Someone need to explain to me why they love this healthcare private insurance model. It still does not give freedom, since you must chose between what is covered and what is not, in addition to in network and out of network. It is not transparent because it is almost impossible to know the cost up-front (thanks to obscure coding systems) and if in a hurry (it hurts) you can’t take all the time needed to research where to go and spend less. I have a family of 4 and the plan is provided by my company. However my company pays for my healthcare 14K per year and subsidizes my HSA for 4k a year (taxable). I am still paying 3K a year out of my paychecks. Deductible for the whole family (there is me + family) is up to 6K a year and co-payments is up to 8K a year. If I use it all (with kids you do) the total annual cost is 27K. This doesn’t count cases where insurance company and healthcare providers don’t agree, you are responsible for paying the difference to the hospital or doctor no matter what. 10 years ago my company payed everything and I had zero deductible and co-payments and still a family of 4. Each year the costs goes much higher than inflation and companies fail to keep it up, unloading the excess of cost on us. Since you can’t avoid healthcare, unless you decide to die, I don’t understand why we don’t consider this like a huge tax on people. Majority of Americans (70%) support a single payer system like Medicare, 85% of democrats and 52% of republicans. Estimates state that it would cost 1.8T a year, but if we count we spend 2T a year in private insurance I guess routing that money would pay for itself. Again, this is not socialized healthcare, since healthcare providers are not employed by the government and are private companies. Like in Medicare, people are free to chose the doctor and the hospital they like, with a small co-payment (often $20 per visit). What wrong with that?
Waiting times in the US are only lower than Canada because the insurers just deny and delay everything and the waiting time clock doesn't start until after a weeks long fight to get approval. I put this in the other thread: https://doctorpatientrightsproject.org/dprpreports/not-what-the-doctor-ordered/ - Almost two out of every three patients denied coverage were denied multiple times and most had to wait more than a month before their insurance provider responded to their request for a prescribed treatment. - 70% of the denied treatments for chronic or persistent illnesses were for conditions described as “serious,” and 43% were for treatment of patients described as “in poor health.” - Nearly a third (29%) of patients initially denied coverage reported that their condition worsened, even if they eventually convinced their insurer to cover their treatments. - More than one out of every threepatients (34%) denied coverage had to put off or forego treatment altogether. - The largest consensus of patients (91 percent) agreed that insurance providers should not have the final sayin treatment decisions, and almost as many (87 percent) felt insurers should play either a secondary role or no role at all in deciding medical treatments.
Health insurance companies are just death panels—who doesn’t like those?!
Exactly. I have personally experienced this. Blue Cross delayed a CT scan ordered by my doctor claiming a previous ultrasound was sufficient. I wasted a month fighting them. When I finally got the scan my doctor called me at 9pm that night and referred me to surgery on an urgent basis. I lost a month because of that insurance company death panel, it's not hypothetical.
Because, the cost will not go down with a single insurer. Besides what you would have heard the margins of most insurance companies is really small, and despite the fact that they optimize their operations for profits they still need to face competition. Just imagine a model with zero competition and how this model can move towards rationing!
^This
You don’t have to imagine. Every first word country except USA is doing this. You are the only exception.