re: If we had a true "pay as you go" system in health insurance, we would not have escalating costs.
If people actually had to pay full price for their brand-name prescription medication, Big Pharma would not be able to charge so much because the market would quickly learn to accept generics.
Very true. But there is no way to get 'there' from 'here'. Just try to pass a law that there will be no more employer paid health insurance... without a replacement. You can get to single payer, but you can't just eliminate the current convoluted system. Politically impossible.
re: I already covered malpractice lawsuits, etc. But I'll also add that doctors more often than not make a real good faith attempt to solve the problems of the patients. Now because of malpractice, they have to spend extraordinary amounts of money on malpractice insurance. Sure, the doctors aren't becoming homeless because of it, because the costs just get passed on to other people.
That's a separate problem, and isn't effected one way or another by single payer.
re: I still believe the following article is accurate and gets to the root problems of rising health care costs
Yes it does, and health care costs are rising everywhere, including in single payer countries. But ours are rising from a MUCH higher level. Let's solve that part.
re: Now the bottom line, i.e. why I think universal health care will multiply the problems. Because you will never have a true "pay as you go" system as long as your priority is making sure everyone has health coverage regardless of their ability to pay.
As said, you will never get to "pay as you go" from the current system.
re: Then you add a bureaucratic culture that actively discourages cutting costs because that means the budget for next year will be smaller.
That's nothing compared to the pressure for insurance company profits, increasing salaries and marketing. To say nothing of the work all the hospitals, clinics and doctors have to perform to try and capture payment from 200 different insurance companies that are fighting every step of the way.
re: Then you add the politics that favors the existence of an entitlement over the quality of service provided, much like the way King-Drew Medical Center survived for years despite many patients dying due to neglect, etc.
"A" doesn't follow "B" in the above.
re: Based on all that, you would have a tough time convincing me that federal bureaucrats would do any better than those working for private health insurance.
Federal bureaucrats are cheaper than private bureaucrats. And they work for you, not against you to avoid paying your claim. Have you seen in some companies they get commissions for the number of claims denied?
Listen, if you want to be an elite, you could still get supplemental. |
