Andy, let's use your own post as fodder. You talk about regulations holding the insurance companies back, so change the regulations. How can a pediatrician who has to pay 500,000 a year for insurance keep her rates down? Does Mexico have a lot of lawyers suing for health care. Does Thailand? Look at,their costs. We would do better to pay for the procedures in foreign countries.. If we allowed national insurance companies we might get companies that specialize in diabetes, heart are, cancer, or Alzheimer's.
We also need to make more use of technology. I was able to watch an operation I was to have on you tube. I was able to investigate symptoms at websites. There should be a federal database that says how much operations and treatments should cost so people have tools to negotiate with. The govt,should pay for Doctor and nurses education and then have them spend 5 years in the inner city or rural areas.and something that is a fact today. On the same drug you can save as much as 200 by buying it at Costco instead of Walgreen. The govt should should publish these drug prices. People with good lifestyles should pay less for health insurance and those with dangerous lifestyles should be charged more. If 5 major diseases causes 80 per cent of healthcare costs then focus on those diseases like a laser.
I could babble on all night, but the point is that there are so many solutions out there and nobody is going after them fast enough.
We'd like to reduce regulation, but we just went the other way. We drastically increased regulations, which increased costs passed onto consumers by insurance companies with Obama Care.
Now as for a Pediatrician paying $500,000, that's exceptionally rare. That doctor has likely had some problems in the past, which is why their rates are so high.
Medical Malpractice: Myths and Realities - True Cost of Health Care
The only doctors that are being nailed to the wall with high premiums for liability, are the ones which have screwed up. Similar to the paying massive auto insurance premiums, are those who have had an accident.
Could some tort reform help? Yes... but... not nearly as much as people claim. There is tons of defensive medicine going on, but understand that if you have tort reform that actually works, it would mean that a doctor using his best judgement, may not order a test, that "could have" detected the cancer, that killed your wife. That's the trade off.
And then you can't sue him for malpractice. Which I actually agree with. Malpractice needs to be a series of consistent clear cut incompetence in my book. But others want to sue every time a doctor makes a bad call, and that's why doctors routinely practice defensive medicine, and order a dozen tests when only one is required.
There's a trade off. One way or the other.
"If we allowed national insurance companies we might get companies that specialize in diabetes, heart are, cancer, or Alzheimer's."
I'm confused why you would say this, given we have those now, without national insurance. And Ironically, we have people who come here from all over the world where they have national insurance, to be treated at specialty places in our country, where we don't have national insurance.
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I could list a few others, but that makes the point. Alzheimers, thus far there isn't anything to be done about it. There are some things being worked on, but the government has pushed companies out of doing research. It's simply too expensive.
When you hear that "X Corp" is trying out a new treatment, what that usually means today is, that they bought out a little company that came up with something.
The problem is, the left-wing idiots have taxed the crap out of companies. "Companies are making too much profit! Evil wealthy! Greed!".... right? But where do you think companies get the money to pay for R&D? From profit. But we have a 35% corporate tax on profit. So most all big companies today do not invest much in R&D. Instead they wait until someone else comes up with something, in a small company somewhere, and then they buy them out.
Equally, small companies simply don't have the capital to fund the cost of clinical trials, and doing all the government regulations required to bring the product they have to market. So they have no choice but to sell out to the Mega-Corps.
Listen, or read this episode of EconTalk for more information on the matter.
Timothy Taylor on Government vs. Business | EconTalk | Library of Economics and Liberty
This system of course, works great for the super rich and wealth and the mega corps. Which is again is why I've said over and over and over.... the left-wing regulation is the number one supporter of the super wealthy. Capitalist like me, wouldn't have the expensive tax rates, and heavy regulatory burden, that creates these monsters.
There should be a federal database that says how much operations and treatments should cost so people have tools to negotiate with
This is another one of those "sounds good in your head" theories, that is simply impractical and impossible to make work.
You really want politicians in Washington DC, who have never worked in health care, never ran a hospital, never run so much as a dentist office, and most have never run even a lemonade stand, standing around debating what the cost of a colonoscopy should be, when half of them can't even spell it, let alone, know where on the body that is? Sheila Jackson Lee asked when the Mars Rover was going to get to the US flag..... and you want people like her, debating how much ANY operation should cost?
