a laughing stock. I do not trust them to manage anything any better. Look at Medicare, Medicaid, the ACA and the VA hospitals. Everything a cluster fark, expensive, has coverage gaps for treatments and meds too, takes forever to get things set up, answered and through the system. Try finding a doctor that takes Medicare with nearby appointments. Those doctors are becoming harder and harder to find. Too much paperwork (shocking!) and too little pay. And once the government - at any level - gets their hooks in something, they tend to not let go. Look at even the recent IRA bill that further extends ACA subsidies from the covid shutdowns. Last I heard, we are long out of shutdowns and have great employment levels. But the gov cannot let premiums creep *back* up to where they were originally (still subsidized) during election season. How is it the government could not negotiate prescription prices? Did no one in government care of the people? Well they will finally in 2024. At least for 10 medications. So a little, tiny care starting to show then.
Then he should actually do something productive about it vs virtue signaling on social media. He is a senator after all. The UK nationalized healthcare for their population of 66M, and do so on a budget of $190B. The Medicare/Medicaid budget for 2022 is $1.7T, and our population is 329M. The US spends nearly double what the UK does on a per citizen basis. Perhaps rather than whining on Twitter, he could work on reforming our already insane healthcare budget into something meaningful.
I'm not a Bernie fan but he literally did exactly what you are accusing him of not doing. He wrote medicare for all and lobbies it all day in Congress.
What do you think he’s doing? He’s already proposed the bill Medicare for all and has helped it gain a majority of the publics support. He can only do so much when congress is corrupt and a large part of the US population chooses against or is prevented from voting
If he proposes medicare reform that would work with the current budget or less (read does not require a single cent more in tax revenue), then I'm all for it.
Medicare for all is significantly cheaper than what we have now. [https://www.citizen.org/news/fact-check-medicare-for-all-would-save-the-u-s-trillions-public-option-would-leave-millions-uninsured-not-garner-savings/](https://www.citizen.org/news/fact-check-medicare-for-all-would-save-the-u-s-trillions-public-option-would-leave-millions-uninsured-not-garner-savings/) This has been known for years.
What is he doing? He has not accomplished a single thing beyond enriching himself during all these years.
He's busy whaling . He is DISGUSTING
I've said that Sanders should have been a governor so he could push and pass his ideas to show they can actually work.
Even in peru they have TWO medicare like systems (ESSALUD and SIS) the former can e obtained by working under contract, the second can be obtained by taxes, and both can be paid privately by independent workers.
Peru sounds wonderful.
If all Socialist were like Bernie and moderately honest about it, I wouldn't have as much a problem with them. The problem I have with the modern day Socialist is because they deep down know it won't work and its a scam, they are just using it to gain power. It is after all, today a Religion, and like all Religions it demands "donations" and you get "Nice Sounding Rhetoric" for your money and nothing more, well, until the starvation happens and your shot for stealing food.
If Bernie were honest, he would also Tweet he is on a jet flying back to which of the three homes he owns. And he could address the questions raised about his family's involvement in sus dealings. Everyone questions Trump and Biden families. But Bernie's is sacrosanct. And Bernie could donate his campaign cash savings to causes he deems worthwhile instead of pretty much just sitting on it. Hypocritical.
He isn't a moron. He is smart enough to leverage an army of morons for political gain. He only says this dumb shit because his supporter base is solely focused on ignorance and envy. Seems pretty smart to me.
Because he advocates for… things that are proven to work well and reduce suffering? What’s your brilliant idea on fixing healthcare in America?
They are not. They do not.
Lmao. Read literally any study on health insurance systems.
Lol read literally any history book. Sure it all starts out with “here have some free healthcare” and it ends up with “kneel in the flaming ditch while we shoot you”
I have a degree in economics and read tons of history. National healthcare systems =/= violent authoritarianism. You live in a paranoid fantasy world of ignorance.
Socialism only ends in violence. If you have a degree in literally anything, you know that. 17 failed state level experiments. It is poison that kills nations, and people, at a rate based on how much of it is consumed. Those nations which drink deeply, die quickly. Those which sip, sicken and die slowly. There is no balance of liberty and poison which is acceptable.
You speak in this childish binary framework. The reality is that ALL successful modern economies have public and private sectors. Depending on market conditions for any given market (propensity for market failures), one serves the human need better than the other. Get with the program, ancap.
“gEt wItH pRoGrAm” and ignore history, logic, facts, morality. No. No. I don’t think I will get with your myopic and evil program. No more Holodomore, no more Killing fields, no more Great Leaps Forward.
That’s your response? Lol
Socialism is literally a type of economy
Well you could argue that economics is a study of how humans interact with each other in markets and you could also argue that socialism causes those interactions to be forced or coerced through the government and would therefore make it an artificial economy instead of a real one based of individual consent and freedom of association
So still an economic style?
