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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (51488)	3/3/2008 9:42:27 PM
From: Cogito	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 543492

Karen - I'm having trouble reconciling these two things that you said. First: "Remember that we're not talking about a fixed set of procedures at a decreasing cost. We're talking about a dramatically increasing set of procedures at a cost that's being restrained somewhat from the point to which it would have otherwise escalated. The net result is an increase." Second: "You're just musing and I'm just trying to keep the analysis of a very complicated system organized. Costs are costs and service level is service level." What is a "dramatically increasing set of procedures" if not a rising service level? So aren't you saying in the first paragraph that costs are higher because of a rising service level? And aren't the costs of most procedures rising? Doesn't that mean that even if service levels remained the same, costs would still be increasing? Meanwhile, you do have a good point about how catastrophic health insurance is cheap in comparison with the all encompassing health plans most people consider to be the norm today. Thus, your conclusion that rising service levels have a lot to do with rising overall costs is correct, in that people do make more use of healthcare if they don't have to pay a lot out of pocket every time they go to the doctor. I also think there's a feeling of "I'm paying these high premiums, so I might as well take advantage of the coverage." A catastrophic plan might have left me just as well off after my cancer. The bills amounted to several hundred thousand dollars. But on the other hand, if I didn't have a more general plan I might not have gone to the doctor as early as I did, and might well have ended up dying as a result. Or my treatment might have gone on much longer and been more expensive when I finally did get a diagnosis. Hard to say which eventuality would have been less expensive overall for the insurance company. I do believe, however, that if every single entity involved with my care and the insurance company, too, weren't making a profit, then the overall care might have ended up costing much less. - Allen