Why do people put up with the US healthcare system?

[healthmyths]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The sky is falling. I get it. Now maybe you should know that the patient pays only a small co-pay, if anything, and the insurer gets a deep discount ... perhaps as deep as 90% off. Pretty much nobody pays full price which may be why it is so outrageously high.

Why is it our whiny, sniveling, low-info, Chicken Little Loony Lefties either fail to tell the whole story or just don't know it?

Oh, yeah, I know these discounts.

"Hey, I'll sell you this item that you can buy for 10 bucks for only 25,000 bucks."

"No thanks"

"Okay, HUGE discount of 90%, now it's only 10,000 bucks"

"But, 90% of 25,000 isn't 10,000"

"Okay then, 9,000, special price just for you"

"Deal".

Discounts and the drug is still $5,000 compared to like $20 elsewhere. Who needs discounts like that?

OK, your analogy sucks but I'll play anyway: Because the cost of making that drug $20 to the patient is massive gov't intervention that stifles R&D (why do you suppose so many drugs and cures are developed in the US?), drags the economy as taxes must be collected and filtered through gov't fingers, diminishes quality control and purity to cut costs, and creates long waits for patient services.

There's a good reason many foreigners come to the US - many from socialized med countries - for med care and training (and pay handsomely for it). Put on your thinking cap and try to figure why.

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

As it is with very uninformed people such as yourself YOU never looked at the components of Johnson & Johnson's Financials.
I did and surprise surprise.... You completely ignored the following from their 2013 Financial report!
NOTE: Consumer/Devices made up 60% of their revenue.... NOT pharmaceuticals AS YOU IMPLIED!
NOTE: R&D is most costly for the pharmaceutical component and as such cost 29.1% of the pharmaceutical revenues!
NOTE: YOU completely forget that little thing known as TAXES! Which they paid $1.6 billion.
NOTE: YOU probably didn't go deep enough to find the reserves that have to be set aside for potential legal issues from their products!
NOTE: Their selling costs INCLUDED Consumer/Devices which you again seem unaware or just simple wanted to BIAS the material!
NOTE: you Also seem to forget the approximately 128,000 employees for which Johnson & Johnson pays PAYROLL TAXES!
These payroll taxes at average salary of the minimum of $44,000 or nearly $430 million in Payroll taxes
You didn't get into the weeds and find the FACTS and as people of your ilk are wont to do...jump to wrong conclusions!
Please try to be more informed and even more disciplined.
View attachment 88788

They only paid 1.6 on 13 billion dollars ? Seems a bit low to me.

YEA $1.6 billion seems low to someone who hates capitalism, America and oh yea maybe yourself?
Why yourself? It is possible in several ways you are an indirect owner of J&J stock via the following entities which your 401K or IRA or pension plan at work
or mutual fund investment OWNS!!!
JNJ Major Holders | Insider Transactions | Johnson & Johnson Common Stock Stock - Yahoo Finance

 

[healthmyths]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The sky is falling. I get it. Now maybe you should know that the patient pays only a small co-pay, if anything, and the insurer gets a deep discount ... perhaps as deep as 90% off. Pretty much nobody pays full price which may be why it is so outrageously high.

Why is it our whiny, sniveling, low-info, Chicken Little Loony Lefties either fail to tell the whole story or just don't know it?

Oh, yeah, I know these discounts.

"Hey, I'll sell you this item that you can buy for 10 bucks for only 25,000 bucks."

"No thanks"

"Okay, HUGE discount of 90%, now it's only 10,000 bucks"

"But, 90% of 25,000 isn't 10,000"

"Okay then, 9,000, special price just for you"

"Deal".

Discounts and the drug is still $5,000 compared to like $20 elsewhere. Who needs discounts like that?

OK, your analogy sucks but I'll play anyway: Because the cost of making that drug $20 to the patient is massive gov't intervention that stifles R&D (why do you suppose so many drugs and cures are developed in the US?), drags the economy as taxes must be collected and filtered through gov't fingers, diminishes quality control and purity to cut costs, and creates long waits for patient services.

There's a good reason many foreigners come to the US - many from socialized med countries - for med care and training (and pay handsomely for it). Put on your thinking cap and try to figure why.

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

As it is with very uninformed people such as yourself YOU never looked at the components of Johnson & Johnson's Financials.
I did and surprise surprise.... You completely ignored the following from their 2013 Financial report!
NOTE: Consumer/Devices made up 60% of their revenue.... NOT pharmaceuticals AS YOU IMPLIED!
NOTE: R&D is most costly for the pharmaceutical component and as such cost 29.1% of the pharmaceutical revenues!
NOTE: YOU completely forget that little thing known as TAXES! Which they paid $1.6 billion.
NOTE: YOU probably didn't go deep enough to find the reserves that have to be set aside for potential legal issues from their products!
NOTE: Their selling costs INCLUDED Consumer/Devices which you again seem unaware or just simple wanted to BIAS the material!
NOTE: you Also seem to forget the approximately 128,000 employees for which Johnson & Johnson pays PAYROLL TAXES!
These payroll taxes at average salary of the minimum of $44,000 or nearly $430 million in Payroll taxes
You didn't get into the weeds and find the FACTS and as people of your ilk are wont to do...jump to wrong conclusions!
Please try to be more informed and even more disciplined.
View attachment 88788

So you want to add new information to the topic, and you chose to do it as if everyone around you is stupid.

Are you joining in this debate, or just coming in to antagonize people?

I abhor LAZY people evidently like you that have fallen for the old cliched idiotic and ignorant attacks on capitalism.
Especially when you might even be an indirect owner of the very company you are attacking!
Why don't you attack lawyers for causing over $500 billion a year in WASTEFUL health services? Is it because you again are just plain ignorant about
"defensive medicine" that 90% of 138,686 physicians invited to participate in a survey said "they practice defensive medicine" at a cost of over $800 billion according to them!
But being the lazy uninformed person like you would not appreciate digging a little deeper to see why 3 distinct studies verify these above figures.
I also abhor idiots maybe like you that always believed Obama's GROSS exaggeration that there were 46 million uninsured Americans. Again I can prove there
weren't with links to the census bureau among others that show he exaggerated by over 90% that figure!

