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Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

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Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#211

Post by codegeek »

grayed-down wrote: post #89

My neighbor, a colorectal surgeon and very into what he does, has remarked on several occasions that if single payer ever happens, he and most of the other surgeons he knows will likely walk away from the profession very shortly thereafter. There would be no financial or professional motivation to continue practicing.

Tell your neighbor he is already been taken for a ride by insurance companies. It may actually be better for him once private insurance does not have a say in EVERYTHING he does as a doctor. He may even be able to make more money. Ask him is he really free today when seeing patients ? The answer is No. He has to listen to everything the insurance company approves.

Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#212

Post by moosey »

legitster wrote: post #31

The net savings would be $450B, but the total cost would still be in the 10s of trillions of dollars (Edit: 30-50 over 10 years), bigger than all of our federal spending combined. It's one thing to have as an objective, and another as a plan for getting there. The proposal they cite would make federal healthcare expenditures 69%(!!!) of the GDP (Edit: total federal expenditures). It's simply not realistic to convert…

The costs are already in the trillions!

I absolutely see your point, though, this idea that we can give everyone in the United States access to health care is revolutionary! Exciting, compassionate, and revolutionary!

We have the opportunity to clear some of the institutional sclerosis that weighs at our society and economy. I really hope it happens.

Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#213

Post by n9 »

OrgNet wrote: post #205

The worst thing for me is if you go, for example, to the emergency room, the hospital charges you something like $200 and you think that is the end of it, but about a month later, other bills start coming in: $300 for xray, $350 for doctor X, etc... health insurance in the US sucks.

ER visit as a foreigner in Switzerland. Saw a dr. Saw a neurologist. Had a full bank of blood tests. Had an MRI of my head and neck. In and out in five hours. I was billed $400.

Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#214

Post by commandlinefan »

three_seagrass wrote: post #13
threeseed wrote: post #8

Pretty disingenuous study. If you move to a Medicare for All policy it would shift employer health care costs to the government. Which they would never be able to financially support especially with the challenges of an ageing population and excessive debt. And so when they say it saves $450b it's not taxpayers. It's mostly employers. There is a reason that countries that started with M4A e.g. Australia, UK have all…

That's why the Medicare for all will still be funded, in part, through a business tax. The difference being you've removed the for-profit middlemen, so the healthcare costs are less for businesses than the privatized hybrid version we have now.

> a business tax

Businesses have proven themselves to be very clever in finding ways to avoid paying taxes. They’ve had a harder time figuring out to avoid paying salaries and benefits.

Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#215

Post by istjohn »

michaelbuckbee wrote: post #159
mgraczyk wrote: post #7

In the study, nearly all the computed savings comes from two sources. 1. Decrease in pharmaceutical costs as a result of better bargaining power. 2. Decrease in administrative overhead, calculated by extrapolating the overhead in medicare to the entire US healthcare economy. I don't have an informed opinion on either of these estimates, but my intuition is that #1 seems reasonable while #2 seems unlikely. The justifi…

There's a third major cost-saving which is preventative care. I have a family friend who lost his job, lost his insurance and couldn't afford to take his meds which would have prevented the massive stroke that paralyzed him 3 weeks later. This was 10 years ago and his rehabilitation is still ongoing. His wife can't work and is his full-time caretaker. Multiple lives destroyed because we as a society can't get a syste…

Not to mention the societal costs incurred by failing to provide mental health services to everyone.

Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#216

Post by 1121redblackgo »

grayed-down wrote: post #95
dboreham wrote: post #6

As Churchill said... “You can always count on the Americans to do the right thing. After they have tried everything else.”

Would the right thing be single-payer or what would have to replace it once the economy and the medical profession have been destroyed?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loaded_question

Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#217

Post by n9 »

beefalo wrote: post #113
megiddo wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have a reasonably middle-class income, the plans are prohibitively expensive and unbelievably shitty. I'm only anecdotal, but by comparison, prior the ACA, my insurance for a family of 3 was $300/month with a $2500/year deductible. That $300/$5000 plan was considered predatory and high deductible. The first plan offered to me under the ACA was something like $700/month with an $8000 deductible. Plans this year…

Do you live in a state that rejected ACA funding?

CA resident here. My ACA plan for me and my son is 890 a month with subsidy and a 14k deductible per year. It’s bad.

Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#218

Post by xmly »

jandrese wrote: post #177
ogre_codes wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, this is talking about single payer healthcare which would mean the current insurance industry would be out the door. No Obamacare, just one government agency paying for healthcare. Employment sponsored healthcare will likely still exist in some form, perhaps to ensure speedier access to some care.

Probably no employer sponsored healthcare for the most part. That money would go towards the Medicare coverage. There might be some supplemental plans for people who want to skip lines but most people will just use Medicare.

Is that what Canada has right now?

For US, the real problem is still health cost is too high. The market regulation seems doe not work, at least for this decade.

Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#219

Post by onemoresoop »

dillondoyle wrote: post #195
scarejunba wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kaiser platinum is pretty close to Healthcare as a Service.

Can confirm I love Kaiser but both the best and worst parts for me are the bureaucracy -> time/$ savers. Great when it's fast and cheap, can email Dr to get meds/treatment, get meds mailed 3 for 2 price - but frustrating when wait to see a specialist is more than a month or being rushed through in person visits like cattle. And I feel well taken care proactively with multi-DR/NP team. Plus they actually did a good jo…

Just curious, what are your total yearly expenses on Kaiser? And how much does the employer pays on top of that, do you know? Thanks

Re: Single-payer healthcare would save $450B and 68k lives a year: study

#220

Post by codegeek »

beat wrote: post #149
onemoresoop wrote: post #79

I'm paying nearly 20k (parents+child) on insurance I don't have time to use (and luckily no serious need) and once my son went to see his pediatrician and our 'private' insurance company (that i'm not going to name) sent us bill of $500, for a check-up. We disputed the charge with the insurance and they agreed to wave the payment next month. Next month comes and guess what? The same letter comes in mail. We disputed…

This is where I think political leaders (Democrat or Republican) could do really well. It's not just making sure people are covered. It's the existential dread of dealing with opaque, unpredictable, and incomprehensible bureaucracy that can make life-and-death decisions or drop financially crippling bills in your lap, even if you have good insurance . The American health care system isn't just bad for the poor. It's…

"isn't just bad for the poor. It's bad for everyone"

Thank you for saying that. I am amazed at how so many people don't see and understand this. It is not just about Cost which is insane alright. It is about the BS we have to go through after a visit to a doctor or hospital. I am scared about the type of bills and claim fights I have to do if I visit a doc. Not because I cannot afford it necessarily. But because I have to spend may be like 5 hours calling doctor's offices, insurance admins, billing departments and what not.

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