Health care reform and its battles draw similar lines to the civil wa

[71buickfreak]

I am not a doctor, so I can't give a number for it, but when it comes to insurance, they already have these dollar amounts they are willing to pay. When you don't have insurance, most doc offices give you a 20-40% discount. There is your price, say 25% less than the standard quoted fee. so, $30 for a basic office visit.

I can take an A1C blood test (for testing long-term glucose levels and various other levels, like proteins, cholesterols, etc) for $160 at the local office, they send the labs to Tulsa, it takes about a week. For $40, I can buy a kit at Walgreens, stick my finger (which us diabetics are used to doing) and put some blood in the sample and mail it off. Takes about a week to get results. Hmmm, what exactly am I paying extra for? $120 to get the same results in the same approximate time AND I get stuck with a needle in my vein AND I have to wait in a disease-infested lab waiting room (I don't like going to the doctor), sign me up! No thanks. It costs $160 becuase the insurance companies get an automatic 30-40% discount and the office gets the copay. So they push the costs a little to squeeze some more money out of the deep pockets of the insurance company, it won't hurt them, they have it. Problem is, they have investors just like any other big business, so they push the costs right along to you and me (well, not me cause I don't have 'surance).

I have a friend who recently had a baby. He is a fireman, his wife works for a hospital. She gets a huge discount on services. Her insurance covered all but $1000 of the baby bill. His insurance was supposed to cover the rest. His insurance company decided that this was co-insurance and they paid $55 of the $1000 bill. they got stuck with the rest. He pays $240 a month to cover all of them and she was paying another $100 or so to cover herself.

 

[RidgeHunter]

Again, my biggest problem with calling obamacare reform is that there is no actual reform, just forcing people to pay for something that they don't want.

Well, your proposed system would force a doctor to work for a price he/she doesn't want to work for.

FWIW, I can find common ground with you on the "use insurance for everything" culture. That's a huge pet peeve of mine.

Like when I was at the grocery store in Yuppieville and they were giving flu shots. Some assclown of a woman was all worked up wondering if her insurance would cover a $20 flu shot. I so wanted to slap her with a piece of deli meat for even asking that. To set the scene, I can pretty much guarantee you she had a $40,000+ car in the lot and lived in a ~$250,000 house. God forbid you shell out a twenty for a shot, you waste of space.

I've always been of the mindset insurance is for unexpected, expensive things that would be a complete and total disruption to any average persons finances, not an office visit for a runny nose. But that's just me. Ideally I'd like to see piddly insurance claims end, but it's not a topic I've devoted much time to thinking about, so I don't know how we could go about that.

 

[71buickfreak]

I understand what you are saying about getting told what to work for, but there is a caveat to that- reduce malpractice insurance and then all of sudden their costs go way down. True health care reform would be a massive project that would certainly ruffle feathers, but the insurance industry could use some ruffling. why have insurance when it won't pay for things like weight loss counseling? That makes you healthier, but they don't want to pay for that, even though it is their one purpose, to pay for health care-related costs.

You go to a mechanic and you don't have money but you have a gun or some other valuable goods, you find the right shop, you can barter. Docs used to barter all the time, they didn't have the expenses they have now. You can't pay a $10,000 a month malpractice insurance bill with a glock 20 and a goat.

 

[Billybob]

And the difference between gov. mandated insurance, (auto or health) and a "protection racket" is...?

Tyranny is defined as that which is legal for the government but illegal for the citizenry - Thomas Jefferson

"If you cannot constrain the state to the standards in 'The Law', then you simply legalize plunder. Given the choice, I would rather deal with plunder by individuals than plunder by the state any day."
"But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime." *~Frédéric Bastiat The Law. 1850


"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can
prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people
under the pretense of taking care of them."
-- Thomas Jefferson

 

[finnimus]

A single payer system means you have free access to health care, no copays, no insurance costs, etc. Yes, you have to pay taxes for it, but it would still be less than what you would be paying to fund an insurance industry that rapes everyone, much like the oil and gas industry.

