Why does an aspirin cost $7, a Bandaid $19 on your hospital bill? The hospitals aren’t trying to gouge you; they are covering the less visible costs of operating a hospital.
Medical costs rise for the same reason other costs rise. As the cost of supplies, wages and benefit packages increase, so do the costs charged by medical facilities. But medical costs also rise for other reasons.
....If private health insurance was eliminated altogether, hospitals would realize significant savings, and so would the American public.....
agree with the article ?
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Last edited by Canuck_Buck; 08-15-2009 at 06:46 PM.
This article only touches on a few of the issues that cause medical costs to rise.
There is a reason private insurance does not want to pay the full bill. It's because they know what the bill should really be.
One of the largest contributers to health care costs is liability. Liability costs more than any other aspect of running a hospital or doctor's office. What is liability and how much does it cost?
Well, that depends on what the insurance (for the hospital) says the liabilities are and what price tag it puts on them. For instance, if a particular hospital is small, has had few lawsuits, and is up to date on equipment and safety features, it's operating insurance might be much less than that of a similar hospital two counties over.
Lawsuits are the number one contributer to rising operating insurance costs. Some lawsuits are legit. Some of those legit lawsuits pay out legit settlements. But many lawsuits are BS and pay out way more than a reasonable amount compared to damages. This causes prices (in a round about way) to rise disproportionately to actual operating costs.
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Not to argue contrary to or to undermine anything else said on the thread -- I haven't read it -- but rather to possibly add to the thread: there are at least two important contributors to healthcare costs that need to be remembered -- (1) inflation and (2) new procedures and equipment.
Lest we forget, the price of just about everything goes up. I remember looking at the factory delivered price of my 1972 Pontiac Bonneville (455 cubic inch engine, boat-sized body) that I bought used in when 10 years old. That car was sold for about $5,200. I just bought a new 2010 Toyota Corolla that could fit in the trunk of the Bonneville (only exagerating a little) that cost $18,000. Inflation, it's just a fact of life.
When I was in grade school my parents didn't spend much money on cell phone subscriptions, cable television, and internet connections because these things did not exist in the 1960s. Many medical procedures that we have today were not available, to the best of my knowledge, in the 1960s. Colonoscopy, ultrasound, electrocardiograms, amniocentesis, CAT scans, various prescription drugs, etc. Back in the good ol' days of the 1960s when you got sick you just died. Perhaps something of an exageration, but not much. Chemotherapy? I don't think so. Open heart surgery -- triple and quadruple bypass operations -- I don't think so. Pacemakers? I don't think so. Hip replacements? I don't think so. Knee replacements? I don't think so. Is it really any wonder that healthcare costs much more today than in the 1960s? Is it fair to point to the rising cost of healthcare costs and suggest that the sky is falling? Frankly, adults just flat didn't go to the doctor often back in the 1960s. You want the good ol' days of healthcare as our parents knew it, stop going to the doctor. That'll solve your healthcare problem in a hurry!
Well, I don't think that is really a rant. And I do think this perspective is lost by the Democrats who suggest the sky is falling.
Hyperinflation is not. Should everyone just accept the fact that a critical service is rising in cost so fast that it is actually the cause of financial ruin for a rising number of Americans and employers are becoming uncompetitive to one degree or another while trying to provide it?
The daily room and board charge for example, is insane. Obviously it does not really cost that much to provide a roof and food for the day. Instead it is a way of shifting costs to others in a way that is anything but transparent. And that is but one example...cost shifting in health care is taking place in a variety of ways.
Some of what you said is true, but real truth is not so easily dichotomized, is it? In this case, the devil is truly in the details.
...there are at least two important contributors to healthcare costs that need to be remembered -- (1) inflation and (2) new procedures and equipment.
Those definately do make a difference, but there's one you left off--hospitals cannot refuse to treat someone regardless of their ability to pay, insurance (or lack thereof), citizenship (or lack thereof), etc. SOMEBODY has to cover the costs of those who can't/won't pay.
It's no mystery why there are so many hospitals in areas overrun with illegals that are shutting down--there's not enough paying "customers" to keep them afloat.
My parents (neither one in good health) often get billed for the same proceedures multiple times. My dad once recived a duplicate bill for a proceedure he'd had years earlier, and legal action was threatened if he didn't pay for it (again). He had to get a lawyer to get it resolved (he didn't have to pay another dime), although the bill collecters had my mom so shook up she had started making payments on it again. I'm sure this is at least in part to an incompetent billing department, but I can't help but wonder if they aren't instructed to try and collect as much as they can from patients who actually pay their bills.
