The bizarre calculus of emergency room charges

Quote from frogtrader:

Patients could plan in advance where they'd prefer to be treated. Also if we allowed proper competition among hospitals, there'd be more choices for the ambulance driver. Different hospitals will have different strengths and weaknesses and prices. And competition will smooth out the prices. If one hospital charged an outrageous amount for one accident victim, people would hear about it and no longer go to that hospital, for example.
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all above exists. for patients who does plan in advance,like you said above. but as usual-it your homework
 
Quote from logic_man:

"This is the kind of insanity that exists when medicine and medical insurance are about private profit rather than public health"

"Public health" is only relevant when you are talking about something like a communicable disease. If some guy has cancer or breaks his leg or gets diabetes and has to take out a second mortgage on his house to pay for his treatment, well, that sucks for him and I wish him well, but that isn't "public health" per se, in the sense that it impacts anyone outside of that person's social circle.

So, yeah, it sucks to be one of those unlucky people who go bankrupt because of medical costs, but it's better that some unlucky people go bankrupt than that the entire country go bankrupt with some sort of single payer health care financing. I have no problem knowing that the doctor I see is profiting from my visit. I'm glad he's profiting because that gives me confidence that he will still be around the next time I need to see him. I can't believe that some members of the human race are so stupid as to not understand that.
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I think I understand your point of view, but how do you explain the large number of countries with much lower total health care costs and better results? When you consider that are you still of the same opinion?
 
Quote from Bob111:

it may work until something really serious. i prefer to have coverage from my wife work. we are paying 400 a month(pre tax) for me and my son(wife covered by company). $35 copay for ER, $5 for any doctor and $10 for drugs. i'm not complaining. :p
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4800 +out of pocket co-pays is not your total cost for your family. You will have to add another 2 to 4 K that your wife pays to medicare per year, and perhaps you are also paying into medicare on top of that, depending on your employment. It is really quite an extraordinary cost, I mean considering that you are probably a relative young and relatively health family. It is at least twice to eight times the the total cost of care in any other industrialized country, but with worse results. It is really quite bizarre that you should pay so much!
 
Quote from piezoe:

I think I understand your point of view, but how do you explain the large number of countries with much lower total health care costs and better results? When you consider that are you still of the same opinion?
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The dregs of American society drag down the averages such that it seems like we have worse results. Yes, those dregs are legal citizens, so it's not as if we can't include them in the overall totals, but, realistically, if they were to disappear tomorrow, the US would fare far better in those international comparisons without changing one iota of the current system. Of course, this is part of the greater overall variance in outcomes for Americans across the board. Compared to other countries, America is more volatile, which is actually befitting a country which is younger than most and not completely limited to a single or small number of ethnic groups. The people who push for these "universal" programs are going to have to come to grips with the fact that the less you have of a blood relationship with your fellow citizen, the less you give a shit about what happens to him. That's just basic biological reality.

Other factors can also influence how much you want those programs, like if you expect to somehow be employed in administering it. Yeah, if I was a candidate to lead a "death panel", why would I oppose one being set up. Not saying that "death panels" are the boogeyman, I'm just saying that if I have a reasonable expectation of having that job, I have a financial incentive to support it. Many of the people who support "universal health care" have just such an incentive because they'll be cogs in its giant machinery. Sorry, that doesn't impress me as being all that moral. They're just another special interest group to me. The largest employer in the UK is the NIH. You think those oh-so-compassionate employees would keep working if their checks bounced? If what they advocate for passes my cost-benefit analysis, I will support it. If it doesn't, I will oppose it. That's the rational way to approach these issues. People say things like "We have a duty to society". Baloney. My duties are to myself first, my family second and society a very distant third. Even I, who don't make all that much money, pay more in taxes than I get in benefits, so I'm not exactly chomping at the bit to pay even more to support another entitlement program.

I had an Australian acquaintance who came to live in the US for a while. One night while I was out with him and another friend for dinner, he came right out and said that the US could never have universal health care because a large proportion of our people were just complete idiots without a lick of common sense.

