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Amazon Health

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Re: Amazon Health

#51

Post by virmundi »

sjg007 wrote: post #44
watertom wrote: post #26

I think these 3 will no longer provide health insurance for their employees, they are going to create a new more affordable framework and they will allow any other large company to participate. The goal will be keep the cost of insurance the same for the employees, while eliminating the cost for the companies entirely, which is why this will take off. It’s crazy to have employers paying for healthcare, this I believe…

What is the mechanism? I don't think it is realistic to assume that health care can run on employee premiums alone. In fact we know it can't b/c individual premiums are outrageous. So I don't think your premise is realistic. These billion dollar companies self insure and Buffet's companies offer reinsurance for the most costly million dollar claims. Even though they self insure, they will pay a company like Cigna a p…

There are multiple ways to get insurance without dealing directly with traditional insurance companies.I'm not saying they're perfect, but then again, neither is the current for profit.

Christian Health Ministries - http://www.chministries.org/ Medi-Share - https://mychristiancare.org/medi-share/ Kaiser Permanente - https://healthy.kaiserpermanente.org/

Taylor University is self-insured.

Re: Amazon Health

#52

Post by dba7dba »

watertom wrote: post #26

I think these 3 will no longer provide health insurance for their employees, they are going to create a new more affordable framework and they will allow any other large company to participate. The goal will be keep the cost of insurance the same for the employees, while eliminating the cost for the companies entirely, which is why this will take off. It’s crazy to have employers paying for healthcare, this I believe…

This is how Kaiser Permanent got started. A major US rail company found it was cheaper and better to hire own doctors to take care of employees.

Re: Amazon Health

#53

Post by donw »

yarg wrote: post #47
sjg007 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the mechanism? I don't think it is realistic to assume that health care can run on employee premiums alone. In fact we know it can't b/c individual premiums are outrageous. So I don't think your premise is realistic. These billion dollar companies self insure and Buffet's companies offer reinsurance for the most costly million dollar claims. Even though they self insure, they will pay a company like Cigna a p…

Premiums are as high as they are because health care is run as a for profit industry - health care in America is orders of magnitude more expensive than in other countries. If you remove the profit motive prices will drop down towards something more reasonable, in this situation it's not unreasonable to expect that the system could be maintained with employee premiums. The cost of initialisation of services will be h…

As always, things are a bit more complicated.

Being largely for-profit is part of the problem with healthcare in the United States, but plenty of other countries have privatized healthcare that works, Japan being the first that comes to mind.

The difference being that, in the US, the long-term dysfunction of our political system has allowed the regulatory framework for healthcare to be built to service its own industry, rather than the needs of individual citizens or society at large.

As one example, regional hospitals used to band together in groups to bargain collectively when purchasing supplies. This arrangement was formalized, legislated, and then warped, so that rather than the hospitals controlling the organization, it was instead controlled by the suppliers, driving the cost to the patient up, rather than down.

There is no easy solution here, without first fixing our broken political system, and I see no evidence of that happening.

Re: Amazon Health

#54

Post by sjg007 »

virmundi wrote: post #51
sjg007 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the mechanism? I don't think it is realistic to assume that health care can run on employee premiums alone. In fact we know it can't b/c individual premiums are outrageous. So I don't think your premise is realistic. These billion dollar companies self insure and Buffet's companies offer reinsurance for the most costly million dollar claims. Even though they self insure, they will pay a company like Cigna a p…

There are multiple ways to get insurance without dealing directly with traditional insurance companies.I'm not saying they're perfect, but then again, neither is the current for profit. Christian Health Ministries - http://www.chministries.org/ Medi-Share - https://mychristiancare.org/medi-share/ Kaiser Permanente - https://healthy.kaiserpermanente.org/ Taylor University is self-insured.

I don't understand your point? These examples would have to either provide care or have contracts with providers. Cigna and your examples provide access to their networks for a management fee (where your company pays the actual costs)... So we are both calling tomatoes, tomatoes.

Re: Amazon Health

#55

Post by vadym909 »

yeukhon wrote: post #39
ihsw2 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's about $19K for employer-provided family-coverage. Considering the three companies have about 1M stuff in total, that represents ~$20B in annual recurring costs. This effort combined with accelerating automation will lead to a much better capital:labor cost ratio (and, depending on who you ask, reduction in labor costs is massively bad for wealth equality).

