Health Care Costs

[Old-Biscuit]

Hang on to your wallet.

Health Insurance Companies are seeking rate increases.....big ones!!
....new customers turned out to be sicker than expected.

Article

[John___Angela]

Question from a foreigner interested in other cultures. If an American can't afford insurance for diagnosis or treatment, is there some kind of backup plan. You read stories but its hard to cut though it all for a foreigner. We live in the US a few months per year but its all quite confusing. Does it also vary state to state?

Thanks in advance.

J and A

[Dutch_12078]

fj12ryder wrote:

Dutch_12078 wrote:
Wow! I hope United Healthcare continues the zero premium Medicare Advantage Plan my wife and I have had for the past few years. The savings has been a big budget help.

That's supported under Medicare, so it's unlikely to go away without Medicare changing its basic structure. Not that that can't happen of course.

Yep, we still pay the normal Medicare premium of course, but the UHC Advantage Plan adds on a number coverages that exceed the Medicare basic coverage. The zero premium Part D drug coverage alone is a big help.

[fj12ryder]

Dutch_12078 wrote:
Wow! I hope United Healthcare continues the zero premium Medicare Advantage Plan my wife and I have had for the past few years. The savings has been a big budget help.

That's supported under Medicare, so it's unlikely to go away without Medicare changing its basic structure. Not that that can't happen of course.

[fj12ryder]

bid_time wrote:

lbrjet wrote:

pnichols wrote:
Yep .... the time has finally come for the insurance companies to pick up the tab for the newly insured health needs instead of hospital emergency rooms. I'm not sure which approach is going to cost society more in the long run.

Health insurance companies profits have never been higher, as well as their stock prices. Look at the Humana buyout at $230 per share. This stock broke $100 for the first time ever less than 18 months and now is worth $230?

What do you think would happen to Maytag stock if the gov came in and said everyone has to buy a dishwasher, complete with 4 cycles and automatic water heating to the optimal temp? Makes about as much sense as me having insurance to cover pap smears and mamograms.

You kind of have a point, but how many people would forego car insurance if states didn't mandate that you have it? AFATG how many people don't have car insurance even though it is mandated? The unpleasant fact of the matter is that sometimes people have to be forced to do what's necessary. Education is necessary, but how many people would voluntarily give money to support schools? Not enough, so it's basically taken unwillingly in the guise of taxes.

[Charlie_D_]

Tom Trostel wrote:
I have a relative who is an emergency room doctor. He earns $400 per hour. No wonder is costs so much.

I doubt that he makes that much. Working just 8 hour days and 2 week vacation would yield him $800,000/year.
ER doctors usually have no office and staff, crippling malpractice insurance, few if any expenses.

[sdianel_-acct_c]

Now the insurance companies will raise the rates because they have an excuse to do so and there are no laws to prevent this. Hold onto your wallets! The premiums are high, the deductibles and copays are so high that lots of healthy people will pay high premiums and never get any benefits from their health insurance because they must meet a $5000 deductible before insurance pays a penny. This was all predicted. The next blow will be the employer mandate and people will lose their jobs. So much for "Affordable" health care. (I am for health care for everyone but not what we have)

[mockturtle]

IMHO, health care should have never become an 'industry'. It's not the doctors who are getting rich. Many physicians I know are closing their practices because they can't afford to keep them and don't want to be swallowed up by the big corporations. We may all have to rein in our use of the system and its fancy services and even ration those services.

[Skid_Row_Joe]

westernrvparkowner wrote:
Some quick research shows that insurance companies net profits (before taxes) is somewhere around 5% of their revenues. If you assume their only source of revenues are premiums (it is not, but it makes the math easier), that means that if you pay $400.00 per month in premiums the insurance company is making twenty bucks. Good work if you can get it, but it isn't the primary driver of high premiums. Premiums are high because medical care is expensive. Medical care costs are skyrocketing because we are getting much better at keeping people alive. Cancer, Aids, heart attacks, strokes and a host of other conditions are no longer a death sentence. Sad fact is health care costs cease when the patient dies. Surviving a $100,000 heart attack now opens the door to you having a couple of hundred thousand dollars of medical claims for cancer in a few years. Given the alternative, it is probably a cost matrix we are all willing to grudgingly accept.

