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The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

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Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#101

Post by bmmayer1 »

venomsnake wrote: post #95
plock wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The consumer also can't entirely walk away from the food market. That doesn't make food prices go out of control.

According to USDA in 2011 15% of US households suffered from food insecurity - for them they are already out of control. And there are the other couple of billion people on the planet that cannot afford a dollar per day for a meal.

> 15% of US households suffered from food insecurity

...partly because of healthcare costs, which is the number one cause of bankruptcy in the US. You're making our point.

Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#102

Post by nsxwolf »

Smudge wrote: post #62
bmmayer1 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What the commenter suggested is exactly the situation right now: the hospital sets the prices as astronomically high as possible because they can get away with it, because the patients aren't paying it. Don't you think introducing patient choice into the equation would put some downward pressure on prices? And certainly if it puts any downward pressure on prices, it's a better situation than we have now.

If you're having a heart attack, are you really in a position to negotiate on price? At all? I get that there might be some downward pressure, but what prevents the hospital from just laying an absurd bill on you after the procedure?

The hope with a real free market is that you wouldn't have to negotiate in that situation, the prices would already be reasonable.

Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#103

Post by dragonwriter »

nsxwolf wrote: post #102
Smudge wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're having a heart attack, are you really in a position to negotiate on price? At all? I get that there might be some downward pressure, but what prevents the hospital from just laying an absurd bill on you after the procedure?

The hope with a real free market is that you wouldn't have to negotiate in that situation, the prices would already be reasonable.

> The hope with a real free market is that you wouldn't have to negotiate in that situation, the prices would already be reasonable.

The theoretical efficiency of a real "real free market" depends on the ability to evaluate and choose options in a competitive market for purchasing goods and services based on perfect knowledge of the costs of and utility from each purchase.

There's a whole lot of reasons that a deregulated market for "purchasing treatment for a heart attack you are currently experiencing" is not likely to have the features that theoretically create efficiency in a "real free market".

Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#104

Post by plock »

roc wrote: post #89
plock wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The consumer also can't entirely walk away from the food market. That doesn't make food prices go out of control.

Which would be a great point if not for the oversight, subsidies, reserves and incentives that affect staple foods.

The point is that consumers are still able to bid down prices despite having no choice but to participate in the market. Individual sellers still have to convince individual buyers to buy their products, and to do so they have to price their goods competitively. It doesn't matter that there is no alternative to participating in the food market because there are alternatives within the food market.

Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#105

Post by sseveran »

specialist wrote: post #93
ahallock wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The free markets are mythical because they're not allowed to happen. Single payer is a horrible idea. Why would you trust a centralized agency (which can be bribed and corrupted so easily) with such an essential service? The government purchasing healthcare from outside organizations is bound to be overrun with special interests and obscene contracts (like we see with the military). I want to be able to vote with my…

Please provide an example of a free market. Why do the existing single payer systems outperform the USA's private health plan system, measured in both cost per capita and life expectancy?

Because of measurements (like including high speed highway deaths) that make other systems look relatively better.

Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#106

Post by sseveran »

jbooth wrote: post #38
baddox wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people will unabashedly say that they believe healthcare to be special. It's not uncommon to hear people say that they don't believe profit motive has any place in healthcare. I don't buy it. I don't see how healthcare is any more special than, say, food production (both are obviously vital to health), yet I think most people have come around to recognizing that profit motive is a spectacular way to organize the…

Of course healthcare is special, it's not a normal market because of extreme demand inelasticity. Food is special too, but it manages to function as a market because we have a food surplus, a plethora of replacement goods within the food category and it's much less specialized to produce. This doesn't mean that people don't deserve to earn a living. The doctor in the article managed to find a way to make the man's pr…

The RAND study clearly showed that much of the demand for healthcare is elastic.

Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#107

Post by GFischer »

rkangel wrote: post #98

The system in the UK, while not perfect, is actually pretty damn good. It's a national pass-time to be rude about the NHS, but when Obamacare was in the press* we all suddenly remembered how good we've got it. There are all sorts of criticisms one can level at the US Health "system" (as well as the UK NHS), but it fundamentally has to come down to efficient use of resources. In the UK, we pay money to the NHS (via ta…

We have a state system in Uruguay too, and it's amazingly better than the one in the U.S. as well.

One difference, I think, is that it reduces the imbalance of power between consumers and providers. The state can and does force prices down.

It sucks if you want the absolute best healthcare, but you can get that by paying (it's not forbidden), but the healthcare we do get is "good enough".

It's also lacking in preventive medicine, quality of life and cosmetic, but I'll take that over the U.S. system anytime.

We have private emergency systems, and they work extremely well for the consumer, my girlfriend had a burn from scalding water and was treated by a doctor within 5 minutes, for U$ 15. Doctors at those emergency services are criminally underpaid, though (as little as U$ 500 per 6 hour-shift monthly)

Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#108

Post by [deleted] »

JPKab wrote: post #72
cromwellian wrote: post #27

A month ago, I was traveling in Germany with my family and my daughter had an emergency, so I had to go to a German hospital in the middle of the night. Within 1 hour, they had given my daughter an ultrasound and two doses of medicine to treat her problem, the cost to me: $130 euro, and I didn't even use my health insurance (which does cover international emergencies) 3 years ago, I had a gallbladder attack in Shangh…

I used to be on a High Deductible Health Plan, which is designed to be just like the author suggests: only for catastrophes. For anything else, you use a Health Savings Account (a tax free account you put money into) and use it to just pay cash prices. IT WAS HORRIBLE. The concept of course, is great. But the problem is one of chicken and egg. Because the entire system is set up for 3rd party payment, NOBODY, and I m…

[deleted]

Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#109

Post by nsxwolf »

dragonwriter wrote: post #103
nsxwolf wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The hope with a real free market is that you wouldn't have to negotiate in that situation, the prices would already be reasonable.

> The hope with a real free market is that you wouldn't have to negotiate in that situation, the prices would already be reasonable. The theoretical efficiency of a real "real free market" depends on the ability to evaluate and choose options in a competitive market for purchasing goods and services based on perfect knowledge of the costs of and utility from each purchase. There's a whole lot of reasons that a deregu…

Also, a heart attack is a rare event, and presumably one that would be covered by a real insurance policy.

Re: The Man Who Was Treated for $17,000 Less

#110

Post by tghw »

rayiner wrote: post #30

So what do you do if you don't have $3,000 to pay for what can be a life-threatening operation (a hernia)? The Cato Institute answer, let the person die, is economically nonsensical. The economic value of that person's lost labor is almost certainly worth way more than $3,000.

Originally the hospital required $20,000 up front. These were the two options discussed in the article. Is there a third, better alternative that they missed?
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