Health-Care Spending for U.S. May Double by 2015

[FreakinDJ]

Health-Care Spending for U.S. May Double by 2015

Feb. 22 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. spending for health care may double to $4 trillion by 2015, propelled by an aging population using more drugs, hospital care and technology, according to a government forecast.

If medical spending rises that much, it will consume about 20 cents of every dollar in goods and services produced in the U.S, up from 16 cents last year, said authors of the outlook.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=a9qhlLJ1grAU&refer=us

Now tell me again why we don't need the "Public Option"

[Oregone]

1. Uhh...

The "public option" is a tad irrelevant to the article. According to early drafts, it wouldn't be available until 2013 anyway, and it would only cover 10 million by 2019. While it may lower costs for those 10 million people, thats just peanuts in the grand scheme of things. As long as the "public option" won't be an option for all Americans, its not going to compete, drive down costs, or keep anyone honest.

Cost are expanding. Even in single-payer nations they go up. Band-aids won't fend off the impending storm.

[ipaint]

4. I wonder what the projected increase is for those single payer nations

Most of them pay half what we do today. Knock out the insurance companies here asap. We just can't afford them.

[Oregone]

5. Soaring

Im a bit too high to retrieve the data, but you can google OECD health spending projections.

Yes, the US cannot afford multi-party, for-profit insurance. I don't even think in another two decades single-payer will be affordable any longer (only single-provider, with salaried practicioners). The US is so far behind even getting a start in the proper direction to handle this crisis.

[Hannah Bell]

6. health care spending = about 18% of us gdp. "administrative cost" = about

1/3 of that. top 1% in us receive close to 25% of us income. us spends something like double what most of the ue does on healthcare, with worse results.

pharma (e.g. pfizer = 26%) profit margins = something like 20%+.

we can afford it. we just have to make some adjustments.

when people say "we can't afford it," they're saying "people must die so that insurers & capitalists & pharmacorps may continue to enjoy the lifestyle they've grown accustomed to".

well, bollocks.

[Oregone]

7. You can afford it now, yes

But I question if, at this rate, nations will be able to afford private, fee-per-service health delivery in the long term, even with single-payer. Ive seen an OECD projection showing single-payer nations spending over 60% of their budget on health costs at some future date (forgot which ones, but it included Canada and Australia).

Once you remove privatized insurance, more and more steps will need to be taken to socialize the actually deliver to contain costs. Unfortunately, the US is still on the home-plate trying to bunt their way on first, and far from even solving the long term problems.

[Hannah Bell]

11. nope, we can *always* afford it. forever. short of resource depletion or plague,

it's simply an illusion that we "can't afford" healthcare for everyone.

[Oregone]

12. In the grand scheme of things, you gotta justify the costs

And its just a silly notion to throw forward your charge card (it won't make the country competitive to take that approach).

Especially when there are cheaper ways to provide universal care than the insurance model

And thats my point. Why would anyone willing choose to just "do it" and let it consume a budget when you can "do it better". The VA...thats doing it better. Thats the model to move towards, and the US already has it.

Look...Im saying single-payer is the first step to make health care affordable in the short term (but not feasible in the big picture). The next step will be eliminating profit and fee-per-service on the delivery end.

Using the "always afford it" argument isn't always the best approach to arrive at the most efficient model of delivery and payment. Hell, you can always afford subsidizing gross for-profit private insurance in a multi-payer system, but thats simply the foolish way to go in the long run (because the US will remain paying over 2X what everyone else will for health care).

[Hannah Bell]

13. i'm not interested in arriving at the "most efficient" model of healthcare.

i don't buy into that whole paradigm.

when you understand what it means when 1% of the population takes 25% of the country's income, you'll understand why.

it's the root of all "inefficiencies".

[Oregone]

15. I can tell

Fuck public services then. Lets outsource everything to the private sector and pay an assload subsidizing exec pay and shareholder dividends.

[Hannah Bell]

18. you misunderstand.

[ipaint]

9. The swiss expected a 15% increase and they came in this year at 11%.

They are the most costly of the nations with some form of universal care.