 

[frigidweirdo]

Oh, yeah, I know these discounts.

"Hey, I'll sell you this item that you can buy for 10 bucks for only 25,000 bucks."

"No thanks"

"Okay, HUGE discount of 90%, now it's only 10,000 bucks"

"But, 90% of 25,000 isn't 10,000"

"Okay then, 9,000, special price just for you"

"Deal".

Discounts and the drug is still $5,000 compared to like $20 elsewhere. Who needs discounts like that?

OK, your analogy sucks but I'll play anyway: Because the cost of making that drug $20 to the patient is massive gov't intervention that stifles R&D (why do you suppose so many drugs and cures are developed in the US?), drags the economy as taxes must be collected and filtered through gov't fingers, diminishes quality control and purity to cut costs, and creates long waits for patient services.

There's a good reason many foreigners come to the US - many from socialized med countries - for med care and training (and pay handsomely for it). Put on your thinking cap and try to figure why.

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

As it is with very uninformed people such as yourself YOU never looked at the components of Johnson & Johnson's Financials.
I did and surprise surprise.... You completely ignored the following from their 2013 Financial report!
NOTE: Consumer/Devices made up 60% of their revenue.... NOT pharmaceuticals AS YOU IMPLIED!
NOTE: R&D is most costly for the pharmaceutical component and as such cost 29.1% of the pharmaceutical revenues!
NOTE: YOU completely forget that little thing known as TAXES! Which they paid $1.6 billion.
NOTE: YOU probably didn't go deep enough to find the reserves that have to be set aside for potential legal issues from their products!
NOTE: Their selling costs INCLUDED Consumer/Devices which you again seem unaware or just simple wanted to BIAS the material!
NOTE: you Also seem to forget the approximately 128,000 employees for which Johnson & Johnson pays PAYROLL TAXES!
These payroll taxes at average salary of the minimum of $44,000 or nearly $430 million in Payroll taxes
You didn't get into the weeds and find the FACTS and as people of your ilk are wont to do...jump to wrong conclusions!
Please try to be more informed and even more disciplined.
View attachment 88788

They only paid 1.6 on 13 billion dollars ? Seems a bit low to me.

YEA $1.6 billion seems low to someone who hates capitalism, America and oh yea maybe yourself?
Why yourself? It is possible in several ways you are an indirect owner of J&J stock via the following entities which your 401K or IRA or pension plan at work
or mutual fund investment OWNS!!!
JNJ Major Holders | Insider Transactions | Johnson & Johnson Common Stock Stock - Yahoo Finance
View attachment 88804

Low to someone who hates capitalism? What does that mean? That capitalism means the richer you get the less you pay? Is that up to the point where you earn so much money the govt starts paying you? Or is that just farmers?

Do rich pharma companies not have to pay for all they use? For all the R&D the US govt spends money on? For all the scientists that they use to make their pharmaceuticals they basically pay for a lot of their training, for the infrastructure and all of that? No, free, oh and then the company goes and makes massive profits.

 

[frigidweirdo]

Oh, yeah, I know these discounts.

"Hey, I'll sell you this item that you can buy for 10 bucks for only 25,000 bucks."

"No thanks"

"Okay, HUGE discount of 90%, now it's only 10,000 bucks"

"But, 90% of 25,000 isn't 10,000"

"Okay then, 9,000, special price just for you"

"Deal".

Discounts and the drug is still $5,000 compared to like $20 elsewhere. Who needs discounts like that?

OK, your analogy sucks but I'll play anyway: Because the cost of making that drug $20 to the patient is massive gov't intervention that stifles R&D (why do you suppose so many drugs and cures are developed in the US?), drags the economy as taxes must be collected and filtered through gov't fingers, diminishes quality control and purity to cut costs, and creates long waits for patient services.

There's a good reason many foreigners come to the US - many from socialized med countries - for med care and training (and pay handsomely for it). Put on your thinking cap and try to figure why.

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

As it is with very uninformed people such as yourself YOU never looked at the components of Johnson & Johnson's Financials.
I did and surprise surprise.... You completely ignored the following from their 2013 Financial report!
NOTE: Consumer/Devices made up 60% of their revenue.... NOT pharmaceuticals AS YOU IMPLIED!
NOTE: R&D is most costly for the pharmaceutical component and as such cost 29.1% of the pharmaceutical revenues!
NOTE: YOU completely forget that little thing known as TAXES! Which they paid $1.6 billion.
NOTE: YOU probably didn't go deep enough to find the reserves that have to be set aside for potential legal issues from their products!
NOTE: Their selling costs INCLUDED Consumer/Devices which you again seem unaware or just simple wanted to BIAS the material!
NOTE: you Also seem to forget the approximately 128,000 employees for which Johnson & Johnson pays PAYROLL TAXES!
These payroll taxes at average salary of the minimum of $44,000 or nearly $430 million in Payroll taxes
You didn't get into the weeds and find the FACTS and as people of your ilk are wont to do...jump to wrong conclusions!
Please try to be more informed and even more disciplined.
View attachment 88788

So you want to add new information to the topic, and you chose to do it as if everyone around you is stupid.

Are you joining in this debate, or just coming in to antagonize people?

I abhor LAZY people evidently like you that have fallen for the old cliched idiotic and ignorant attacks on capitalism.
Especially when you might even be an indirect owner of the very company you are attacking!
Why don't you attack lawyers for causing over $500 billion a year in WASTEFUL health services? Is it because you again are just plain ignorant about
"defensive medicine" that 90% of 138,686 physicians invited to participate in a survey said "they practice defensive medicine" at a cost of over $800 billion according to them!
But being the lazy uninformed person like you would not appreciate digging a little deeper to see why 3 distinct studies verify these above figures.
I also abhor idiots maybe like you that always believed Obama's GROSS exaggeration that there were 46 million uninsured Americans. Again I can prove there
weren't with links to the census bureau among others that show he exaggerated by over 90% that figure!

You call me lazy, yet you INSULT instead of debate. You call me ignorant, yet you insult instead of debate.

Sorry, I don't stoop to the level you're going for, I put people like you on ignore. Bye.

 

[Sun Devil 92]

Oh, yeah, I know these discounts.

