Quote:
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Originally Posted by ubertuber
.....More importantly, this thread is really missing the important points contained within the movie Sicko, and is therefore sort of missing an opportunity to be different from any other healthcare thread we could have. Sicko wasn't about people who are uninsured, whether through choice or poverty. It's not about the uninsured at all, which I know because Michael Moore told me so at the beginning of the film. It's about the idea that a privatized healthcare system is a fundamentally flawed thing. Here's the synopsis for those of you who haven't had a chance to check the film out:
Healthcare, when tied to economics and profit, doesn't deliver optimal care to the end user - you and me as insured people. ....
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Less than 2 weeks ago, near the bottom of post #4
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showpos...41&postcount=4
...for the second time on this TFP politics forum,I posted this data:
Aetna Net Income Avl to Common (ttm): 1.73B
Humana Inc. Net Income Avl to Common (ttm): 405.93M Total Cash (mrq): 4.42B
Unitedhealth Group, Inc. Net Income Avl to Common (ttm): 3.96B Total Cash (mrq): 9.92B
Cigna CI Net Income 1,133.0
HCA Income From Total Operations (mil) (FYE) 1,424.00
Quote:
http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/nati...ewsrelease.htm
Current-dollar GDP
.....Current-dollar GDP -- the market value of the nation's output of goods and services -- increased 4.9 percent, or $162.0 billion, in the first quarter to a level of <b>$13,620.2 billion.</b>
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15 percent of $13,620 billion = 2,043
1.73
.405
3.960
1.133
1.424
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8.652 ....so, <b>.423 of one percent</b> of US Healthcare expenditures ended up as net income to just five healthcare insurers...although part of HCA $1.424 billion net profit came from European operations and profits from the hospitals that it also operates.....
....add Wellpoint, a Blue Cross, "for profit" franchisee, operating in 14 states, annual profit:
<a href="http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=WLP">Net Income Avl to Common (ttm): 3.15B</a> and the obscene executive pay and dilutive expense to it's outstanding common stock, caused by creation of new shares exercised by Wellpoint executives:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=WLP
....and the annual net income to just six major "for profit" US insurance providers amounts to $11.8 billion, <b>or .570 of one percent</b> of entire US expeditures on healthcare.
Consider whether there would be savings if the expense of overhead and exorbitant executive compensation, not counted in the net profits of these six for profit companies, (as well as from all of the other insurers...) was also eliminated. What do they spend on advertising, investor relations, perks for executives not counted as income, lavish HQ's, M&A, recruting, travel and other expenses that are unnecessary in non-profit structured entity.....
Picture a funnel where premiums are paid in on the wide end, and profits end up flowing only to a small group of executives and passive investors and the lawyer, accountants, advisors, and ad executives who receive payment expensed from premiums collected, to enhance growth that keeps the stock price rising and throwing off dividends....THEY ARE IN THE BUSINESS OF SELLING STOCK..... their insurance business if just a "model" to act as "bait" to attract investor demand for the stock.....look below at the value of exercised stock options...in just one year....of such a small group of Wellpoint executives:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=WLP
<b>Consider that the above "model",,,a system that rewards just a few... is the reason that 150 million own just 2-1/2 percent of total US assets, and ponder why you are soooo resistant to taxing the shit out of folks like the HCA Frist family and the Wellpoint executives.....is it because you hope one day, to be "just like them".....what does that sentiment do for the rest of us?</b>
The $11.8 billion profits of just these 6 companies would provide $6000 annually (or $500 per month) to pay for non-profit monthly insurance <b>premiums for 1,966,666 individuals, or 4.37 percent of the 45 million uninsured.....</b>