You're off-base here too kymosabi. Medical care costs are skyrocketing because of the non-competitive nature of that industry because of Gov't controls.

If you'll take the time to research paying cash for your medical services, they can be done for far less than the list prices. But first, you have to shop and compare.

[Skid_Row_Joe]

westernrvparkowner wrote:

Tom Trostel wrote:
I have a relative who is an emergency room doctor. He earns $400 per hour. No wonder is costs so much.

Ridiculous. He/she should be paid the same as the Fry Cook at McDonalds. I mean, they have no special skills, no special training, and if they screw up what's the big deal? Personally, the pay could be 100 times that amount if they saved my life or limb.
But petty jealousy is a powerful force, so go right on believing they are overpaid. (And I would bet all I have that you DON'T really know what that doctor actually makes, since doctors generally have to pay their own expenses such as staff, malpractice insurance (often six figures), office space, equipment etc.) As far as I am concerned, doctors earn every penny they make.

:h What does a doctor's pay have anything whatsoever to do with the "Fry Cooks at McDonald's," relative to the cost of medical services?

The total cost of any product or services has a bigger picture cost pattern than any individual's rate of pay. -Even "Fry Cooks at McDonald's.":S

[westernrvparkow]

pasusan wrote:
Meanwhile... This

Health care-insurance firm Aetna announced a $37 billion agreement Friday to acquire smaller rival Humana in a deal that continues the rapid consolidation in the U.S. health care industry.

Must be pretty lucrative...

Some quick research shows that insurance companies net profits (before taxes) is somewhere around 5% of their revenues. If you assume their only source of revenues are premiums (it is not, but it makes the math easier), that means that if you pay $400.00 per month in premiums the insurance company is making twenty bucks. Good work if you can get it, but it isn't the primary driver of high premiums. Premiums are high because medical care is expensive. Medical care costs are skyrocketing because we are getting much better at keeping people alive. Cancer, Aids, heart attacks, strokes and a host of other conditions are no longer a death sentence. Sad fact is health care costs cease when the patient dies. Surviving a $100,000 heart attack now opens the door to you having a couple of hundred thousand dollars of medical claims for cancer in a few years. Given the alternative, it is probably a cost matrix we are all willing to grudgingly accept.

[bid_time]

lbrjet wrote:

pnichols wrote:
Yep .... the time has finally come for the insurance companies to pick up the tab for the newly insured health needs instead of hospital emergency rooms. I'm not sure which approach is going to cost society more in the long run.

Health insurance companies profits have never been higher, as well as their stock prices. Look at the Humana buyout at $230 per share. This stock broke $100 for the first time ever less than 18 months and now is worth $230?

What do you think would happen to Maytag stock if the gov came in and said everyone has to buy a dishwasher, complete with 4 cycles and automatic water heating to the optimal temp? Makes about as much sense as me having insurance to cover pap smears and mamograms.

[Shearwater]

Over the last 10 years I've seen more of our health care system than I ever wanted to. My quick (and relatively simplistic) observation is that increases are mostly due to:

1. Insurance companies
2. Drug companies
3. Hospitals (surprisingly).

I agree with westernrvparkowner about MD salaries. The new MD's are starting out with education debts of hundreds of thousands of dollars. That can't be paid off with $50 per hour jobs.

[lbrjet]

pnichols wrote:
Yep .... the time has finally come for the insurance companies to pick up the tab for the newly insured health needs instead of hospital emergency rooms. I'm not sure which approach is going to cost society more in the long run.

Health insurance companies profits have never been higher, as well as their stock prices. Look at the Humana buyout at $230 per share. This stock broke $100 for the first time ever less than 18 months and now is worth $230?

[Ron3rd]

Folks, the Heath Care Lobby is too powerful with enormous influence in congress. There is simply no way to reign them in. After all, this is free enterprise, right? It's what we love! Like I said, get used to the 10-15% increase every year. No stopping that!

[Dutch_12078]

Wow! I hope United Healthcare continues the zero premium Medicare Advantage Plan my wife and I have had for the past few years. The savings has been a big budget help.