fatvegan

Denzil (and some other guys from CHERE) did some research on the private health insurance market. Abbott doesn't like it, so they must have done something right. Apparently, a lot of Australian's get private health insurance but don't use it. The tax incentives to buy insurance mean that it's sometimes worth getting even if you never intend to use it. So what really happens is the insurance companies and the insurance "user" divvy up the tax refund, but nothing else actually changes. At least in high number of cases.

I think the real issue is that the only way you can have an effective private health insurance system that people want to use is by having a crap public health insurance system. And despite what everyone is saying, I just don't think public health care is crap enough yet. Give us time though.