>> you'd just be changing the payer...and you'd likely add a shitload of cost, having lost the power of government and having to pay profits to private insurance companies. It makes no sense at all.
What makes no sense is your comment.
First of all, you realize that commercial insurance company profits don't amount to crap. $12 Billion/year, 0.5% or less of the cost of health care. That, for efficient and effective management of half the health care finance system. A total bargain.
Secondly, it has been shown time and again that private health insurance companies operate more efficiently that government payers. By a wide margin. And that is before you take into account the waste, fraud, and abuse differential.
But those are MINOR points compared with the big one -- the fact that government involvement in health care is, quite obviously, the most important single driver of health care cost increases. Has been that way since 1965, when government first got involved.
Practically every credible study over the years has pointed to cost shifting to private plans as among the most important drivers of cost increases. There are tons of such studies, but here's an example:
unh.edu
There is just no doubt at all that GOVERNMENT is the basic cause of our health care crisis. Aside from the rather obvious correlation (after all, health care costs were not a problem for anyone until Medicare and Medicaid screwed it up, although the seeds date back to WWII), there is plenty of empirical evidence that doesn't just SUGGEST, but PROVES that government is the problem. So, you're going to solve this problem with MORE government? |