A single payer system does not mean you have free access to care. It means there is only one administrator of insurance benefits. The purpose is two-fold. You create the largest pool of people to share risk. Secondly, a component of healthcare costs is the administrative cost of processing claims. The theory is that if you put everyone under the same roof, you will reduce redundancy and increase efficiency.

A system providing free care would fail quickly and miserably. Consumption would increase without any penalty to the consumer for the increase. Thus, there's no reason for a consumer not to "consume."

I am not a doctor, so I can't give a number for it, but when it comes to insurance, they already have these dollar amounts they are willing to pay. When you don't have insurance, most doc offices give you a 20-40% discount. There is your price, say 25% less than the standard quoted fee. so, $30 for a basic office visit.

I don't know if you're fully aware of the costs of running a medical practice. Here are a few costs to consider:
1. Nurse Salary: $38k
2. Office Assistant Salary: $26k
3. Rent: $24k
4. Utilities: $12k
5. Office Expenses (computers, phones, etc.): $12k
That's a total of $112k no including the physician salary (minimum $150k), malpractice (minimum $10k), continuing education ($2.5k), clinic supplies ($12k), billing (18k), benefits (15% salaries), electronic medical record ($18k per year and $60k implementation) or the startup costs of a practice like remodeling, exam tables, trash cans, computers. Then there's the 90-120 days you go with no income as you wait for Medicare and insurance companies to start paying you. After all those expenses, most physicians have 6-25% of patients that can't pay (uninsured/unemployed/broke). This doesn't include patients who have insurance and have the ability to pay, but choose not to. $30 per visit doesn't go very far.

Hmmm, what exactly am I paying extra for? $120 to get the same results in the same approximate time AND I get stuck with a needle in my vein AND I have to wait in a disease-infested lab waiting room (I don't like going to the doctor), sign me up! No thanks.

You are paying for the cost of the office you sat in as well as the salary of the person who drew the blood. Also, without understanding the sensitivities of the test as well as the equipment being used for the test in the background, there's no way to compare price. Not all tests are created equal.

It costs $160 becuase the insurance companies get an automatic 30-40% discount and the office gets the copay. So they push the costs a little to squeeze some more money out of the deep pockets of the insurance company, it won't hurt them, they have it. Problem is, they have investors just like any other big business, so they push the costs right along to you and me (well, not me cause I don't have 'surance).

This is somewhat true. If you're paying cash, ask for the cash discount.

I have a friend who recently had a baby. He is a fireman, his wife works for a hospital. She gets a huge discount on services. Her insurance covered all but $1000 of the baby bill. His insurance was supposed to cover the rest. His insurance company decided that this was co-insurance and they paid $55 of the $1000 bill. they got stuck with the rest. He pays $240 a month to cover all of them and she was paying another $100 or so to cover herself.

Did some quick research and the cost of having a baby without complications is somewhere between $9k and $17k. Let's assume it's $9k. If your friend's wife pays $100 per month, she would have to pay for 80 months with no other covered expenses in order to break even. If she's paid less than 80 months and/or has had other covered expenses (prenatal care, anesthesia, OB physician) she's ahead.

Like when I was at the grocery store in Yuppieville and they were giving flu shots. Some assclown of a woman was all worked up wondering if her insurance would cover a $20 flu shot.

Many employers/insurance companies cover flu shots as part of preventative care. I'd do the same thing. It's a benefit I'm paying for, so I'm going to take advantage of it, $5, $20 or $2,000.

why have insurance when it won't pay for things like weight loss counseling? That makes you healthier, but they don't want to pay for that, even though it is their one purpose, to pay for health care-related costs.

More often, what is and is not covered is determined by the employer and not by the insurance company. The insurance company is just the administrator for what the employer purchases. There are a number of employers that cover weight loss counseling with a medical professional.

 

[71buickfreak]

Car insurance is different because you don't have to own a car. and if you don't have insurance and hit somebody, you hurt them directly.