More than a third of U.S. healthcare costs go to bureaucracy

[BeckyDem]

(Reuters Health) - U.S. insurers and providers spent more than $800 billion in 2017 on administration, or nearly $2,500 per person - more than four times the per-capita administrative costs in Canada’s single-payer system, a new study finds.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-costs-administration/more-than-a-third-of-u-s-healthcare-costs-go-to-bureaucracy-idUSKBN1Z5261


Medicare for All

[Wounded Bear]

1. IIRC Medicare runs about 3-5% overhead...

I think Medicaid is higher, probably because of more state involvement.

I've worked in the private sector (not health care). Administration and efficiency really aren't that much better than the gov't.

[Turbineguy]

2. The system functions because of its inefficiency

It's a bit like how cars got low emissions in the 70's by getting 10mpg.

What are we going to do with the million or so people who will lose their insurance company bureaucracy jobs?

[BeckyDem]

4. There is a very good plan in place, but it still needs some adjustments.

Unfortunately, debates and corporate media don't like detailed discussions on television.

( excerpt )

It is also refreshing that the PERI authors insist on a “just transition” and open up that discussion. Their program would use ERISA, the federal government regulatory agency for private pensions, to ensure that health insurance companies and providers cannot raid their currently solvent pension funds, thereby guaranteeing all workers their current pension benefits. In addition, of the 1.8 million displaced workers, nearly 300,000 are 60 years or older and that part of the workforce is treated very generously—they will be paid 100 percent of their current salaries until age 65 if they choose to retire.

But the rest of the plan, though probably the most generous ever proposed for dislocated workers, is just not enough, and it leaves Medicare for All subject to political backlash that could be offset by a more thorough program. It leaves about 1.5 million displaced workers, who would be guaranteed one-year’s salary and would receive $10,000 each to pay for education or training and $10,000 each to cover relocation expenses. This is historically generous, but it is not enough, primarily because the American system of training is an ill-coordinated mess about which workers are highly, and rightly, cynical.

In the Rust Belt, for example, so-called Trade Adjustment Assistance training programs have been notoriously poorly funded and have often led not to jobs but to flooded labor markets for specific occupations, thereby pulling down wages in those occupations. Likewise, the relocation assistance is very generous money-wise, but the U.S. does not have a nationally coordinated employment system that helps workers find out where they might be needed elsewhere in the country. So, though very generous, the PERI proposal pretty much throws money at displaced workers and tells them to figure out what to do on their own.

https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/looking-after-workers-who-will-lose-their-jobs-under-medicare-for-all/

[Bettie]

5. You will never have to worry about those people

our system will never change. We'll be on for-profit health insurance for ever.

There is no hope for any change on this.

So, if you have insurance that pays for things, then you are fortunate.

The rest of us will continue to avoid going to the doctor as long as we can, because it costs too much and the insurance companies literally have entire departments of people whose only job is to find an excuse to avoid covering care.

[Turin_C3PO]

6. If Democrats get into office, things will change.

Maybe not Medicare for All but expansion of the ACA including a robust public option, more expansion of Medicaid, and more generous subsidies.

[Bettie]

8. It is VERY likely that

the ACA will be gone overnight.

It is entirely possible (probable) that the SCOTUS will rule it unconstitutional on a 5/4 vote.

So, we'll be back to where we started.

[Turin_C3PO]

9. I actually don't believe that SCOTUS will rule it

unconstitutional. I don’t think Roberts wants that for his legacy.

[Bettie]

11. You have a lot more faith in him

than I do.

I don't think he gives a single fuck about anything but pleasing the orange anus.

I've been burned too many times expecting Republicans to have any integrity.

I hope you are right, but I expect the worst.

[BeckyDem]

7. That is the dangerous part not usually covered by the media.

A clerk decides what you need, what they will pay for. The US should be ashamed to not have single payer. It enrages me above all other policies.

[Bettie]

10. It does me as well

but, profit over people, every time.

[leftstreet]

3. DURec