Single Payer Healthcare WILL COST LESS than any other system. Period.

[burythehatchet]

This misconception is perpetuated by many well meaning people. Single payer healthcare will cost far less in aggregate health spending than any other system.

First, you can immediately cut out at least 20% of current costs that go to pay for insurance company profit and administration costs. Once a healthcare consultant I was in a meeting with admitted freely that insurance companies are nothing more than a marketing vehicle. A lot of what they claim as their cost of doing business is simply marketing driven expense.

Second, the 45MM+ uninsured in this country still get healthcare. But they get it in the Emergency Room, when they have no other choice. ER expenses to treat pneumonia as opposed to relatively inexpensive treatment early in the illness are probably a 5:1 ratio.

I could go on and on and on. Single payer is opposed by the insurance companies and health plans because it will put their miserable "gatekeepers" out of business and render them pointless.

Did you know that's what managed care plans called their care management concept? The Gatekeeper model! Someone acts as a gatekeeper, standing on guard so that you won't access healthcare when you need. That's what a gatekeeper does. And when you reward him for how many people he turned away, what the hell else is going to happen.

...ok I'm getting a little hot so I'll stop. You get the point. :mad:

:rant:

[wakeme2008]

1. I would bet it is more than 20% of every dollar spend on health care that

fattens the insurance companies pockets.

[burythehatchet]

6. I'm trying to keep my observations within a conservative realm

Underwriters write insurance to a loss ratio of 65 to 70%. i.e. 1 dollar of premium pays out 65 cents in claims. The reason you are correct is that I'm not including the cost of regulatory compliance WHICH WOULD BE WIPED OUT for the most part.

[Selatius]

7. Figures seem to indicate between 20 to 30 percent. In comparison, Medicare eats up 2 to 3 percent.

For every dollar that goes into Medicare, two or three cents are eaten up in administrative costs. In comparison, twenty to thirty cents are eaten up if not more with any for-profit corporation that administers health care. That also includes the costs of marketing, which they spend several billion dollars on each year. In contrast, Medicare, Medicaid, and even Medical don't spend any money on marketing. They don't need to. Also, they have no profit motive, so there is no burden of maximizing profits for shareholders by denying coverage and pinching pennies.

[burythehatchet]

9. social security, the same percentage.

[Princess Turandot]

26. FYI Medicare uses private insurance companies to process their claims..

I do not believe that they do any of it themselves. For example for Medicare recipients in Downstate NY, Empire Blue Cross does the claims processing for them. There is a dedicated unit for Medicare. So, I would imagine that the processing infrastructure for a single payor plan would cost somewhat more than 2 or 3% although I can't imagine that it would be close to the private insurance overhead.

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

2. You are right on the mark.

It's all about money, but not money it will cost us, it's money they will no longer get if we switch. No wonder they fight so hard against it. Face it, the wealthy don't really care becuase they can afford whatever they want.

[redqueen]

3. Yup.

More and more people are getting fed up with the M$M, so maybe more people will start seeing through their corporate-sponsored BS.

[Robbien]

4. Duh. That is the point.

Insurance companies and their stockholders know that single payor is not good for their pocketbooks.

Which is why we have the system we have today.

[Selatius]

5. We only need to talk to France and the World Health Organization to find that out.

France has been ranked number 1 in the world in terms of health care quality and coverage. Per capita, they spend a fraction of what an American would spend both out of pocket and in terms of taxes as far as health care goes. Of course, conservatives go apeshit when you bring France into the equation.

[burythehatchet]

8. when I was in my 20's and living in Paris, I found I needed reading glasses

Within two days I was wearing a stylish pair of lamps and I think I remember paying a total of 40 francs...for the cab ride to go pick them up!

Yes, I am a US citizen, but my then girlfriend and future ex-wife talked to the optom and he said "no problem"

[HCE SuiGeneris]

10. I concur. It is the greed of those currently

bleeding the current system that is much more costly.

