Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 304 posts

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#91

Post by vundercind »

triceratops wrote: post #45
vundercind wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was reported in The Nation (and nowhere else that I ever found when I went looking—so, grain of salt) that Obama said that all the totally unnecessary jobs that’d be eliminated are exactly why he wouldn’t push full single payer. It’s a regressive-tax-funded white collar makework jobs program. JFC.

He didn't have the votes to get single payer through Congress. Simple as.

Yes, I agree that is at least one reason that happened, and possibly the main one.

I think the Nation’s quote of him on the topic points out something that may be true, which is that he might have balked at doing it given how many people would be laid off (hundreds of thousands, surely) and what the optics of that would be, though I kinda doubt the quote itself.

But yeah, even if he’d been gung-ho behind it, it wasn’t happening.

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#92

Post by jmyeet »

tptacek wrote: post #79
jmyeet wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm honestly not sure if I should attribute this comment to disingenuity, ignorance or just bad faith. > pushing back on anesthesiology pay on the East Coast. Not even close. BCBS was just pushing extra charges onto patients. > insurers working to make surgeries cost less This is laughably ill-informed, I don't know where to begin. The only thing insurers are doing is increasing the gap between what they collect and…

Anthem proposed to apply the precise guidelines Medicare uses to pay for anesthesiology, including references to those CMS guidelines. Billing for anesthesiology has been a hot button issue: the search you want is [anesthesia surprise billing]. Anesthesiology is one of the highest-paid specialties in American medicine. You cannot reasonably support Medicare and claim that Anthem was doing something unconscionable, be…

Insurers use the Medicare schedule as a weapon to simply reduce how much providers get paid and/or increase how much patients have to pay out-of-pocket.

The Medicare schedule is generally low because of the negotiating power of the Federal government so when Anthem (or whoever) says something like "we'll pay Medicare rates" or "we'll pay 120% of the Medicare rate" they're really just cutting payments and increasing patient costs. Nothing more.

In the recent BCBS case, all they were doing was saying "it may take 8 hours for the surgery but we're only going to pay you for 3". They haven't made the surgery cheaper to provide. They just wanted to pay out less.

Also, if we're going to simply do everything based on Medicare, why exactly do we even need private insurers? Just expand Medicare to everyone if the schedules are good, right?

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#93

Post by tptacek »

vundercind wrote: post #48
tptacek wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a distinction to be drawn between challenging norms of discourse like not speaking ill of the dead, and actively cheerleading murders, like "we should boycott Starbucks for providing evidence about the murderer to police", or Taylor Lorenz calling for the assassination of Anthem's CEO by name.

The incoming President told his supporters that if he lost they’d still have to the option of shooting his opponent, when he ran in 2016. Instead of being ejected from politics forever by an outraged public, he went on to win that election. Then another one more recently. What’s this norm you mention?

I don't understand why you think pointing to another odious person rebuts my argument.

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#94

Post by coldpie »

tptacek wrote: post #29

It's mostly not rational. For instance, much of the conversation over the last day has been about Anthem pushing back on anesthesiology pay on the East Coast. That's people angry about their insurers working to make surgeries cost less by employing the literal guideline Medicare uses, and yet people online were overtly suggesting Anthem's CEO be murdered over it. Incoherent. This won't win me any points in this parti…

Okay. So other than getting mad on HN, what do you propose we do to fix the feelings people have about this situation and prevent this happening again?

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#95

Post by jjj123 »

defen wrote: post #52
Dalewyn wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What I do find disappointing is the lack of concern This is (was) the CEO of the largest health insurer in the country which has shown a lack of concern for paying out insurance or securing data both private and medical. Their data leak this year is second only to National Public Data's leak (also this year) of practically every single SSN on the planet and arguably worse because their leak also contains medical dat…

> this guy is also about the most unsympathizable man in the country. There's no way that is true. It's only remotely possibly true if you're only talking about people who at least nominally obey the rules and laws of society. You don't actually think that he was worse than a murderer, or a rapist, or a child abuser, of which we have many, many thousands in this country.

When deciding who deserves my scorn, I genuinely do put those who are in power and commit atrocities at scale (like healthcare CEOs) above one-off violent criminals.

Even if you’re a few levels removed from the deaths you’ve caused, you still have blood on your hands imo.

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#96

Post by UncleOxidant »

vundercind wrote: post #48
tptacek wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a distinction to be drawn between challenging norms of discourse like not speaking ill of the dead, and actively cheerleading murders, like "we should boycott Starbucks for providing evidence about the murderer to police", or Taylor Lorenz calling for the assassination of Anthem's CEO by name.

The incoming President told his supporters that if he lost they’d still have to the option of shooting his opponent, when he ran in 2016. Instead of being ejected from politics forever by an outraged public, he went on to win that election. Then another one more recently. What’s this norm you mention?

Norm died in 2016.

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#97

Post by vundercind »

tptacek wrote: post #93
vundercind wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The incoming President told his supporters that if he lost they’d still have to the option of shooting his opponent, when he ran in 2016. Instead of being ejected from politics forever by an outraged public, he went on to win that election. Then another one more recently. What’s this norm you mention?

I don't understand why you think pointing to another odious person rebuts my argument.

Another extremely popular person. Who violated that norm on camera and had it broadcast all over the place. And remained extremely popular.

What norm?

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#98

Post by tptacek »

jmyeet wrote: post #92
tptacek wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anthem proposed to apply the precise guidelines Medicare uses to pay for anesthesiology, including references to those CMS guidelines. Billing for anesthesiology has been a hot button issue: the search you want is [anesthesia surprise billing]. Anesthesiology is one of the highest-paid specialties in American medicine. You cannot reasonably support Medicare and claim that Anthem was doing something unconscionable, be…

Insurers use the Medicare schedule as a weapon to simply reduce how much providers get paid and/or increase how much patients have to pay out-of-pocket. The Medicare schedule is generally low because of the negotiating power of the Federal government so when Anthem (or whoever) says something like "we'll pay Medicare rates" or "we'll pay 120% of the Medicare rate" they're really just cutting payments and increasing p…

You're saying "the Medicare schedule" as if it's an abstraction, but it is literally the payment process used by the largest buyer of medical services in the country. What Medicare pays matters more than what anybody else pays, because most medical services are performed for Medicare patients. So I'll ask directly: how is it unconscionable for Anthem to use those policies, but not for Medicare to use them?

You are exactly right that Anthem is demanding providers charge less for surgeries, not for surgeries to take less time. Providing "less anesthesia" is not a thing. This is entirely about preventing health providers from charging more money to Anthem and, in turn, their customers. That's why Medicare does the same thing.

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#99

Post by bdangubic »

tptacek wrote: post #90
WorldWideWebb wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Accurate. They are literally middle men taking a cut without offering anything to the process. Switch to single payer, dump the middlemen, and have our taxes pay for essential services (keeping us alive and healthy). Seems simple enough but…

But literally every state in the country disagrees with you and so it's not going to happen.

true but that doesn’t make it right when people are running these states are paid by the same people who benefit from the current system…

Re: Torrent of Hate for Health Insurance Industry Follows CEO's Killing

#100

Post by s1artibartfast »

coldpie wrote: post #83
s1artibartfast wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yeah, blood in the street and mass death and destruction. Everyone killing everyone.

So, what do you propose to do to fix it? I don't think scolding people on HN is going to accomplish much.

I dont know how to talk people from normalized murder.
Post reply on HN