When you "privatize" something, doesn't that mean that you have to show a profit?

[Yavin4]

How can you show a profit from Medicare? There's no real profit in health insurance for older people who are far more likely to use it.

[KT2000]

1. sometimes a guaranteed profit

is built into the contract, such as prisons.

[HassleCat]

2. Nah!

It just means your big contributors have to suck up load of yax dollars, then leave the public holding the empty bag. Unless, as a final insult, they shit in the bag, so it's not empty.

[global1]

3. Reduce Services - Raise Prices.....

we'll be paying more for less.

[mwooldri]

4. Nope, just that the service is run not by a public entity.

The British Railways is an example of privatization gone right and wrong. The profits are kept by the companies, the losses are absorbed by the government. A couple of companies thought that the East Coast Main Line from London to Edinburgh would be a money maker. Nevertheless this is one notable example of where a private company (National Express) walked away and where the government had to step in. Fortunately Richard Branson (who knows how to run a railway) stepped up and is now running things on that line. If this is an example of what can happen to a railway... what would happen if Medicare was fully privatized?

[unblock]

5. "privatizing" is a manipulative word used to make people think of free enterprise.

as if the government is no longer involved. it is, in a big way, by providing vast money in the form of funding, subsidies, tax breaks, whatever.

what they're really outsourcing is operations, pricing discretion, some of the policy particulars, etc. but a ton of money comes from the government.

so the "private" businesses can operate at what would otherwise be a loss without government help, but still make a "profit" once you add in the government loot.

[lpbk2713]

6. If an endeavor shows a profit, they take the credit.

If it doesn't they point fingers at the Dems.

[DesertFlower]

7. i pay more for medicare part b and c because

i have a high income. it keeps going up -- the higher your income is. i'm beginning to think that the rich don't like this.

of course, medicare does not cover everything. you still need a supplemental policy through an insurance company. those policies can be quite costly.

http://www.thespectrum.com/story/life/features/mesquite/2016/11/27/how-much-youll-pay-medicare-2017/94296402/