"Hey, I'll sell you this item that you can buy for 10 bucks for only 25,000 bucks."

"No thanks"

"Okay, HUGE discount of 90%, now it's only 10,000 bucks"

"But, 90% of 25,000 isn't 10,000"

"Okay then, 9,000, special price just for you"

"Deal".

Discounts and the drug is still $5,000 compared to like $20 elsewhere. Who needs discounts like that?

OK, your analogy sucks but I'll play anyway: Because the cost of making that drug $20 to the patient is massive gov't intervention that stifles R&D (why do you suppose so many drugs and cures are developed in the US?), drags the economy as taxes must be collected and filtered through gov't fingers, diminishes quality control and purity to cut costs, and creates long waits for patient services.

There's a good reason many foreigners come to the US - many from socialized med countries - for med care and training (and pay handsomely for it). Put on your thinking cap and try to figure why.

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

As it is with very uninformed people such as yourself YOU never looked at the components of Johnson & Johnson's Financials.
I did and surprise surprise.... You completely ignored the following from their 2013 Financial report!
NOTE: Consumer/Devices made up 60% of their revenue.... NOT pharmaceuticals AS YOU IMPLIED!
NOTE: R&D is most costly for the pharmaceutical component and as such cost 29.1% of the pharmaceutical revenues!
NOTE: YOU completely forget that little thing known as TAXES! Which they paid $1.6 billion.
NOTE: YOU probably didn't go deep enough to find the reserves that have to be set aside for potential legal issues from their products!
NOTE: Their selling costs INCLUDED Consumer/Devices which you again seem unaware or just simple wanted to BIAS the material!
NOTE: you Also seem to forget the approximately 128,000 employees for which Johnson & Johnson pays PAYROLL TAXES!
These payroll taxes at average salary of the minimum of $44,000 or nearly $430 million in Payroll taxes
You didn't get into the weeds and find the FACTS and as people of your ilk are wont to do...jump to wrong conclusions!
Please try to be more informed and even more disciplined.
View attachment 88788

They only paid 1.6 on 13 billion dollars ? Seems a bit low to me.

Think about how much they benefit from the US govt's $24 billion on Science research. And think how they use the infrastructure of the country. How many of their workers are trained through US financial aid. How the stability of the country allows them to do this, and how the way the healthcare system is structured allows them to make massive fortunes, and they don't pay for this stuff.

I do all the time.

Big Business = Government's Friend.

 

[Sun Devil 92]

Oh, yeah, I know these discounts.

"Hey, I'll sell you this item that you can buy for 10 bucks for only 25,000 bucks."

"No thanks"

"Okay, HUGE discount of 90%, now it's only 10,000 bucks"

"But, 90% of 25,000 isn't 10,000"

"Okay then, 9,000, special price just for you"

"Deal".

Discounts and the drug is still $5,000 compared to like $20 elsewhere. Who needs discounts like that?

OK, your analogy sucks but I'll play anyway: Because the cost of making that drug $20 to the patient is massive gov't intervention that stifles R&D (why do you suppose so many drugs and cures are developed in the US?), drags the economy as taxes must be collected and filtered through gov't fingers, diminishes quality control and purity to cut costs, and creates long waits for patient services.

There's a good reason many foreigners come to the US - many from socialized med countries - for med care and training (and pay handsomely for it). Put on your thinking cap and try to figure why.

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

As it is with very uninformed people such as yourself YOU never looked at the components of Johnson & Johnson's Financials.
I did and surprise surprise.... You completely ignored the following from their 2013 Financial report!
NOTE: Consumer/Devices made up 60% of their revenue.... NOT pharmaceuticals AS YOU IMPLIED!
NOTE: R&D is most costly for the pharmaceutical component and as such cost 29.1% of the pharmaceutical revenues!
NOTE: YOU completely forget that little thing known as TAXES! Which they paid $1.6 billion.
NOTE: YOU probably didn't go deep enough to find the reserves that have to be set aside for potential legal issues from their products!
NOTE: Their selling costs INCLUDED Consumer/Devices which you again seem unaware or just simple wanted to BIAS the material!
NOTE: you Also seem to forget the approximately 128,000 employees for which Johnson & Johnson pays PAYROLL TAXES!
These payroll taxes at average salary of the minimum of $44,000 or nearly $430 million in Payroll taxes
You didn't get into the weeds and find the FACTS and as people of your ilk are wont to do...jump to wrong conclusions!
Please try to be more informed and even more disciplined.
View attachment 88788

They only paid 1.6 on 13 billion dollars ? Seems a bit low to me.

YEA $1.6 billion seems low to someone who hates capitalism, America and oh yea maybe yourself?
Why yourself? It is possible in several ways you are an indirect owner of J&J stock via the following entities which your 401K or IRA or pension plan at work
or mutual fund investment OWNS!!!
JNJ Major Holders | Insider Transactions | Johnson & Johnson Common Stock Stock - Yahoo Finance
View attachment 88804

What is the percentage ?

I don't hate capitalism.

I don't hate America.

I do hate the left wing.

I simply said, when looking at the numbers....that 1.6 billion out of 13 plus billion seems low.

I can't say that ? Really ?

And not get a dick response like yours ?

 

[healthmyths]

OK, your analogy sucks but I'll play anyway: Because the cost of making that drug $20 to the patient is massive gov't intervention that stifles R&D (why do you suppose so many drugs and cures are developed in the US?), drags the economy as taxes must be collected and filtered through gov't fingers, diminishes quality control and purity to cut costs, and creates long waits for patient services.

There's a good reason many foreigners come to the US - many from socialized med countries - for med care and training (and pay handsomely for it). Put on your thinking cap and try to figure why.

