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You are confusing the other issue also. The hospital is the service provider. They are the example of Best Buy. The hospital is allowed to make deals with certain groups and establish prices with them. Everyone else pays twice as much. The insurance provider and the insured are customers. My insurance divides providers into 'network' and 'non-network'. Network providers are hospitals that they have made pricing agreements with. Best Buy does not have the right to practice price preferencing (or discrimination based on how you look at it) for their products.
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You get a card that drops your price by 10%.
Your business negotiates a 40% volume discount with another company.
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I really think there should be legislation introduced that forces the hospitals to provide the same services at the exact same prices. The govt would not be imposing any actual prices, just stating that everyone pays the same amount.
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This removed all bargaining power from the insurance companies. Part of the reason why private insurance is 'more efficient' than public insurance is that each insurance company fights tooth and nail to lower their costs relative to each other.
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Cuba has a lower infant-mortality rate than the U.S. without using a single $20 bottle of tylenol...If only we knew their secret!
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I actually suspect that Cuba's infant mortality rate is at least partially a lie. Low infant mortality makes Cuba look better. All they have to do is count things wrong.
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But, in the long run, I wouldn't worry about it too much, since all medicine in America will be socialized (a la Canada and Britian) within 20 years...between the insurance companies, medicare and medicaid, and the aging population's need for more and more medical care, the entire operation will be nationalized and run with the same grace and efficiency as the airline industry.
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The reason why public health insurance works is because of the lemon problem.
If insurance costs Y$, you won't buy it unless you have some reason to believe you might spend more than Y$ in on health expenses that the insurance covers.
Now, say the insurance companies are allowed to refuse coverage to sick and old people, or charge them huge amounts to sign up. Now, healthy people can afford coverage -- but people who get sick when not covered are screwed for the rest of their lives.
If insurance companies aren't allowed to make decisions based off the same information that people can, then they have to charge for the insurance at a hugely inflated rates.
People who know they are healthy look at the insurance rate, and think "hmm, this isn't worth it". Everyone who is sick looks at the rate, and says "I'll buy, that's a bargain".
The company loses money. So the company has to raise rates.
As the rate goes up, healthier people are less likely to buy. Eventually slightly sick people won't want to buy, and then nobody.
This is why corperate socialized health insurance is common. You have to get the health insurance, so they can spread the cost out. Meanwhile, buying health insurance privately costs an arm and a leg.
The articles talking about how to be an entrapaneur in the USA that advise you to get a job at McD's to keep health insurance are evidence of how stupid the system really is.
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Oh please. Give me a break there. First of all these are OTC drugs that were given to us under the illusion that they were samples. They NEVER told us that the package would cost $60.
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Stop payment on the bill? Complain to their billing department?
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Well travel between our countries isn't exactly open otherwise I'd seriously consider it - no joke. The healthcare I'd receive there would be vastly superior to what I would receive here with no health insurance.
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Part of it is that people in Cuba become Doctors by default. Smart? Well, not much else to do but become a Doctor...