Like the German system of health care or the French system or the Swiss system? Great, get some people of the caliber of the average German or French or Swiss person to come here and live in the US in place of some of the absolutely useless trash we have now. The foundation of any society is human capital and the US has been declining in that factor for a while now.

Sorry, but let's just be honest here, OK?
 
Quote from logic_man:

The dregs of American society drag down the averages such that it seems like we have worse results. Yes, those dregs are legal citizens, so it's not as if we can't include them in the overall totals, but, realistically, if they were to disappear tomorrow, the US would fare far better in those international comparisons without changing one iota of the current system. Of course, this is part of the greater overall variance in outcomes for Americans across the board. Compared to other countries, America is more volatile, which is actually befitting a country which is younger than most and not completely limited to a single or small number of ethnic groups. The people who push for these "universal" programs are going to have to come to grips with the fact that the less you have of a blood relationship with your fellow citizen, the less you give a shit about what happens to him. That's just basic biological reality.

Other factors can also influence how much you want those programs, like if you expect to somehow be employed in administering it. Yeah, if I was a candidate to lead a "death panel", why would I oppose one being set up. Not saying that "death panels" are the boogeyman, I'm just saying that if I have a reasonable expectation of having that job, I have a financial incentive to support it. Many of the people who support "universal health care" have just such an incentive because they'll be cogs in its giant machinery. Sorry, that doesn't impress me as being all that moral. They're just another special interest group to me. The largest employer in the UK is the NIH. You think those oh-so-compassionate employees would keep working if their checks bounced? If what they advocate for passes my cost-benefit analysis, I will support it. If it doesn't, I will oppose it. That's the rational way to approach these issues. People say things like "We have a duty to society". Baloney. My duties are to myself first, my family second and society a very distant third. Even I, who don't make all that much money, pay more in taxes than I get in benefits, so I'm not exactly chomping at the bit to pay even more to support another entitlement program.

I had an Australian acquaintance who came to live in the US for a while. One night while I was out with him and another friend for dinner, he came right out and said that the US could never have universal health care because a large proportion of our people were just complete idiots without a lick of common sense.

Like the German system of health care or the French system or the Swiss system? Great, get some people of the caliber of the average German or French or Swiss person to come here and live in the US in place of some of the absolutely useless trash we have now. The foundation of any society is human capital and the US has been declining in that factor for a while now.

Sorry, but let's just be honest here, OK?
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That's a very, very interesting point of view. I want to think about it some before I respond further, if I do. I have never heard that before. I mean the idea that the make-up of the population in the U.S. precludes the U.S. having universal health care. It is quite an original idea, and it deserves some thought!
 
Quote from logic_man:

The dregs of American society drag down the averages such that it seems like we have worse results. Yes, those dregs are legal citizens, so it's not as if we can't include them in the overall totals, but, realistically, if they were to disappear tomorrow, the US would fare far better in those international comparisons without changing one iota of the current system. Of course, this is part of the greater overall variance in outcomes for Americans across the board. Compared to other countries, America is more volatile, which is actually befitting a country which is younger than most and not completely limited to a single or small number of ethnic groups. The people who push for these "universal" programs are going to have to come to grips with the fact that the less you have of a blood relationship with your fellow citizen, the less you give a shit about what happens to him. That's just basic biological reality.

Other factors can also influence how much you want those programs, like if you expect to somehow be employed in administering it. Yeah, if I was a candidate to lead a "death panel", why would I oppose one being set up. Not saying that "death panels" are the boogeyman, I'm just saying that if I have a reasonable expectation of having that job, I have a financial incentive to support it. Many of the people who support "universal health care" have just such an incentive because they'll be cogs in its giant machinery. Sorry, that doesn't impress me as being all that moral. They're just another special interest group to me. The largest employer in the UK is the NIH. You think those oh-so-compassionate employees would keep working if their checks bounced? If what they advocate for passes my cost-benefit analysis, I will support it. If it doesn't, I will oppose it. That's the rational way to approach these issues. People say things like "We have a duty to society". Baloney. My duties are to myself first, my family second and society a very distant third. Even I, who don't make all that much money, pay more in taxes than I get in benefits, so I'm not exactly chomping at the bit to pay even more to support another entitlement program.

