4 ms·
This is a good take, but I wonder if there's a difference between "goes to old people" vs "is spent on things concerning old people" as in how much of that mone
by alexey-salmin 2y ago
This is a good take, but I wonder if there's a difference between "goes to old people" vs "is spent on things concerning old people" as in how much of that money actually reaches old people directly or indirectly. Given that "half a budget" is around 3 trillion and there are 60 million old people in the US this gives $100k for a household of 2 people which I doubt they receive. Quite possibly there's a big room for optimization too.
- llamaimperative 2y agoGiven healthcare costs that doesn’t seem wildly high after accounting for the administrative burden you’d expect for administering that amount of money.
- matwood 2y agoEnd of life care is crazy expensive [1]. Things like assisted living, hospice, and medical care for end of life is where a vast majority of the costs end up. Could the actual care be made more efficient? Maybe. The irony is the GOP spread lies about death panels when the ACA was being debated, and we may end up with them here if we go down a path of deciding who gets what EoL care in the name of efficiency. [1] https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanam/article/PIIS2667-193X(22)00176-4/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanam/article/PIIS2667-19...
- fastball 2y agoMaybe the federal government shouldn't be in the business of EoL care at all?
- matwood 2y agoOk, I'll bite. How do you fund EoL care w/o the federal government involved?
- s1artibartfast 2y agoyou don't. You let people die in a manner according to their own means without blowing through several hundred thousand of public funds on their way out. If given the choice of 100k EoL care, or 100k for their grandchildren, most people would choose the latter. Add a layer between and it becomes a prisoners dilemma problem. If you forgo treatment, your children still get billed 99.9k instead of 100k.
- matwood 2y agoSo no plan. Simply let people die in the street. Got it.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoYou don't need to be so extreme. You can let people die in their own home with palliative care without providing every drug and surgery imaginable.
- fastball 2y agoHomelessness does not seem particularly related to EoL care.
- astura 2y agoSocial Security also goes to disabled people as well as "disabled" people. That population is almost 10 million people.