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

As it is with very uninformed people such as yourself YOU never looked at the components of Johnson & Johnson's Financials.
I did and surprise surprise.... You completely ignored the following from their 2013 Financial report!
NOTE: Consumer/Devices made up 60% of their revenue.... NOT pharmaceuticals AS YOU IMPLIED!
NOTE: R&D is most costly for the pharmaceutical component and as such cost 29.1% of the pharmaceutical revenues!
NOTE: YOU completely forget that little thing known as TAXES! Which they paid $1.6 billion.
NOTE: YOU probably didn't go deep enough to find the reserves that have to be set aside for potential legal issues from their products!
NOTE: Their selling costs INCLUDED Consumer/Devices which you again seem unaware or just simple wanted to BIAS the material!
NOTE: you Also seem to forget the approximately 128,000 employees for which Johnson & Johnson pays PAYROLL TAXES!
These payroll taxes at average salary of the minimum of $44,000 or nearly $430 million in Payroll taxes
You didn't get into the weeds and find the FACTS and as people of your ilk are wont to do...jump to wrong conclusions!
Please try to be more informed and even more disciplined.
View attachment 88788

They only paid 1.6 on 13 billion dollars ? Seems a bit low to me.

YEA $1.6 billion seems low to someone who hates capitalism, America and oh yea maybe yourself?
Why yourself? It is possible in several ways you are an indirect owner of J&J stock via the following entities which your 401K or IRA or pension plan at work
or mutual fund investment OWNS!!!
JNJ Major Holders | Insider Transactions | Johnson & Johnson Common Stock Stock - Yahoo Finance
View attachment 88804

What is the percentage ?

I don't hate capitalism.

I don't hate America.

I do hate the left wing.

I simply said, when looking at the numbers....that 1.6 billion out of 13 plus billion seems low.

I can't say that ? Really ?

And not get a dick response like yours ?

Sorry may have over reacted because simple math is hard for most people for the ilk that hate capitalism,America and can't seem to read and think logically.
So when you have a problem dividing 1.6B by 13B which equals 12% I jumped to the conclusion based on your response.
Sorry!

 

[Sun Devil 92]

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

As it is with very uninformed people such as yourself YOU never looked at the components of Johnson & Johnson's Financials.
I did and surprise surprise.... You completely ignored the following from their 2013 Financial report!
NOTE: Consumer/Devices made up 60% of their revenue.... NOT pharmaceuticals AS YOU IMPLIED!
NOTE: R&D is most costly for the pharmaceutical component and as such cost 29.1% of the pharmaceutical revenues!
NOTE: YOU completely forget that little thing known as TAXES! Which they paid $1.6 billion.
NOTE: YOU probably didn't go deep enough to find the reserves that have to be set aside for potential legal issues from their products!
NOTE: Their selling costs INCLUDED Consumer/Devices which you again seem unaware or just simple wanted to BIAS the material!
NOTE: you Also seem to forget the approximately 128,000 employees for which Johnson & Johnson pays PAYROLL TAXES!
These payroll taxes at average salary of the minimum of $44,000 or nearly $430 million in Payroll taxes
You didn't get into the weeds and find the FACTS and as people of your ilk are wont to do...jump to wrong conclusions!
Please try to be more informed and even more disciplined.
View attachment 88788

They only paid 1.6 on 13 billion dollars ? Seems a bit low to me.

YEA $1.6 billion seems low to someone who hates capitalism, America and oh yea maybe yourself?
Why yourself? It is possible in several ways you are an indirect owner of J&J stock via the following entities which your 401K or IRA or pension plan at work
or mutual fund investment OWNS!!!
JNJ Major Holders | Insider Transactions | Johnson & Johnson Common Stock Stock - Yahoo Finance
View attachment 88804

What is the percentage ?

I don't hate capitalism.

I don't hate America.

I do hate the left wing.

I simply said, when looking at the numbers....that 1.6 billion out of 13 plus billion seems low.

I can't say that ? Really ?

And not get a dick response like yours ?

Sorry may have over reacted because simple math is hard for most people for the ilk that hate capitalism,America and can't seem to read and think logically.
So when you have a problem dividing 1.6B by 13B which equals 12% I jumped to the conclusion based on your response.
Sorry!

And I thought was low given today's tax rates.

It was just a comment.

I don't claim to be in the know when it comes to corporate tax rates.

 

[Sun Devil 92]

Why do people put up with the US healthcare system?

Cowardice, laziness, and lack of organization and willpower to fight the system.

Shut up.

 

[Sun Devil 92]

How a bite from a stray dog shows the sick state of U.S. healthcare

"The first shot at Royal Angkor International Hospital cost $125." (Cambodia)

"Jan received her second Verorab shot at a clinic in northern Thailand. The bill this time: A mere $18.50"

"Things changed dramatically once the Kerns returned to this country. For her third shot, Jan visited Torrance Memorial Medical Center. It was a Sunday, and she had to go to the emergency room, so that added considerably to her cost. The tab for a single injection: $5,254.85."


"“It’s obvious that our system is unlike any other health system,” said Uwe Reinhardt, a healthcare economist at Princeton University. “Other systems were set up to care for patients. Ours was set up by the providers — the hospitals and drug companies — for their own benefit.”"

Most countries in the world have healthcare to treat patients, the US has healthcare to make healthcare providers money.

So much money gets wasted in corruption, it's something like 3% of US GDP at the very least.

Any question like this is legitimate.

As I have said for a long time.

Someone has to put together a grading system that we all agree on....maybe there are multiple systems.

When everyone agrees, then we can grade the systems and people might be able to join a conversation about improvement.

Is % of GDP legitimate ? I think it should be part of the equation.

But that is the cost of the system.

If you have insurance (and it isn't some stupid ACA plan with outrageous deductibles), then you have access to the best technological care in the world.

If you don't have access, you might as well live in the congo.

 

[JoeNormal]

How a bite from a stray dog shows the sick state of U.S. healthcare

"The first shot at Royal Angkor International Hospital cost $125." (Cambodia)

"Jan received her second Verorab shot at a clinic in northern Thailand. The bill this time: A mere $18.50"

"Things changed dramatically once the Kerns returned to this country. For her third shot, Jan visited Torrance Memorial Medical Center. It was a Sunday, and she had to go to the emergency room, so that added considerably to her cost. The tab for a single injection: $5,254.85."


"“It’s obvious that our system is unlike any other health system,” said Uwe Reinhardt, a healthcare economist at Princeton University. “Other systems were set up to care for patients. Ours was set up by the providers — the hospitals and drug companies — for their own benefit.”"

Most countries in the world have healthcare to treat patients, the US has healthcare to make healthcare providers money.

