4 ms·

I really wished the US would have addressed the high-costs of healthcare versus trying to get everyone insurance. The cycle will continue and it feeds this patt

I really wished the US would have addressed the high-costs of healthcare versus trying to get everyone insurance. The cycle will continue and it feeds this pattern of poor behavior by hospitals. Same thing with education. There's too many "admins" in the mix.

tertius 6y ago
It's probably much easier, politically, to pay for everyone than to work on pricing.
sushicalculus 6y ago
This also reminds me of university costs. They're allowed to continuously increase prices non-stop, but then the politicians want to just cancel student debt. They probably should have just capped the prices instead
pwinnski 6y ago
As politically difficult as "trying to get everyone insurance" has been, addressing the high costs of health care would be even more difficult. Trying to get everyone insurance involves paying for it, which people often don't want to do. Trying to lower the cost of health care involves working against well-funded companies willing to do anything and everything they can to preserve their profits, even if it requires destroying a few politicians along the way.
- stuff4ben 6y ago
  That's definitely true. Although I wonder if anyone has done an analysis of where hospitals and physicians spend their money? Could reducing the costs due to malpractice be a potential solution?
  - pwinnski 6y ago
    There has been so much analysis of every step of the health care pipeline, and most of the meta-analyses I have read suggest that there is no silver bullet, only many, many, many things combined. All nedical malpractice costs combined, insurance, actual payments, and legal combined, amount to 0.3% of the total cost of health care[0]. That's one-third of one percent. So its not nothing, but it's not the highest priority, either. [0] https://truecostofhealthcare.org/malpractice/ https://truecostofhealthcare.org/malpractice/

tertius 6y ago

It's probably much easier, politically, to pay for everyone than to work on pricing.

sushicalculus 6y ago

This also reminds me of university costs. They're allowed to continuously increase prices non-stop, but then the politicians want to just cancel student debt. They probably should have just capped the prices instead

pwinnski 6y ago

As politically difficult as "trying to get everyone insurance" has been, addressing the high costs of health care would be even more difficult. Trying to get everyone insurance involves paying for it, which people often don't want to do. Trying to lower the cost of health care involves working against well-funded companies willing to do anything and everything they can to preserve their profits, even if it requires destroying a few politicians along the way.

stuff4ben 6y ago
That's definitely true. Although I wonder if anyone has done an analysis of where hospitals and physicians spend their money? Could reducing the costs due to malpractice be a potential solution?
- pwinnski 6y ago
  There has been so much analysis of every step of the health care pipeline, and most of the meta-analyses I have read suggest that there is no silver bullet, only many, many, many things combined. All nedical malpractice costs combined, insurance, actual payments, and legal combined, amount to 0.3% of the total cost of health care[0]. That's one-third of one percent. So its not nothing, but it's not the highest priority, either. [0] https://truecostofhealthcare.org/malpractice/ https://truecostofhealthcare.org/malpractice/