[originalpckelly]

11. Science makes a miraculous breakthrough in embryonic stem cell research.

Unfortunately, the Republicans have slanked back into power by lying to the USA again, what happens? Do people go without a treatment just because the Republicans are too stupid to understand the embryos would be killed anyway?

[kenny blankenship]

12. But that's why the Republicans and the Democrats have to be against it

Subtract the total cost of a single payer system from the "system" we now have, and the resulting difference is profit not extracted from working people and given to capitalists.

[antigop]

13. Want to know the best argument FOR single-payer? Take a look...

Why do large companies self-insure? Because it's cheaper.

By the same reasoning, we should self-insure as a country.

[burythehatchet]

19. That's a great snippet. nt

[PA Democrat]

14. I am curious about the administrative costs for doctors and other health care providers in countries

that have a single payer system. I would imagine that a doctors office wouldn't need as many people to deal with the paperwork hassle from all of the different insurance companies. Every time I've been to the doctor's or taken my kids to the doctor's I've noticed that there are more people working to process insurance claims than there are people providing actual health care.

And I almost always hear the office staff talking about their frustration in dealing with the confusing tangle of rules, forms, procedures of the various companies.

[burythehatchet]

15. one of the creepiest things I experienced in French doctor offices

was that they were always by themselves....no staff except maybe a personal assistant ot nurse

[PA Democrat]

18. A local talk show host had some people on her show who had lived in both Canada and

in the US and were comparing our system to Canada's. One comment that one of the participants made was how they were struck by the difference in the numbers of administrative staff to support a Canadian doctor verses a US doctor.

Incidentally, none of the participants, nor callers who had lived in Canada preferred the US system to Canada's.

[mcscajun]

16. I can't speak for the industry, but in the doctor's office where I work

we currently have seven part-time workers supporting two Internists. (We work in staggered shifts; there are never more than three/four workers in on any given day.)

If we didn't have to process insurance claims and provide referrals, do "prior authorizations" for various medications and "pre-certifications" for expensive imaging and other tests, three, perhaps even four of those staffers would be unnecessary.

Handling appointments, making/taking calls, and processing medical reports could be handled by the remaining staffers, although we'd probably need one person dedicated to filing (that at least would never go away; there will always be reports from other doctors/hospitals that need to make it into patient charts in something resembling a timely and tidy fashion.)

:)

[burythehatchet]

17. deployment of EMR's (elec med recs)

will change the filing systems as well.

[madrchsod]

20. you still need a hard copy

[geek_sabre]

22. where will all the

administrative employees go (hospitals, insurance, etc)? I'd hate to see this increase unemployment.

[burythehatchet]

24. that will be "their" final last ditch argument

Its about re=deploying our resources. We don't need to have a whole working class pushing paper round and round. We need investment in our energy development, our national infrastructure, stem cell research, global warming research and control. There are millions of jobs that aren't getting done because we prefer lining the pockets of fat cat CEO's.

[antigop]

25. If they open up Medicare for all, then some of them will just go work for Medicare n/t

[mcscajun]

21. Only in the practices willing to adopt it.

We're still in the stone age at our office; we still make appointments with pencil and paper, although I have managed to move the doctors to Electronic Prescribing. :)

The doctor who owns the practice where I work is in his mid-fifties with plans to work at least another 10-15 years. He and his same-age colleagues all say that the day EMR is federally mandated down to the small practice level is the day they all retire, college costs and retirement funds notwithstanding.

I don't know what their opinions are on Single-Payer HC.

[burythehatchet]

23. The next health care bill will surely contain an HL7 (health language)

standard. It's critical if the medical community is going to take disease management seriously, which it must.

[bluethruandthru]

27. See "Sicko" - the Michael Moore movie.

I saw this movie earlier this week and have not stopped talking about it (and writing about it on DU!). A brilliant movie that will hopefully open the eyes of Americans to what we're missing out on. I can't believe how many people in this country are so afraid of a single payer system. There is real momentum to change the system and I think this movie may actually help push us in the right direction.