So much money gets wasted in corruption, it's something like 3% of US GDP at the very least.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The sky is falling. I get it. Now maybe you should know that the patient pays only a small co-pay, if anything, and the insurer gets a deep discount ... perhaps as deep as 90% off. Pretty much nobody pays full price which may be why it is so outrageously high.

Why is it our whiny, sniveling, low-info, Chicken Little Loony Lefties either fail to tell the whole story or just don't know it?

Oh, yeah, I know these discounts.

"Hey, I'll sell you this item that you can buy for 10 bucks for only 25,000 bucks."

"No thanks"

"Okay, HUGE discount of 90%, now it's only 10,000 bucks"

"But, 90% of 25,000 isn't 10,000"

"Okay then, 9,000, special price just for you"

"Deal".

Discounts and the drug is still $5,000 compared to like $20 elsewhere. Who needs discounts like that?

OK, your analogy sucks but I'll play anyway: Because the cost of making that drug $20 to the patient is massive gov't intervention that stifles R&D (why do you suppose so many drugs and cures are developed in the US?), drags the economy as taxes must be collected and filtered through gov't fingers, diminishes quality control and purity to cut costs, and creates long waits for patient services.

There's a good reason many foreigners come to the US - many from socialized med countries - for med care and training (and pay handsomely for it). Put on your thinking cap and try to figure why.

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

Yup, pharmaceutical companies are mainly massive marketing and sales forces. They have legions of attractive women sent out to flirt with doctors in order to get their products into the market.

 

[Redfish]

No, did you? and what does that have to do with the topic?

I had top secret and SAP security clearances most of my career. So I know that Hillary violated federal law regarding classified data. I know the rules. If I did what she did, I would be typing this in Leavenworth prison.

You must have me confused with someone else. I'm no Hillary supporter. And what does that have to do with healthcare anyway?

The reason I want to know whether or not you worked in healthcare is because you carry so much water for them. Maybe you've had government provided healthcare most of your career (and now medicare) and really have no idea how crappy the system has become.

I never said that the healthcare industry is without problems, fraud, incompetence, and corruption.

My point is that anything run by the government will have more of those things than the same thing run by the free market.

Turning problems over to the government to "fix" always makes them worse. Healthcare is the perfect example.

You say this even though you apparently spent your career in a government job? I realize the government isn't perfect either but without an entity whose function is to act as a mediator and limit the effects of corporate greed, that greed will cause unlimited damage.

I did not spend my career in a government job. I worked in private industry and as an independent consultant. I worked under government contracts some of the time, but never as a government employee.

once you use a term like "corporate greed" you discredit yourself as a competent person to discuss this, or any other, topic. Corporations exist to make money for their shareholders, greed will make that impossible and they will go out of business.

I am sorry that you are a loser and consider yourself a victim of those who have been successful. But I get it.

I'm deeply entrenched in the corporate culture. And I've seen the difference in the management styles of the founder of the company (who took it from small startup to international corporation) and the weasels who've taken over since he departed. Corporations can become very successful without the mercenary levels of greed that you seem to think make them tick. That leads me to believe that you are one of the weasels. Enjoy your retirement. I'm sure you've fostered high levels of hate directed against you.

you know nothing about me or my work history.

for the record I always treated my employees with respect and honesty.

But you are correct, there are assholes in the corporate world just as there are assholes in every segment of human life.

To make the stupid claim that assholes only exist in corporations is, well, Stupid.

The other point that you seem oblivious to is that assholes do not last long in any environment. They self destruct or are run out of business.

But continue the whine if it makes you feel better.

 

[Redfish]

How a bite from a stray dog shows the sick state of U.S. healthcare

"The first shot at Royal Angkor International Hospital cost $125." (Cambodia)

"Jan received her second Verorab shot at a clinic in northern Thailand. The bill this time: A mere $18.50"

"Things changed dramatically once the Kerns returned to this country. For her third shot, Jan visited Torrance Memorial Medical Center. It was a Sunday, and she had to go to the emergency room, so that added considerably to her cost. The tab for a single injection: $5,254.85."


"“It’s obvious that our system is unlike any other health system,” said Uwe Reinhardt, a healthcare economist at Princeton University. “Other systems were set up to care for patients. Ours was set up by the providers — the hospitals and drug companies — for their own benefit.”"

Most countries in the world have healthcare to treat patients, the US has healthcare to make healthcare providers money.

So much money gets wasted in corruption, it's something like 3% of US GDP at the very least.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The sky is falling. I get it. Now maybe you should know that the patient pays only a small co-pay, if anything, and the insurer gets a deep discount ... perhaps as deep as 90% off. Pretty much nobody pays full price which may be why it is so outrageously high.

Why is it our whiny, sniveling, low-info, Chicken Little Loony Lefties either fail to tell the whole story or just don't know it?

Oh, yeah, I know these discounts.

"Hey, I'll sell you this item that you can buy for 10 bucks for only 25,000 bucks."

"No thanks"

"Okay, HUGE discount of 90%, now it's only 10,000 bucks"

"But, 90% of 25,000 isn't 10,000"

"Okay then, 9,000, special price just for you"

"Deal".

Discounts and the drug is still $5,000 compared to like $20 elsewhere. Who needs discounts like that?

OK, your analogy sucks but I'll play anyway: Because the cost of making that drug $20 to the patient is massive gov't intervention that stifles R&D (why do you suppose so many drugs and cures are developed in the US?), drags the economy as taxes must be collected and filtered through gov't fingers, diminishes quality control and purity to cut costs, and creates long waits for patient services.

There's a good reason many foreigners come to the US - many from socialized med countries - for med care and training (and pay handsomely for it). Put on your thinking cap and try to figure why.

Do you know where the risky business of developing drugs takes place? It's not in the big pharma companies at all. It's from money given by the US govt in grants and the like. Once something has been shown to be successful the big Pharma companies pick it up and then work on it a little and then sell it for massive profits.

These companies are making massive profits. So them selling drugs cheaper isn't stifling R&D as you said, it'd be stifling their profits.

Pharmaceutical industry gets high on fat profits - BBC News

Yep, they have massive profit margins. Not putting it into R&D at all.

