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"In Sweden medical care is free. I can fight as long as I want without them getting in trouble." It's not free. It's free to you, but it is placing additional

by ssharp 15y ago

"In Sweden medical care is free. I can fight as long as I want without them getting in trouble." It's not free. It's free to you, but it is placing additional costs on the Swedish medical system, which somebody is ultimately paying for. You don't have to internalize the costs of your decision. I'm not arguing whether or not you're a making a good or bad decision, or whether or not "free" medical care is a good thing. I'm just pointing out that providing such a system skews decision making.

jlangenauer 15y ago
As would a pay-for-treatment medical system, like in the United State, which simply skews decision-making in a different direction. (Or, if your uninsured/indigent, reduces the choices you have available to make a decision between anyway)
tibbon 15y ago
Free or not, it seems to work pretty well for the citizens there. You don't have a sizable portion of the population filing bankruptcy over medical bills and they haven't gone bankrupt like Greece. Something Sweden is doing is right.
- cturner 15y ago
  Greece has socialised healthcare, as do the rest of the European countries circling the drain. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Greece http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Greece It's worth noting that the US health model isn't a free-market system - the state links health care to employment, which distorts the market away from individual private health ownership, and creates patterns that make it easy for costs to creep up. The US health care model is a disaster: the state doesn't supply health care, but then also prevents the free market from operating effectively.
  - Symmetry 15y ago
    The state does a lot of other things too, like setting the ratio of a GP's pay to a specialist's pay to something much higher than in other countries, and letting pharmaceutical companies charge whatever they want in the US market but banning the re-importation of drugs from companies where they're sold far more cheaply.
  - cjy 15y ago
    How is the state linking health care to employment? My understanding is that health care is linked to employment because of the adverse selection problem that occurs in a free market of individual health insurance. Can you elaborate on why you consider this to be the government's fault?
    - onemoreact 15y ago
      Health insurance is not taxed when a company pays for it, but individuals need to pay for it with after tax dollars. Assume you can sign up for plan A at your company that costs 200$ a month and covers everything you want. Or you can buy Plan B which costs 180$ a month for the same coverage. Assuming your marginal tax rate is over 10% then plan A costs you less money. Now, most company's bundle healthcare so it's harder to get that money out of the equation, but for small company's it easy to negotiate if you can get heath care cheaper though your spouse etc.
    - jasonwatkinspdx 15y ago
      The adverse selection can be solved a different way: legislate that health plans have to be open to all comers and regulate price differentiation to a few key cost drivers that are politically viable (eg smoking).
    - cturner 15y ago
      > How is the state linking health care to employment? During the second world war US wages were frozen. But there was an exception where you could provide employees with differing levels of health care. So that became a mechanism for competing for staff: it became common for companies to offer corporate health care at the same time that individual private health was dropping off because nobody had any money to afford it. This pushed the market towards group-based programs. After the war, public policy further cemented the patterns that had developed. I understand that if you live in the US it's impractical to get private health insurance on an individual basis because there's low business in the space, meaning low competition, as well as the tax structures described by other commenters. > My understanding is that health care is linked to > employment because of the adverse selection problem that > occurs in a free market of individual health insurance I'm not familiar with this effect, which isn't to say that it doesn't exist - don't know. Certainly there were healthy private health markets in countries I'm familiar with before the age of government intervention.
  - anigbrowl 15y ago
    The EU countries that are not circling the drain also have socialized healthcare, for the most part. Healthcare is a driver of public sector costs, but hardly the only one.
    - cturner 15y ago
      Yup. That's why I thought the Sweden/Greece thing above was odd.
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  - jbooth 15y ago
    Nice job blaming socialized healthcare for the greek situation. Has there been a single serious or unserious comment blaming their problems on socialized healthcare? Glenn Beck wouldn't even do that. Germany has socialized healthcare too, FWIW. Cheaper cost per capita than our system, with better results.
  - disgruntledphd2 15y ago
    Ireland has an extremely poor socialised health care system, and is in trouble right now. By your logic, the fact that the health care system was gutted in the 1980s should have allowed Ireland to avoid these issues. Sadly, it really isn't that simple.

