Apr 23

Written by:
4/23/2009 4:50 PM 

A Health Care Plan for Vashon

A project of the Ad hoc Committee on Alternate Currency

Presented here is a combination of single-payer health care with a local exchange currency system. This combination attempts to fix certain problems with US health insurance and US currency. As will be seen, this health care is unlike conventional health insurance and this exchange currency is unlike US currency. Here follows a short description of the combination.

The single payer is a Vashon organization that owns a clinic and employs medical staff. It is funded by monthly premiums paid in Exchange currency. The Exchange is a membership group. All members of the Exchange are entitled to basic health care by paying a monthly premium in Exchange currency. The Exchange maintains a ledger consisting of one account per member. Of a type known as complementary, the Exchange records trade between members by subtracting from one account and adding same to the other. Each account begins with zero and has credit up to some figure (equivalent to about one thousand USD in the Fourth Corner Exchange). A negative balance does not incur interest, and there is no time limit on repayment. A pauper willing to work has basic health care. The key to making the combination work is establishment of the value of the exchange currency.

This presentation outlines a plan for the combination. Basic health care is to be defined, and Exchange currency is to be given a value. This latter is critical because an endowment of US dollars is essential for the clinic. And that requires conversion of value between the dollar and Exchange currency.

That completes the introduction. The following outline is laid out so that contributors may pick a topic of interest and work on it without need to correlate with others.

All those interested are invited to work on a topic. Who knows, you might become famous.

Plan Topics:

The Vashon Exchange

1. Propose a basis of value for the Exchange currency. This is mandatory because of need to convert with dollars. Surely you can do better than the dollar, whose value is a plaything of the establishment. A word of advice, gold simply won’t do.

2. Investigate reasons why nobody on Vashon wants Fourth Corner Exchange

3. Address the need for, and regulation of, credit in the Exchange.

4, Address the matter of investing. Do you agree or disagree that the exchange currency could accumulate by earning interest? Assuming you disagree, how then is a person to save up for retirement?

5. How can dollars be invested in something like the clinic given that the clinic is to be operated using exchange currency?

Basic Health Care

1. Set forth the essential features of preventive care. Consider conventional and alternate practice, also diet.

2. Set forth the essential features of basic restorative care. That is, where is the line to be drawn regarding transplants?

3. Set forth immunization policy.

4. Sketch a drug purchase policy that reflects prevention.

5. Study how to pay the staff with exchange currency.

6, Estimate the cost of a basic care facility.

7. Using a Vashon population of 10,000 estimate the monthly premium per person for basic health care.

8. Explore how this single-payer plan might co-exist with existing plans.

9. How might a person be rewarded for investing dollars in the clinic?

A Blanket Question

If the established financial system fails does our health care have to fail or are we smart enough to have a workable alternate in place?