"With some drugs costing upwards of $100,000 for a full course, and with the cost of manufacturing just a tiny fraction of this, it's not hard to see why."

Johnson & Johnson made a profit of $13.8 BILLION in this particular year (probably 2013), a profit margin of 19%. It spend $17.2 BILLION on marketing, and $8.2 billion of R%D. Yeah, it spends DOUBLE on marketing than on R&D. It's R&D is less than its profits, R&D is only 1/9th of their total revenue.

Pfizer, another US company, has profit margins of 43%. $6.6 billion on R&D and profits of $22 billion. Though they spend a higher percentage of their total revenue on R&D, it's still not that much.

"Until recently, paying bribes to doctors to prescribe their drugs was commonplace at big pharmas,"

"The rules on gifts, educational grants and sponsoring lectures, for example, are less clear cut, and these practices remain commonplace in the US."

"Indeed a recent study found that doctors in the US receiving payments from pharma companies were twice as likely to prescribe their drugs."

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/76xx/doc7615/10-02-drugr-d.pdf

"
The federal government spent more than $25 billion on health-related R&D in 2005. Only some of that spending is explicitly related to the development of new pharmaceuticals. However, much of it is devoted to basic research on the mechanisms of disease, which underpins the pharmaceutical industry’s search for new drugs."

So the US spends about the same amount as the top three Pharma companies in the world on R&D and doesn't make a profit from it.

"federal grants help to train many of the researchers who are hired by drug companies."

"In general, the government tends to focus on basic research, whereas private firms focus much more on applied research and development"


So basically the Pharma companies are making it rich. Their profits are high, they could reduce drug prices, they could do a lot, but because of the nature of the US's for profit healthcare system they don't need to. A system which is not for profit would be far more beneficial as it would cost a lot less, and force the drug companies to not massively overcharge for drugs, as it can't do in other countries.

Yup, pharmaceutical companies are mainly massive marketing and sales forces. They have legions of attractive women sent out to flirt with doctors in order to get their products into the market.

very true. big pharma is raping us. Has obozo done anything about that? has the hildebeast proposed doing anything about it? of course not, they are financial slaves to big pharma.

Why do drug patents run for 12 years? Why are they allowed to make a tiny change in the formula and get a new patent? Why cant Canadian drugs be sold in the USA?

If you libs want to attack something, attack big pharma.

 

[JoeNormal]

You must have me confused with someone else. I'm no Hillary supporter. And what does that have to do with healthcare anyway?

The reason I want to know whether or not you worked in healthcare is because you carry so much water for them. Maybe you've had government provided healthcare most of your career (and now medicare) and really have no idea how crappy the system has become.

I never said that the healthcare industry is without problems, fraud, incompetence, and corruption.

My point is that anything run by the government will have more of those things than the same thing run by the free market.

Turning problems over to the government to "fix" always makes them worse. Healthcare is the perfect example.

You say this even though you apparently spent your career in a government job? I realize the government isn't perfect either but without an entity whose function is to act as a mediator and limit the effects of corporate greed, that greed will cause unlimited damage.

I did not spend my career in a government job. I worked in private industry and as an independent consultant. I worked under government contracts some of the time, but never as a government employee.

once you use a term like "corporate greed" you discredit yourself as a competent person to discuss this, or any other, topic. Corporations exist to make money for their shareholders, greed will make that impossible and they will go out of business.

I am sorry that you are a loser and consider yourself a victim of those who have been successful. But I get it.

I'm deeply entrenched in the corporate culture. And I've seen the difference in the management styles of the founder of the company (who took it from small startup to international corporation) and the weasels who've taken over since he departed. Corporations can become very successful without the mercenary levels of greed that you seem to think make them tick. That leads me to believe that you are one of the weasels. Enjoy your retirement. I'm sure you've fostered high levels of hate directed against you.

you know nothing about me or my work history.

for the record I always treated my employees with respect and honesty.

But you are correct, there are assholes in the corporate world just as there are assholes in every segment of human life.

To make the stupid claim that assholes only exist in corporations is, well, Stupid.

The other point that you seem oblivious to is that assholes do not last long in any environment. They self destruct or are run out of business.

But continue the whine if it makes you feel better.

I don't think I claimed that assholes only exist in corporations. Some of the most egregious ones I've known were small business owners who treat their employees like crap.

The reason that I generally target corporations these days is because it's what I know. I've worked in three major corporations since becoming an engineer and I've seen the machinations at the top. My first job as an engineer was in defense and I've never seen such a collection of douchebags in my life - and I've worked with honest-to-goodness Hollywood producers. At least the producers were creative enough to somewhat deserve to be arrogant. The other corps were somewhat less offensive but there's still that drive to move all of the profits to the players at the top and squeeze the guys in the trenches. It's gotten to the point where I work now that I no longer make any effort to create anything patentable.

 

[Redfish]

I never said that the healthcare industry is without problems, fraud, incompetence, and corruption.

My point is that anything run by the government will have more of those things than the same thing run by the free market.

Turning problems over to the government to "fix" always makes them worse. Healthcare is the perfect example.

You say this even though you apparently spent your career in a government job? I realize the government isn't perfect either but without an entity whose function is to act as a mediator and limit the effects of corporate greed, that greed will cause unlimited damage.

I did not spend my career in a government job. I worked in private industry and as an independent consultant. I worked under government contracts some of the time, but never as a government employee.

once you use a term like "corporate greed" you discredit yourself as a competent person to discuss this, or any other, topic. Corporations exist to make money for their shareholders, greed will make that impossible and they will go out of business.

I am sorry that you are a loser and consider yourself a victim of those who have been successful. But I get it.

I'm deeply entrenched in the corporate culture. And I've seen the difference in the management styles of the founder of the company (who took it from small startup to international corporation) and the weasels who've taken over since he departed. Corporations can become very successful without the mercenary levels of greed that you seem to think make them tick. That leads me to believe that you are one of the weasels. Enjoy your retirement. I'm sure you've fostered high levels of hate directed against you.

you know nothing about me or my work history.

for the record I always treated my employees with respect and honesty.

But you are correct, there are assholes in the corporate world just as there are assholes in every segment of human life.