by ssharp 15y ago

jlangenauer 15y ago

As would a pay-for-treatment medical system, like in the United State, which simply skews decision-making in a different direction. (Or, if your uninsured/indigent, reduces the choices you have available to make a decision between anyway)

tibbon 15y ago

Free or not, it seems to work pretty well for the citizens there. You don't have a sizable portion of the population filing bankruptcy over medical bills and they haven't gone bankrupt like Greece. Something Sweden is doing is right.

cturner 15y ago
Greece has socialised healthcare, as do the rest of the European countries circling the drain. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Greece http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Greece It's worth noting that the US health model isn't a free-market system - the state links health care to employment, which distorts the market away from individual private health ownership, and creates patterns that make it easy for costs to creep up. The US health care model is a disaster: the state doesn't supply health care, but then also prevents the free market from operating effectively.
- Symmetry 15y ago
  The state does a lot of other things too, like setting the ratio of a GP's pay to a specialist's pay to something much higher than in other countries, and letting pharmaceutical companies charge whatever they want in the US market but banning the re-importation of drugs from companies where they're sold far more cheaply.
- cjy 15y ago
  How is the state linking health care to employment? My understanding is that health care is linked to employment because of the adverse selection problem that occurs in a free market of individual health insurance. Can you elaborate on why you consider this to be the government's fault?
  - onemoreact 15y ago
    Health insurance is not taxed when a company pays for it, but individuals need to pay for it with after tax dollars. Assume you can sign up for plan A at your company that costs 200$ a month and covers everything you want. Or you can buy Plan B which costs 180$ a month for the same coverage. Assuming your marginal tax rate is over 10% then plan A costs you less money. Now, most company's bundle healthcare so it's harder to get that money out of the equation, but for small company's it easy to negotiate if you can get heath care cheaper though your spouse etc.
  - jasonwatkinspdx 15y ago
    The adverse selection can be solved a different way: legislate that health plans have to be open to all comers and regulate price differentiation to a few key cost drivers that are politically viable (eg smoking).
  - cturner 15y ago
    > How is the state linking health care to employment? During the second world war US wages were frozen. But there was an exception where you could provide employees with differing levels of health care. So that became a mechanism for competing for staff: it became common for companies to offer corporate health care at the same time that individual private health was dropping off because nobody had any money to afford it. This pushed the market towards group-based programs. After the war, public policy further cemented the patterns that had developed. I understand that if you live in the US it's impractical to get private health insurance on an individual basis because there's low business in the space, meaning low competition, as well as the tax structures described by other commenters. > My understanding is that health care is linked to > employment because of the adverse selection problem that > occurs in a free market of individual health insurance I'm not familiar with this effect, which isn't to say that it doesn't exist - don't know. Certainly there were healthy private health markets in countries I'm familiar with before the age of government intervention.
- anigbrowl 15y ago
  The EU countries that are not circling the drain also have socialized healthcare, for the most part. Healthcare is a driver of public sector costs, but hardly the only one.
  - cturner 15y ago
    Yup. That's why I thought the Sweden/Greece thing above was odd.
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- jbooth 15y ago
  Nice job blaming socialized healthcare for the greek situation. Has there been a single serious or unserious comment blaming their problems on socialized healthcare? Glenn Beck wouldn't even do that. Germany has socialized healthcare too, FWIW. Cheaper cost per capita than our system, with better results.
- disgruntledphd2 15y ago
  Ireland has an extremely poor socialised health care system, and is in trouble right now. By your logic, the fact that the health care system was gutted in the 1980s should have allowed Ireland to avoid these issues. Sadly, it really isn't that simple.