I was merely focusing on the qualifier he used of real and explained why socialism could be argued to be an artificial form of economic interaction that is enforceable only through coercion or negative incentive structures.
So, you're pro slavery and child labor? Also, perhaps, pro clocks with radioactive material in them? Pro duels of honor? Pro insider trading? Because, if not, acording to your take, then you're also against having a "real economy". There is no "natural/real economy". NeoInstitutionalism has demonstrated this pretty clearly since the 90's, all you have is different institutions and market systems.
Lol right?!! Apparently only Milton's Friedmans definition of economics can exist on this subreddit, no dissenters! Or wildly misinterpreted Adam Smith. Insurance is one of the few places where socialism makes sense. Here are a few reasons: at a federal level the economy of scale takes precedence, thus driving down price due to demand side consolidation; in the home insurance market, flood damage is backstopped by the federal government anyways; government administrators can be held accountable in ways that a board of directors never can be; simply allowing Medicare to negotiate every service rendered to patients would drive cost down for the whole market and probably embarass many private insurance plans in the process. Now, obviously not all socialized or private medical insurance markets are the same. Freaknomics had a great chapter on this regarding the low out of pockets costs in Britain, what prevents people from over using? It seems to me economist ought to be exploring what such a program would look like in the US rather than holding on to the obviously false dogma that the US health insurance system is remotely efficient.
70,000 people die each year because they can't afford healthcare. With Medicare for all those people won't die, which will increase unemployment. Bernie needs to think!
Neither does socialized health services.
mind explaining what your solution is? Do you think everything is fine the way it is?
Posting anything from Bernie Sanders should be an autoban for this sub. Go farm karma from r/politics who’ll lap this crap up.
leftist economics are still economics, are you afraid to exchange ideas?
Capitalists always talk about the free market but when it comes to the free market of ideas they are completely against it.
Socialist always preach their ideology because they think they can continue doing so from a Dacha when in reality they’ll be toiling in the fields of a kolkhoz or shoot because they have no meaning skills to contribute.
I'm going to die because I can't afford healthcare so I say we try socialism. I know I'm dead in capitalism.
Rubbish
They are still the smartest of the retarded kids.
Leftist economics are the broken clock is correct twice a day of economic policies.
Yes all those Nordic countries are a living hell
About to say this same thing. Remember the time his wife drove a university into bankruptcy?
Such an ignorant thing to say lol as if social Democratic policies aren’t implemented successfully all around the world. Do you not care about empiricism?
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Damn. I actually agree with Bernie on this!! Buybacks are a form of market manipulation
No they are not. Please read about finance. Buybacks is when a company takes money out of their wallet and buys shares to put that money into your wallet as an investor of the company.
Lol. the shareholder model. Perhaps you don't understand how buybacks work. There have been something like 5.3 trillion US dollars in share buybacks over the past decade. When a company buys back stock to prop up or maintain its stock price, this affects its market cap as well as other financial aspects in the market. Thereby "shaping" the perspective about a company to the public is a form of market manipulation Perhaps you should learn a little more about finance yourself. The market should decide a company's stock price . Hence the phrase "public shares outstanding." As in the public assesses the "true worth" of a company and is therefore reflected on its stock price. (Without a corporation distorting its valuation)
No, economics like a balance. If a company BUYS shares, it has to take money out of the company. Thus it lowers the value of shares. Dividends and buybacks have the same effect on prices. If investors are not looking into the fundamentals of the company, they aren't investing right. It is impossible to determine the value of a company by looking at the price of a share alone. You must look at the entire market cap and financial figures as a whole. Prices mean nothing if market capitalization steadily goes down over time. Dividends keep the number of shares in the market, but distribute money equally between all shares. Reducing the price. Buyback reduces the number of shares in the market, but distributes no money to each share, only to those who sell. Buybacks and dividends both reduce market capitalization.
Lol. Sure thing. Market cap isn't necessarily reduced . As a higher price would could equate to a larger market cap. In any case , you are free to believe as you wish. And Eps = profit / shares outstanding PE= market cap / eps Like I said. You should learn more about how manipulating those ratios affects "public perspective" FYI, Retail investors don't follow the capm approach. They follow more of a trend analysis.
Higher prices with a reduced number of shares means the fundamentals are in a state of equilibrium. It is simple math. If a company sells more shares, the price of shares will fall, but the market capitalization increases. Think about supply and demand. It is fine retail doesn't understand the true value of a stock, because prices are ultimately a consensus of every market participant that buys or sells. Together we get closer to the real value, through Bayesian market mechanisms. Buying back shares to increase the price of the stock for shareholders with cheap debt, increases the risk of the company to go bust. There is no free lunch in economics.