To make the stupid claim that assholes only exist in corporations is, well, Stupid.

The other point that you seem oblivious to is that assholes do not last long in any environment. They self destruct or are run out of business.

But continue the whine if it makes you feel better.

I don't think I claimed that assholes only exist in corporations. Some of the most egregious ones I've known were small business owners who treat their employees like crap.

The reason that I generally target corporations these days is because it's what I know. I've worked in three major corporations since becoming an engineer and I've seen the machinations at the top. My first job as an engineer was in defense and I've never seen such a collection of douchebags in my life - and I've worked with honest-to-goodness Hollywood producers. At least the producers were creative enough to somewhat deserve to be arrogant. The other corps were somewhat less offensive but there's still that drive to move all of the profits to the players at the top and squeeze the guys in the trenches. It's gotten to the point where I work now that I no longer make any effort to create anything patentable.

lets talk about distribution of profits to corporate employees and management.

In general management gets paid more because they are responsible for making decisions that cause the corporation to succeed or fail. They have a fiduciary duty to the shareholders to earn dividends and raise the stock price.

due to Sarbanes Oxley, directors also have a legal obligation to report truthfully or go to jail.

with responsibility comes reward.

Want more money? work hard and get into management.

 

[JoeNormal]

You say this even though you apparently spent your career in a government job? I realize the government isn't perfect either but without an entity whose function is to act as a mediator and limit the effects of corporate greed, that greed will cause unlimited damage.

I did not spend my career in a government job. I worked in private industry and as an independent consultant. I worked under government contracts some of the time, but never as a government employee.

once you use a term like "corporate greed" you discredit yourself as a competent person to discuss this, or any other, topic. Corporations exist to make money for their shareholders, greed will make that impossible and they will go out of business.

I am sorry that you are a loser and consider yourself a victim of those who have been successful. But I get it.

I'm deeply entrenched in the corporate culture. And I've seen the difference in the management styles of the founder of the company (who took it from small startup to international corporation) and the weasels who've taken over since he departed. Corporations can become very successful without the mercenary levels of greed that you seem to think make them tick. That leads me to believe that you are one of the weasels. Enjoy your retirement. I'm sure you've fostered high levels of hate directed against you.

you know nothing about me or my work history.

for the record I always treated my employees with respect and honesty.

But you are correct, there are assholes in the corporate world just as there are assholes in every segment of human life.

To make the stupid claim that assholes only exist in corporations is, well, Stupid.

The other point that you seem oblivious to is that assholes do not last long in any environment. They self destruct or are run out of business.

But continue the whine if it makes you feel better.

I don't think I claimed that assholes only exist in corporations. Some of the most egregious ones I've known were small business owners who treat their employees like crap.

The reason that I generally target corporations these days is because it's what I know. I've worked in three major corporations since becoming an engineer and I've seen the machinations at the top. My first job as an engineer was in defense and I've never seen such a collection of douchebags in my life - and I've worked with honest-to-goodness Hollywood producers. At least the producers were creative enough to somewhat deserve to be arrogant. The other corps were somewhat less offensive but there's still that drive to move all of the profits to the players at the top and squeeze the guys in the trenches. It's gotten to the point where I work now that I no longer make any effort to create anything patentable.

lets talk about distribution of profits to corporate employees and management.

In general management gets paid more because they are responsible for making decisions that cause the corporation to succeed or fail. They have a fiduciary duty to the shareholders to earn dividends and raise the stock price.

due to Sarbanes Oxley, directors also have a legal obligation to report truthfully or go to jail.

with responsibility comes reward.

Want more money? work hard and get into management.

I had a perfect opportunity to get into management about 5 years ago and the president of the company nixed it because he said I was too valuable in the role of development. Really motivational! Since then, that president was forced out and a new crop of guys were brought in to 'save' us. There were 4 main players and they're all gone now due to the catastrophic results they brought. We've been nearly self managing since then and we're starting to recover but at this point, I'm not convinced upper management has the ability to do anything but damage.

 

[Redfish]

I did not spend my career in a government job. I worked in private industry and as an independent consultant. I worked under government contracts some of the time, but never as a government employee.

once you use a term like "corporate greed" you discredit yourself as a competent person to discuss this, or any other, topic. Corporations exist to make money for their shareholders, greed will make that impossible and they will go out of business.

I am sorry that you are a loser and consider yourself a victim of those who have been successful. But I get it.

I'm deeply entrenched in the corporate culture. And I've seen the difference in the management styles of the founder of the company (who took it from small startup to international corporation) and the weasels who've taken over since he departed. Corporations can become very successful without the mercenary levels of greed that you seem to think make them tick. That leads me to believe that you are one of the weasels. Enjoy your retirement. I'm sure you've fostered high levels of hate directed against you.

you know nothing about me or my work history.

for the record I always treated my employees with respect and honesty.

But you are correct, there are assholes in the corporate world just as there are assholes in every segment of human life.

To make the stupid claim that assholes only exist in corporations is, well, Stupid.

The other point that you seem oblivious to is that assholes do not last long in any environment. They self destruct or are run out of business.

But continue the whine if it makes you feel better.

I don't think I claimed that assholes only exist in corporations. Some of the most egregious ones I've known were small business owners who treat their employees like crap.

The reason that I generally target corporations these days is because it's what I know. I've worked in three major corporations since becoming an engineer and I've seen the machinations at the top. My first job as an engineer was in defense and I've never seen such a collection of douchebags in my life - and I've worked with honest-to-goodness Hollywood producers. At least the producers were creative enough to somewhat deserve to be arrogant. The other corps were somewhat less offensive but there's still that drive to move all of the profits to the players at the top and squeeze the guys in the trenches. It's gotten to the point where I work now that I no longer make any effort to create anything patentable.

lets talk about distribution of profits to corporate employees and management.

In general management gets paid more because they are responsible for making decisions that cause the corporation to succeed or fail. They have a fiduciary duty to the shareholders to earn dividends and raise the stock price.

due to Sarbanes Oxley, directors also have a legal obligation to report truthfully or go to jail.

with responsibility comes reward.

Want more money? work hard and get into management.