I had an Australian acquaintance who came to live in the US for a while. One night while I was out with him and another friend for dinner, he came right out and said that the US could never have universal health care because a large proportion of our people were just complete idiots without a lick of common sense.

Like the German system of health care or the French system or the Swiss system? Great, get some people of the caliber of the average German or French or Swiss person to come here and live in the US in place of some of the absolutely useless trash we have now. The foundation of any society is human capital and the US has been declining in that factor for a while now.

Sorry, but let's just be honest here, OK?
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You sound like all these trash people in the US somehow emerged lately out of nowhere. So where do these people, these trash people come from? Howcome the ancestors of these trash people founded the most powerful and richest country in the world? But their kids are trash or idiots? Please explain..
 
Quote from misterno:

You sound like all these trash people in the US somehow emerged lately out of nowhere. So where do these people, these trash people come from? Howcome the ancestors of these trash people founded the most powerful and richest country in the world? But their kids are trash or idiots? Please explain..
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It's pretty well-known that Generations X and Y will not have the same educational attainments or living standards as the Baby Boomers, so, clearly, regardless of whether or not their "ancestors" did x,y or z, these generations are not able to carry the ball forward. I blame the fact that they are taught idiotic things by idiots in the public schools. That's one element.

The second is clearly the shift in immigration policy toward favoring people from 3rd and 4th world dumps, as well as a near-complete collapse in securing the border against illegal immigrants.

Then, you've got people in the euphemistically-named "inner cities", where there are people who try to join the "20-20 club" and have 20 kids with 20 "baby mommas" and you've got a dysgenic stew for the ages. I guess the US is about to go the world's biggest experiment in whether or not genes actually impact social outcomes. I'm betting they do, which way are you betting? Why?

Now, before your little panties get all wadded up, I've got plenty of trash people in my own family and I attended public school (the most useful thing I learned was typing, everything else was better off forgotten as soon as the last bell rang on the last day of senior year), so don't think I'm some born with a silver spoon in my mouth private school WASP looking down on hoi polloi. I'm just a guy with an objective eye, the ability to interpret data and a distinct lack of romanticism about "the American people", at least circa 2012.
 
Quote from logic_man:

It's pretty well-known that Generations X and Y will not have the same educational attainments or living standards as the Baby Boomers, so, clearly, regardless of whether or not their "ancestors" did x,y or z, these generations are not able to carry the ball forward. I blame the fact that they are taught idiotic things by idiots in the public schools. That's one element.

The second is clearly the shift in immigration policy toward favoring people from 3rd and 4th world dumps, as well as a near-complete collapse in securing the border against illegal immigrants.

Then, you've got people in the euphemistically-named "inner cities", where there are people who try to join the "20-20 club" and have 20 kids with 20 "baby mommas" and you've got a dysgenic stew for the ages. I guess the US is about to go the world's biggest experiment in whether or not genes actually impact social outcomes. I'm betting they do, which way are you betting? Why?

Now, before your little panties get all wadded up, I've got plenty of trash people in my own family and I attended public school (the most useful thing I learned was typing, everything else was better off forgotten as soon as the last bell rang on the last day of senior year), so don't think I'm some born with a silver spoon in my mouth private school WASP looking down on hoi polloi. I'm just a guy with an objective eye, the ability to interpret data and a distinct lack of romanticism about "the American people", at least circa 2012.
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Go to http://zeitgeistmovie.com/
Then go to the bottom of the web page and play the movie Zeitgeist:Moving Forward/2011

About 32 minutes into the film there is an segment that you should find fascinating that is germane to your viewpoint.
 
Quote from babutime:

Wow. I really hope Americans sort their health care mess out.

Big and awesome country. Just war obsessed and messed up politicians sleeping with giant corporations.
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We Americans are not "war obsessed"... just the military-industrial complex and the politicos who pander to them for campaign money.
 
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