Now I know what you are thinking. These brilliant angelic beings in government will come up with some Utopian system for determining price.... but understand this.... they debate how much treatments should be paid with medicare today. That's why Medicare is going broke, and doctors and hospitals refuse to accept medicare patients routinely.
Let's even make up that we do in fact have brilliant people in government.... (hahahahahaha)...... let's say we do....
Do you realize how impossible this is? How much do you think an operation is going to cost in New York, NY, verses... Pueblo CO? $50,000 buys you a mansion in Pueblo. Where should the government set the price for an operation? You set the price high, and the hospitals in Pueblo go out of business, because they have no customers. You set the price low, and the hospitals in New York go out of business because no doctor would work for so little.
Even within states, the cost of living is massively different. The Hospital in down town Columbus is expensive. As you would expect. taxes are higher. Property is more expensive. Drive to the hospital just outside the city... wow, cheaper. What a shock. Taxes are lower. Property is cheaper. Who would have thunk it?
Then you have other problems. I delivered supplies from Columbus Ohio, to a hospital located in WV. Of course they paid through the teeth, but they were so far from the beaten path, that was the only way to get supplies. How do you price them?
See it's absolutely impossible for you to come up with some magic standardized price list. You just can't do it. You need a market system, where prices are determined by supply and demand. When that happens, you'll see prices fall to the market level. And we don't know what that market level is. Because we don't have a market yet.
But if you have government start assigning prices, you are going to end up with some hospitals over priced and empty, and others closed.
If you doubt that, just take a look at what is already happening.
Private cancer docs say they're getting forced out of business
Does limiting access to top cancer centers undermine the ACA?
The govt,should pay for Doctor and nurses education and then have them spend 5 years in the inner city or rural areas.and something that is a fact today
Again, another nifty idea, that doesn't have a great track record.
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UK doctors, trained at tax payer expense, and then leave the country. Free-education sounds like a wonderful idea, but the fact is, once that person has an education, you can't force him to work somewhere.
Are we in for another doctor exodus to the U.S.? - Macleans.ca
Canadian doctors leaving for the US. Now, if you are informed, I'm sure you'll have seen contradictory evidence, which is absolutely true. The flow of Canadian doctors to the US, isn't static. It fluctuates up and down, which we should expect. When the government tries to reign in costs, by capping doctor pay, suddenly there is a flow of doctors to the US. When the government realizes the massive shortage of doctors, and wait times are huge, they remove the cap, and the flow of doctors to the US drops. Better still, there are doctors that go to Canada, to get trained on tax payer money, and then quickly come back to the US to practice.
This plan has already been tried by the way. We have debt forgiveness for teachers, to make them work in inner city schools. Oddly my sister attempted this. She went to an inner city school, where she was paid next to nothing (relative to a decent teaching job), and it was so miserable, she quit immediately. Better to pay back the loan making real money, than live miserable and barely paid for years.
Teacher Loan Forgiveness in Florida Has Positive Effects, At Least in the Short Term
According to this, loan forgiveness, only had a mild 25% higher retention rate for those who enrolled in the program. Meaning many didn't enroll. And those that did, only stayed for the time required to get the debt forgiven. Then they left too.
In the short term, you'll get tons of new doctors. Anyone that can get $100,000 in medical school loans paid for free, is going to jump on it. But when the wages start falling, and those doctors can get paid more elsewhere, they'll leave. You'll end up like the UK
Breakthrough cancer treatment 'only offered to private patients'
Privately paying? Sure we can treat you. Oh, you are a gov-patient? Sorry. Maybe next year. Have a nice day.
If your job had been nationalized, and you found out you could earned double at a private company, where would you work? Same exact job. Twice the pay. Same distance from home. Why would you assume doctors are any different?
People with good lifestyles should pay less for health insurance and those with dangerous lifestyles should be charged more
Ironically, that is exactly what Obama Care just prevented. Again, I said at the start, we want to remove the regulations. It's the regulations that prevent exactly what you said.
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<sarcasm mode on>