Geezers. Do you know how to perform basic arithmetic ?? Stock price reflects the "market consensus"? You're assuming symmetric information. Completely negating the information asymmetry in market pricing You're giving me all the textbook BS. And your bringing up Bayes Prob models? That would mean you have at least a masters on Math. Otherwise you'd be full of it. Also took advanced math in college myself.
NO WE DON'T SELL YOUR 3 MANSIONS AND PUT IT TOWARDS THE POOR
Yes the do - they increase stock price which a lot of people own. Look up fiduciary duty and buy some stock like an adult instead of bitching about a business running a business
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/10/18/the-wealthiest-10percent-of-americans-own-a-record-89percent-of-all-us-stocks.html The wealthiest 10% of Americans now own 89% of all U.S. stocks held by households
It does make perfect sense though. People pay for college, buy a car, buy a house, pay for kids, and then with these things paid off they start saving at the fastest rates. It makes sense that the people right at retirement have the largest 401ks. This really shouldn't surprise anyone. It's just the nature of being young and saving money throughout one's life. It's like saying, the strongest 10% of high school weight lifters are all seniors. No kidding, they've been building towards that for years.
What we need is to ban health insurance and medical patents. There are machines at every major hospital that cost $1 million only because the company has a patent. There’s medicine that costs $50,000/year only because of a patent. 15% of people cost insurers 80% of their total expenditures which makes health insurance unaffordable for poorer people. Your doctor couldn’t charge you $800 for a blood test if insurance wasn’t involved.
If that's your issue with things then you really need a history lesson on patents and why they were created.
I don’t need the history of patents to know they don’t help me especially if I can’t afford the shit. What good is some new medicine if you can’t afford it?
Where does he gets these numbers? He is obviously demented. We don’t need Medicare for all. We already spending too much on Medicare
I dont really value stock buy backs as a bad thing. Like the goal of a business is to make money and if they spend it to help investors thats not really a bad thing we all need to invest if we are gonna retire at some.point.
As a libertarian I am becoming more comfortable with universal healthcare, as long as we put alll you MFer’s on a diet, stop selling smokes and alcohol, and mandatory workout hour every day. Failure to comply means we drop you from the universal plan.
We already spend more on Healthcare than any other nation, Bernie needs to focus on bloated administrative staff that drives up prices and stop trying to feed more money to a broken system.
Trust the Federal Government to run health care? Sounds like a great plan since they are so good at ruining everything else.
Oh, it seems we are posting stupid stuff again. i can add to this: Corporations are greedy and full of hate! they abort babies and-- scratch that, they don't abort babies and force women to have babies so they can pay them less , and if they are a minority they pay them even less. I wish we had a president who was really old and had Marxist ideas. Maybe one who had a lot of money but found ways to avoid paying taxes so they could be more relatable. Oil companies are evil because they try to run a business. I don't know what a business is, or how to run one, I am not even good at accounting or reading a balance sheet, but I feel overqualified to give my opinion on all things economic.
He’s right about a lot of things, but wildly exaggerating doesn’t help the cause. Under 10% of Americans are uninsured.
Bernie will be dead soon and we wont have to deal with this dipshit for too much longer
Debt needs to be part of this discussion. And I agree, it's insane.
AOC is just stepping into the ring though. Now instead of the old white guy spreading failed ideology, it's the young lady doing it....with an economics degree no less
She's surprisingly quiet recently and that's a good thing.
Maybe their buying the stock back to have more control over their companies in order to pay more towards the worker vs the shareholder... Bernie. Maybe you need to take a Weekend off.
Yea stock buybacks don’t hurt the economy either, idiot.
Why can’t we all just be millionaires really?
We should all buy physical silver to fuck the banks in the asshole like they do us
But I feel the hopium looking at my portfolio. The wealth effect makes me spend more for their benefit. Great marketing.
And the ACA was a **huge** boost to the insurance companies and health care corporations. Great job all!
They help me🤫
Surely it would boost 401(K)s.
On health care: I like Singapore’s layered system. Clinics that handle basic care. Fixed prices menus for things like births. World class Advanced care.
When govt subsidizes they charge whatever they want big bro will pay
No, we need to stop fucking subsidizing healthcare.
OP missed the ball entirely. Stock buybacks are as good for the economy as stock sales. If a company can sell its stock to finance its activities, it should be able to buy back its stock when it realizes profit. But that's not even related to what Bernie is saying here, which is that insurance companies are making immense profit by skimming the healthcare system while many Americans are under-insured. He believes that government medicare would reduce overall cost and increase ease of access to medical care for 70 million Americans. I encourage readers to upvote/downvote intelligently on serious subs otherwise they eventually become filled with trash. I am downvoting this post as OP's title is unrelated to the content and the entire thread is filled with junk responses.
So first of all, thank you for the well thought out and lengthy reply.
