5 ms·

I'm not a fan of the guy, but this is probably the most important/good thing he did with his presidency. Price transparency is the most fundamental first step t

I'm not a fan of the guy, but this is probably the most important/good thing he did with his presidency. Price transparency is the most fundamental first step to driving down health care costs. Once people get a taste of it, it will drive even more, better and accurate data. Start real conversations about costs and open the door to measureable improvement through innovation.

mullingitover 5y ago
Price transparency is a pointless shell game designed to keep everyone strung along on the entrenched, failed system. When you're having a heart attack, the last thing you're doing is shopping around for the best prices on heart attack emergency treatment. The free market has no place in health care, because in the hands of the free market the first thing that will happen in a life-threatening emergency is for you to transfer 100% of your wealth to the party that has 100% of the leverage.
- twofornone 5y ago
  >When you're having a heart attack, the last thing you're doing is shopping around for the best prices on heart attack emergency treatment. This is a tired, nonsensical argument. The vast, vast majority of medical procedures are not last minute emergencies. Furthermore, with price transparency you will clearly be able to evaluate which hospitals may or may not be generally in your price range and choose a default to visit for an emergency (assuming you're not carted off in an ambulance). More importantly, this will absolutely force competition and some degree of price correction.
- xur17 5y ago
  I agree that it's pointless for emergency surgery, but there are plenty of other cases where a consumer could shop around (colonoscopy, ACL repair, etc), and I'd argue these are actually the majority rather than the minority of cases. To me it comes down to - if we are going to pretend we have a market based system for health care (that's what we say we have now), we need pricing transparency to have any hope of it working.
  - pessimizer 5y ago
    > I'd argue these are actually the majority rather than the minority of cases. For well-insured middle-class people. Poor working people only get emergency care
- codegeek 5y ago
  I think forcing hospitals to at least list something is a good start. It won't be perfect but it will make people more aware of how hospitals and insurance companies are working usually to screw people when it comes to billing. Any transparency is a good thing whether it is perfect or not.
- bjt 5y ago
  Not all health care is heart attacks. "Health care" is a huge bucket containing everything from buying a bottle of cough syrup to the heart attacks you mention. For life threatening emergencies, I'm with you. Let's fund that care through the state. But excluding the market from everything is not the answer. The problem with using insurance for all these non-urgent things is that insurance distorts the market and price discipline goes out the window.
  - mullingitover 5y ago
    We don't have to reinvent the wheel. Other countries have solved these problems. They have better health care than we do. It's measurable, it's been measured, and no surprise, they have flat-out superior outcomes. They are dramatically more efficient. Our market focus is a cargo cult.
    - weberer 5y ago
      What market focus? Prices were completely opaque until just a few months ago. Any economist on the planet will tell you that would lead to awful outcomes for everyone except the powerful healthcare lobby.
      - mullingitover 5y ago
        Yes, we have a thoroughly regulated, negotiated, contractually obligated system. You can't have a true "free market" in health care without some truly egregious outcomes because when people are in health crisis they will pay anything to stay alive, and we already know we won't countenance the (let's call it what it is) extortion that the free market would produce in those scenarios. Because we want to feel like it's a free market, because free market economics is a cargo cult when it comes to health care, we get the worst of both worlds.
    - gfodor 5y ago
      There is no silver bullet. Your absolutist perspective undermines your argument.
- trixie_ 5y ago
  Price gouging especially in a system with transparent pricing is not difficult to prevent with laws. This is really is the ideal place for government in healthcare. Make the laws, set the standards, level the playing field and let the free market work just like in every other facet of society. It’s funny people who see how incompetent and irresponsible our government is on a daily basis think that handing healthcare over to them is a good idea.

mullingitover 5y ago

Price transparency is a pointless shell game designed to keep everyone strung along on the entrenched, failed system. When you're having a heart attack, the last thing you're doing is shopping around for the best prices on heart attack emergency treatment. The free market has no place in health care, because in the hands of the free market the first thing that will happen in a life-threatening emergency is for you to transfer 100% of your wealth to the party that has 100% of the leverage.

twofornone 5y ago
>When you're having a heart attack, the last thing you're doing is shopping around for the best prices on heart attack emergency treatment. This is a tired, nonsensical argument. The vast, vast majority of medical procedures are not last minute emergencies. Furthermore, with price transparency you will clearly be able to evaluate which hospitals may or may not be generally in your price range and choose a default to visit for an emergency (assuming you're not carted off in an ambulance). More importantly, this will absolutely force competition and some degree of price correction.
xur17 5y ago
I agree that it's pointless for emergency surgery, but there are plenty of other cases where a consumer could shop around (colonoscopy, ACL repair, etc), and I'd argue these are actually the majority rather than the minority of cases. To me it comes down to - if we are going to pretend we have a market based system for health care (that's what we say we have now), we need pricing transparency to have any hope of it working.
- pessimizer 5y ago
  > I'd argue these are actually the majority rather than the minority of cases. For well-insured middle-class people. Poor working people only get emergency care
codegeek 5y ago
I think forcing hospitals to at least list something is a good start. It won't be perfect but it will make people more aware of how hospitals and insurance companies are working usually to screw people when it comes to billing. Any transparency is a good thing whether it is perfect or not.
bjt 5y ago
Not all health care is heart attacks. "Health care" is a huge bucket containing everything from buying a bottle of cough syrup to the heart attacks you mention. For life threatening emergencies, I'm with you. Let's fund that care through the state. But excluding the market from everything is not the answer. The problem with using insurance for all these non-urgent things is that insurance distorts the market and price discipline goes out the window.
- mullingitover 5y ago
  We don't have to reinvent the wheel. Other countries have solved these problems. They have better health care than we do. It's measurable, it's been measured, and no surprise, they have flat-out superior outcomes. They are dramatically more efficient. Our market focus is a cargo cult.
  - weberer 5y ago
    What market focus? Prices were completely opaque until just a few months ago. Any economist on the planet will tell you that would lead to awful outcomes for everyone except the powerful healthcare lobby.
    - mullingitover 5y ago
      Yes, we have a thoroughly regulated, negotiated, contractually obligated system. You can't have a true "free market" in health care without some truly egregious outcomes because when people are in health crisis they will pay anything to stay alive, and we already know we won't countenance the (let's call it what it is) extortion that the free market would produce in those scenarios. Because we want to feel like it's a free market, because free market economics is a cargo cult when it comes to health care, we get the worst of both worlds.
  - gfodor 5y ago
    There is no silver bullet. Your absolutist perspective undermines your argument.
trixie_ 5y ago
Price gouging especially in a system with transparent pricing is not difficult to prevent with laws. This is really is the ideal place for government in healthcare. Make the laws, set the standards, level the playing field and let the free market work just like in every other facet of society. It’s funny people who see how incompetent and irresponsible our government is on a daily basis think that handing healthcare over to them is a good idea.