I'll probably look into it more tomorrow.

[hansberrym]

10. What is 11% annual growth rate compounded for 8 years?

The article was written in 2007, and says expects costs to double by 2015.


At 11% annual growth the costs more than double over 8 years.

[Hannah Bell]

14. health care is about 11% of their gdp; it didn't grow by 11%. growth was

"2.4% of GDP between 1990 and 2004, above the OECD average increase of 1.5%."

(2006)http://www.oecd.org/document/47/0,2340,en_2649_201185_37562223_1_1_1_1,00.html.

"In two weeks the Swiss government will announce approved health care premiums for 2009, which are likely to rise by 2.5 to 3.5%"

http://genevalunch.com/2008/09/12/insurers-say-health-care-premiums-must-rise-more/.


That is, costs are rising approx on a par with inflation.

[ipaint]

16. Thanks for the correction.

I got it in my head but it certainly didn't come out right written down.:blush:

[hansberrym]

17. According to the article, costs are rising faster than premiums.

Also according to the article, costs increased as %of GDP, and so rose faster than inflation. In a period of real growth, just holding steady as a % of GDP would be growing faster than inflation.




The Swiss seem to be in denial regarding the demographic shift. Raising premiums less than costs may be politically expedient, but this only delays the inevitable hard choices.

http://genevalunch.com/2009/08/17/nobel-economist-krugman-calls-obama-health-plan-like-swiss-system/

In the US, neither party is willing to address the aging of the baby boomers, and until they do, they are simply rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

[Hannah Bell]

19. "costs increased as %of GDP, and so rose faster than inflation."

not a logical conclusion.

[hansberrym]

20. Did the Swiss GDP grow in real terms over the time period specified

in the article? Yes.
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/Economics/GDP-Growth.aspx?Symbol=CHF

Did costs rise faster than GDP? Yes, the article says costs grew as percent of GDP.

Since GDP grew in real terms (outpaced inflation) and cost grew faster than GDP, then costs grew faster than inflation.



The other time period cited is early 2008. T
The increase in premiums is not the same as the increase in costs.
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/Economics/Inflation-CPI.aspx?Symbol=CHF

The article says costs rose 5% in early 2008, but inflation as per the above link was only about 3% in first half of 2008.

So while one could say premiums rose only as fast as inflation, costs actually rose faster.

[Hannah Bell]

21. the period specified = 1990-2004.

"The cost has been increasing steadily in Switzerland, rising by 2.4% of GDP between 1990 and 2004, above the OECD average increase of 1.5%."

Things you don't know:

1. Inflation 1990-2004.
2. Population growth/decline & demographics 1990-2004.
3. What they mean when they differentiate between "costs" & "premiums". Seems to me premiums in insurance are set to cover cost, & then some. Not sure why switzerland would be different.

[hansberrym]

8. The post WWII baby boom affects the EU as well.

http://www.globalaging.org/health/world/depopulationeuropejapan.htm

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2004_2009/documents/dv/722/722778/722778en.pdf

The rising costs are mainly due to demographic shift.

[hansberrym]

2. How is anyone or any plan going to stop the rise in cost?

The article posted by the OP is dated Feb, 2007 but still relevant to the current debate.



The plain facts are the nation is growing older, the boomers are reaching retirement age, and total health care spending will continue to rise.

The rational thing to do is to accept that a larger portion of the average American's income will go to health costs -because the average American is getting older, and older persons tend to spend more on health care. The government should be encouraging more people to become doctors and nurses and should be encouraging the increase of facilities such as hospitals, clinics, and testing facilities because we are going to need them over the next 20 or 30 years. All the focus on holding down costs just makes it that much more difficult to prepare to meet the future needs.


Yes, it would be nice if there were something like 15 workers for every retiree, and it would be nice if the average age of the workforce were something like 30, but that is not the world we live in.

http://www.nga.org/Files/ppt/0611SENIORWEBCASTKREPCIO.PPT

[jeffbr]

3. Unbelievable

and scary as hell