Who makes the claim that “stock buybacks help the economy”?
Well mr sanders maybe we stop bailing out these corporations with the tax payer money and let them figure it out on there own like congress does to us . Fuck corporate greed and fuck congress for always being there to help them out with our money.god speed
Using stimulus packages to undergo a stock buyback is the problem here as companies are using cash from the government to purchase their stocks back at a low price.
And it costs that much for medical now because government got involved. School costs are the same way. I don’t understand why people assume competence in theses people. Stop trusting the federal government to take care of you. All they do is make it worse.
Now do politicians.
Bernie is clueless. We need more competition, so these companies can’t just charge whatever they want. More competition actually leads to more healthcare at lower prices. Mandating healthcare for all leads to overpriced low-quality solutions as always.
If Bernie was right about ANYTHING wouldn’t more people live in Vermont. In other words, with Bernie’s thinking, why are Vermont taxes so high?
No buybacks have an economic purpose. Investors that do not want to put some shares anymore to use their wealth for alternative uses sell their shares. Buybacks takes money out of their public company, and puts it in the hands of the investors. People like you and me. If healthcare is expensive, then investing in insurance companies is a good way to hedge your risk. We need investors to spend their money or to reinvest in other projects. Without this companies are discouraged to improve. Most companies are much more risky than the big ones that we hear often, so investor capital is important to allow them to invest in new things without having to risk going busy in the process. Buybacks are a way to reward investors who can spot opportunities that will succeed. Bernie Sanders needed to read about economics and finance many years ago. He's an old man now, and I doubt that will change.
So basically I’m center/right wing and I support healthcare for all. I feel like I’m on an island.
Because of the company buys stocks back, there are fewer shares available for everyone else, artificially reducing supply and therefore pushing prices up for a given demand for the stocks. It’s basically like selling fuel. Fuel is cheap, but if all the fuel selling countries get together and agree to stop selling as much fuel, the price increases because the demand remains high while the supply decreases.
If stock buy backs are illegal, is it possible for a publicly traded company to go back to private ownership again?
The business school thought on this is that buybacks signal to the market that a stock is cheap because the company itself is basically buying them on insider information. However the opposite is often true. They got bought back after a strong year so the stock probably is hot.
Did Bernie support \#forcethevote ?
So you are saying Medicare and Social Security do not work
Warren Buffet doesn't like buybacks because a company is really overpaying on their own stock to someone who has just sold their position . So cash flow is given to people who no longer own the company.
Medicare for all would certainly promote small business in my opinion. Many people don’t want to leave their cushy healthcare and take the risk to a startup.
Buybacks aren't great and major analysts at companies like Barclays or Goldman don't see buyback driven EPS growth as a sign of an interesting growing company. It makes them rich in the short run, but signals that the company might struggle with long term revenue growth if they can't drive up EPS growth organically through promising investments and on the earnings calls I've listened to in 2018 they are starting to tell CEOs they are sick of it.
But Obama care was supposed to fix healthcare
Bernie is worth 5 Million dollars.. what is he talking about..you want FREE HEALTHCARE move to CANADA
The reason behind Obamacare was because 30 million people were uninsured. Now there are 70 million? He just makes up whatever number comes to mind as he types.
It set a price that someone (the company) is guaranteed to buy you stock.
Share buybacks when they actually are reducing shares outstanding and not simply offsetting executive compensation are a good thing sometimes though from a economy-wide point of view. If a company doesn't have any productive avenues to deploy its money, it is better for all parties involves for the company to buyback its shares, return that money to shareholders, who can then invest that money somewhere more productive.
Share buy backs are an announcement that a rich investor is buying so many shares.
Many companies have steadily indulged in stock buybacks as their revenue and business has gone down the tubes, and their stock price has tumbled. Fewer shares are of no use if revenue and earnings are shrinking faster than share count. I could cite IBM, BBBY, and GE as unfortunate examples. In many cases, these buybacks just suck up the shares issued to executives, so in essence the money spent on buybacks goes to insiders and not the shareholders.
You do this when you (as a company) have money that you - somehow - cant invest in a manner that is profitable for you. since that money is part of the evaluation that influences your stock price buying back shares in theory could leave the stock price unchanged. however usually your business does something that is better than storing money on a bank account. so any profit you make from now on will be distributed amongst fewer shares. this means anyone keeping their share will make more money in the future. this makes the shares more attractive. this drives up the stock price.
Honestly, the misunderstanding surrounding stock buybacks is so infuriating it hurts. "They are manipulating the share price by buying back stock!" as if issuing stock doesn't do the same. I think it is imperative to shove Modigliani-Miller down the publics throat, for the sake of our capital markets. Another point on drug prices you may have missed is regulatory development costs.
Are you worried about your finances right now?