IMO all the talk about "insurance reform" and "healthcare reform" is a smokescreen generated by burning cow chips. What this country needs, IMO much more than "healthcare reform" or "insurance reform", is illegal immigration reform. That would help resolve so many problems--healthcare, schools, welfare, crime, etc. etc. etc.
The sad thing is it won't happen, because it might (will) offend a huge voter base.
Chad
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Hyperinflation is not. Should everyone just accept the fact that a critical service is rising in cost so fast that it is actually the cause of financial ruin for a rising number of Americans and employers are becoming uncompetitive to one degree or another while trying to provide it?
The daily room and board charge for example, is insane. Obviously it does not really cost that much to provide a roof and food for the day. Instead it is a way of shifting costs to others in a way that is anything but transparent. And that is but one example...cost shifting in health care is taking place in a variety of ways.
Some of what you said is true, but real truth is not so easily dichotomized, is it? In this case, the devil is truly in the details.
OK. I think I take your point. I don't like paying for the costs of covering others either. But again, my point is that people are not taking into account the fact that the "healthcare" they speak of today is entirely different from the "healthcare" they would have received in the early 1960s. To fail to take account of the dramatic difference of what is encompassed by that term today is to overlook a key aspect of what is driving increasing healthcare costs.
OK. I think I take your point. I don't like paying for the costs of covering others either. But again, my point is that people are not taking into account the fact that the "healthcare" they speak of today is entirely different from the "healthcare" they would have received in the early 1960s. To fail to take account of the dramatic difference of what is encompassed by that term today is to overlook a key aspect of what is driving increasing healthcare costs.
Should people's healthcare be calibrated to their means and/or their financial resources? The car I drive conforms to my financial resources. The house I live in conforms to my financial resources. The education that my children receive conforms to my financial resources. Shouldn't healthcare be similarly calibrated to one's means? After all, we are no longer talking about minimal procedures. Should we as a collective pay for the knee replacements of an elderly person without means or should this person get along as best they can? Should we as a collective pay for a triple bypass operation for an individual without means or should this person simply live as long as they can without this operation?
Suppose the answer you give is "As a society, we must fund these procedures for these individuals. Healthcare is different. It is not subject to these kinds of personal property, personal resources calculations." Then I would ask, is it better to spend $75,000 of public money on a quadruple bypass operation than on a college education for a capable but impeccunious high school graduate? Is it better to spend $75,000 of public money on a quadruple bypass operation when you are going to pay not with up-front money but instead pay with borrowed money?
Frankly, call me unreformed Scrouge, but I don't think it is the public burden to provide healthcare to everyone. I say you take care of yourself. This is a private good and the burden is on the individual to manage and take care of this. It is very unwise for the government to step into this arena. Regulating doctors and hospitals is one thing. Regulating insurers is one thing. Stepping in to run the system and to guarantee everyone medical care . . . not a good thing in many, many ways.
And bottom line, things could be worse than having 1960s healthcare. Some things everyone already has -- innoculations for example. Is it so bad if everyone doesn't have access to the high cost procedures, such as quadruple by-pass operations?
Actually, the opposite. Marie Antoinette, when told the people have no bread to eat (cheapest food) said "then let them eat cake (a more expensive, luxury food item)." It is key to understanding this exchange to appreciate the obliviousness of Marie Antoinette to the costs of goods and the pinching financial constraints of the people. Now I'm sure you are familiar with this history IPSCShooter and that I am not teaching you anything on this subject. Others, however, may not be as knowledeable. A comparable situation would be for Obama to complain to me "Alsatian, the people have no pate de foie gras and caviar to eat and no champagne to wash it down with!!!" to which I might replay "Barrack, then let them eat beans and rice and drink water!"
I know that the position I advanced above is vulnerable to attack. My reference to "unreformed Scrouge," I think, points the way. Even so, I think the point I make is important and needs to be addressed. I do not think our nation -- the tax payers, to be more explicit -- can afford to provide unlimited healthcare to everyone -- to the impecunious to be more explicit. Without some limitations on what would be provided for those who can't carry their own weight, the system would soon collapse. If not initially, how about in 10 years when $1 M procedures to replace hearts and lungs and circulatory systems whole-hog are developed?
Why medical costs are so high & why they rise