Do you have a source backing on $19K?

I've seen and paid employer health benefits bills- $15K-$24K is the range depending on the quality of healthplans.

About 10-25% of this is what employees pay as their part of the premium normally, the rest is employer paid. Stingier companies cover 75% of the employee cost and 50% of dependents cost.

Re: Amazon Health

#56

Post by RyanUnited »

Fuck this and fuck Amazon. That's an overvalued company by magnitudes and just like Enron all of WS knows it they just don't care cause the bond market is in dire straits.

Why doesn't anyone mention the ludicrous cost of becoming a doctor or funding FDA pharma research/trials. Dr in the US make twice as much as other advanced countries and the AMA has an iron grip.

Re: Amazon Health

#57

Post by dboreham »

donw wrote: post #53
yarg wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Premiums are as high as they are because health care is run as a for profit industry - health care in America is orders of magnitude more expensive than in other countries. If you remove the profit motive prices will drop down towards something more reasonable, in this situation it's not unreasonable to expect that the system could be maintained with employee premiums. The cost of initialisation of services will be h…

As always, things are a bit more complicated. Being largely for-profit is part of the problem with healthcare in the United States, but plenty of other countries have privatized healthcare that works, Japan being the first that comes to mind. The difference being that, in the US, the long-term dysfunction of our political system has allowed the regulatory framework for healthcare to be built to service its own indust…

>The difference being that, in the US, the long-term dysfunction of our political system has allowed the regulatory framework for healthcare to be built to service its own industry, rather than the needs of individual citizens or society at large.

You can templateize that statement, inserting pretty much any aspect of life in place of healthcare and it will still be true.

Re: Amazon Health

#58

Post by aaavl2821 »

yarg wrote: post #47
sjg007 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the mechanism? I don't think it is realistic to assume that health care can run on employee premiums alone. In fact we know it can't b/c individual premiums are outrageous. So I don't think your premise is realistic. These billion dollar companies self insure and Buffet's companies offer reinsurance for the most costly million dollar claims. Even though they self insure, they will pay a company like Cigna a p…

Premiums are as high as they are because health care is run as a for profit industry - health care in America is orders of magnitude more expensive than in other countries. If you remove the profit motive prices will drop down towards something more reasonable, in this situation it's not unreasonable to expect that the system could be maintained with employee premiums. The cost of initialisation of services will be h…

The traditional economic view is that private, profit seeking enterprises actually offer better prices to consumers because of competition, while monopoly firms charge higher prices bc they have more market power, and government run enterprises yield lower quality products because they don't have incentive to compete on quality. India has a very competitive healthcare system that is largely out of pocket and while they aren't perfect, they do pretty well considering the size of the country and their per capita gdp. On the other hand, though it is common to praise "single payer" European systems, these systems are not without fault. France is actually trying to learn about innovative American models of care because their system won't be able to afford caring for an aging population

The US system is more expensive due to weird interactions of profit seeking and regulations, and idiosyncratic local systems, all exacerbated by lobbying and political issues (like hospitals being major employers in most counties). Arguably another part of the US healthcare cost premium is that the US invests the most in innovation

It's simply not true either that healthcare is cheaper by orders of magnitude than other countries. Using health care expense as % of GDP as a metric of comparison, the US is at 17-18% while France / U.K. / Germany are around 10-12%

Attributing the high cost of healthcare in the US is a bit facile and simplistic

Re: Amazon Health

#60

Post by [deleted] »

yarg wrote: post #47
sjg007 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the mechanism? I don't think it is realistic to assume that health care can run on employee premiums alone. In fact we know it can't b/c individual premiums are outrageous. So I don't think your premise is realistic. These billion dollar companies self insure and Buffet's companies offer reinsurance for the most costly million dollar claims. Even though they self insure, they will pay a company like Cigna a p…

Premiums are as high as they are because health care is run as a for profit industry - health care in America is orders of magnitude more expensive than in other countries. If you remove the profit motive prices will drop down towards something more reasonable, in this situation it's not unreasonable to expect that the system could be maintained with employee premiums. The cost of initialisation of services will be h…

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