I had a perfect opportunity to get into management about 5 years ago and the president of the company nixed it because he said I was too valuable in the role of development. Really motivational! Since then, that president was forced out and a new crop of guys were brought in to 'save' us. There were 4 main players and they're all gone now due to the catastrophic results they brought. We've been nearly self managing since then and we're starting to recover but at this point, I'm not convinced upper management has the ability to do anything but damage.

some do, some don't, might be time to look for a new company. Sounds like yours has been managed poorly.

when the boss told you that you were too valuable where you were, you should have said, "then pay me what I am worth or I will take by skills elsewhere"/

 

[JoeNormal]

I'm deeply entrenched in the corporate culture. And I've seen the difference in the management styles of the founder of the company (who took it from small startup to international corporation) and the weasels who've taken over since he departed. Corporations can become very successful without the mercenary levels of greed that you seem to think make them tick. That leads me to believe that you are one of the weasels. Enjoy your retirement. I'm sure you've fostered high levels of hate directed against you.

you know nothing about me or my work history.

for the record I always treated my employees with respect and honesty.

But you are correct, there are assholes in the corporate world just as there are assholes in every segment of human life.

To make the stupid claim that assholes only exist in corporations is, well, Stupid.

The other point that you seem oblivious to is that assholes do not last long in any environment. They self destruct or are run out of business.

But continue the whine if it makes you feel better.

I don't think I claimed that assholes only exist in corporations. Some of the most egregious ones I've known were small business owners who treat their employees like crap.

The reason that I generally target corporations these days is because it's what I know. I've worked in three major corporations since becoming an engineer and I've seen the machinations at the top. My first job as an engineer was in defense and I've never seen such a collection of douchebags in my life - and I've worked with honest-to-goodness Hollywood producers. At least the producers were creative enough to somewhat deserve to be arrogant. The other corps were somewhat less offensive but there's still that drive to move all of the profits to the players at the top and squeeze the guys in the trenches. It's gotten to the point where I work now that I no longer make any effort to create anything patentable.

lets talk about distribution of profits to corporate employees and management.

In general management gets paid more because they are responsible for making decisions that cause the corporation to succeed or fail. They have a fiduciary duty to the shareholders to earn dividends and raise the stock price.

due to Sarbanes Oxley, directors also have a legal obligation to report truthfully or go to jail.

with responsibility comes reward.

Want more money? work hard and get into management.

I had a perfect opportunity to get into management about 5 years ago and the president of the company nixed it because he said I was too valuable in the role of development. Really motivational! Since then, that president was forced out and a new crop of guys were brought in to 'save' us. There were 4 main players and they're all gone now due to the catastrophic results they brought. We've been nearly self managing since then and we're starting to recover but at this point, I'm not convinced upper management has the ability to do anything but damage.

some do, some don't, might be time to look for a new company. Sounds like yours has been managed poorly.

when the boss told you that you were too valuable where you were, you should have said, "then pay me what I am worth or I will take by skills elsewhere"/

I should have. I've always had a problem with misplaced loyalty.

 

[frigidweirdo]

How a bite from a stray dog shows the sick state of U.S. healthcare

"The first shot at Royal Angkor International Hospital cost $125." (Cambodia)

"Jan received her second Verorab shot at a clinic in northern Thailand. The bill this time: A mere $18.50"

"Things changed dramatically once the Kerns returned to this country. For her third shot, Jan visited Torrance Memorial Medical Center. It was a Sunday, and she had to go to the emergency room, so that added considerably to her cost. The tab for a single injection: $5,254.85."


"“It’s obvious that our system is unlike any other health system,” said Uwe Reinhardt, a healthcare economist at Princeton University. “Other systems were set up to care for patients. Ours was set up by the providers — the hospitals and drug companies — for their own benefit.”"

Most countries in the world have healthcare to treat patients, the US has healthcare to make healthcare providers money.

So much money gets wasted in corruption, it's something like 3% of US GDP at the very least.

Any question like this is legitimate.

As I have said for a long time.

Someone has to put together a grading system that we all agree on....maybe there are multiple systems.

When everyone agrees, then we can grade the systems and people might be able to join a conversation about improvement.

Is % of GDP legitimate ? I think it should be part of the equation.

But that is the cost of the system.

If you have insurance (and it isn't some stupid ACA plan with outrageous deductibles), then you have access to the best technological care in the world.

If you don't have access, you might as well live in the congo.

So you live in the richest country in the world and it's like you're in the 3rd world. Is that the govt looking out for its people?

No, as we all know, the govt cares about the rich.

 

[Sun Devil 92]

How a bite from a stray dog shows the sick state of U.S. healthcare

"The first shot at Royal Angkor International Hospital cost $125." (Cambodia)

"Jan received her second Verorab shot at a clinic in northern Thailand. The bill this time: A mere $18.50"

"Things changed dramatically once the Kerns returned to this country. For her third shot, Jan visited Torrance Memorial Medical Center. It was a Sunday, and she had to go to the emergency room, so that added considerably to her cost. The tab for a single injection: $5,254.85."


"“It’s obvious that our system is unlike any other health system,” said Uwe Reinhardt, a healthcare economist at Princeton University. “Other systems were set up to care for patients. Ours was set up by the providers — the hospitals and drug companies — for their own benefit.”"

Most countries in the world have healthcare to treat patients, the US has healthcare to make healthcare providers money.

So much money gets wasted in corruption, it's something like 3% of US GDP at the very least.

Any question like this is legitimate.

As I have said for a long time.

Someone has to put together a grading system that we all agree on....maybe there are multiple systems.

When everyone agrees, then we can grade the systems and people might be able to join a conversation about improvement.

Is % of GDP legitimate ? I think it should be part of the equation.

But that is the cost of the system.

If you have insurance (and it isn't some stupid ACA plan with outrageous deductibles), then you have access to the best technological care in the world.

If you don't have access, you might as well live in the congo.

So you live in the richest country in the world and it's like you're in the 3rd world. Is that the govt looking out for its people?

No, as we all know, the govt cares about the rich.

I can't tell if you are being sarcastic or not.

But, the bottom line is that in our current system things like Single Payer won't work like people think they work in other countries (and while they may work to some degree...they are far from perfect).

If you want a true single payer system, you'll need to basically change the way our government works.