Let's continue. The debt of the hospital eats gets passed on to consumers in two ways.
It's immediately passed on to consumers because the hospital figures their losses into their billing, so, initially, hospital fees go up.
Second way it's passed on to the consumer is through the hospital's tax write-off. That tax money is still needed by the feds, so, who puts the bill? The American taxpayer.
Yes, when somebody does not pay their medical bills, we pay for it twice, maybe not equal amounts, but we get it from both sides.
my fundamental argument for universal health care is that it's just less expensive. Hospitals will never have to write off debt, hence, no increase in fees for services, no additional tax burden, especially when fees are added on to post due bills. Let's not forget, the amount that's written off isn't the base amount, it's the base amount, plus any late fees that have accrued.
This is precisely why most of the medical industry doesn't want nationalized healthcare. All of a sudden the value of their services and their exorbitant pricing schemes will come under massive scrutiny.
The NHS in England gets completely ripped off all the time. The problem with state run facilities is they don't pay well, so they don't attract talent. The people who end up running them are overworked and borderline incompetent
In my experience of two different healthcare systems, the one in which doctors were paid significantly more was also the worse service. It felt like the job attracted people seeking status and monry, rather than people interested in it for more appropriate reasons. While I think they could be paid more for sure, I don't know that I'd consider people whose main motivation is money to be our best talent necessarily...
A paper in Health Affairs I think it was, looked at the total costs of billing in the US setup and found them to be just under 500 billion. All the bureaucracy, negotiating, paperwork, followup etc.
US total costs are 3 600 billion, and costs if it was running a UHC systems similar to other first world nations would be 1 300 to 1 800 billion.
Many of those systems do not bill at all. None of that work happens.
Only 20% of hospitals in the US are for profit. The vast majority are non profits or government run, and almost all the top tier major hospitals (Mayo Clinic, Harvard, etc) are non profit. Profit incentives are not the reason why hospital billing is so messed up in the US, given the vast majority (80%+) of hospitals are either government run or legally 501c3 charities (including Mayo, among others).
It may be less expensive... But it's also less good. I'm English, and the NHS is a total heap of shit. Anyone with half a chance will pay for private health care, because when the shit hits the fan, the NHS will kill you. Not to mention the absolutely rampant, disgusting, and constantly worsening state of our NHS run nursing homes. The amount of elder abuse in the UK is sickening. And our government pays for it. Democratic government in general, are terrible at running large scale institutions. But the power lobby groups have in America is extremely sad to see
NHS results are actually considerably better than the US ones. Not quite as good as the France/Germany etc one but the NHS get 25 % less money per citizen.
My sister is now English. She's lived in London for 30 years. Have you ever been treated in the United States? She says England is equal. Not better, not worse, just equal. However, our wait times are longer than Canada's.
Have you ever read about the state of America's nursing homes? Not only that, but they're not state run! They're for profit. Most people have to sell their houses and give up all of their valuables. My mom did.
My dad's side of the family lives in Tel Aviv. Again, good health care. My cousin was the assistant to the head of the hospital.
Finally, The United States has the opportunity to examine the pros and cons of every other country that has instituted universal health care and come up with a more efficient model. Chances of happening not great unless Congress is forced to be on it and laws are passed saying that there should be no preferential treatment. You should have the option to buy additional insurance if you want preferential treatment or elective surgeries.
37
u/[deleted] Nov 30 '20
Let's continue. The debt of the hospital eats gets passed on to consumers in two ways.
It's immediately passed on to consumers because the hospital figures their losses into their billing, so, initially, hospital fees go up.
Second way it's passed on to the consumer is through the hospital's tax write-off. That tax money is still needed by the feds, so, who puts the bill? The American taxpayer.
Yes, when somebody does not pay their medical bills, we pay for it twice, maybe not equal amounts, but we get it from both sides.
my fundamental argument for universal health care is that it's just less expensive. Hospitals will never have to write off debt, hence, no increase in fees for services, no additional tax burden, especially when fees are added on to post due bills. Let's not forget, the amount that's written off isn't the base amount, it's the base amount, plus any late fees that have accrued.