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Healthcare

Of course, if health plans are allowed to compete nationally, and non-profits are able to deliver better value and service, then we would all have a chance to choose those companies that do it best. Right now, we are limited by what our employer chooses for us, and by what is available in our state. If non-profits are able to do a better job -- great! Let us take our business to them.
 
WildCat said:
You have to have some profit to remain viable. But you can still be for-profit and still be low-cost. I'm talking about the whole "health care as a business" model so common throughout the US today. We have doctors who have a financial interest in the MRI clinic, for example. Guess what? That doctor will send patients to get an MRI far more often than a doctor who doesn't have such an interest. It also leads to hospitals and doctors upselling patients tests and procedures they don't really need. When a doctor gets paid per procedure guess what you get? More procedures. Health care is being run like a auto dealership, fine for auto dealerships but disastrous for patients.

And the AMA has done nothing to discourage such practices.
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I completely agree with you here. But again, this is far beyond just health insurance reform and is actual health care reform (which should be what the discussion is about.) That Kaiser has its doctors on salary rather than fee-for-service is just one great aspect of that type of system.

Interestingly, though, it sounds like we're geting closer to going back to the HMO model of healthcare.
 
ARubberChickenWithAPulley said:
Of course, if health plans are allowed to compete nationally, and non-profits are able to deliver better value and service, then we would all have a chance to choose those companies that do it best. Right now, we are limited by what our employer chooses for us, and by what is available in our state.
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Which is why we need to decouple health insurance from employment, and eliminate state regulation of the insurance industry and regulate it instead at the federal level.
 
WildCat said:
Which is why we need to decouple health insurance from employment, and eliminate state regulation of the insurance industry and regulate it instead at the federal level.
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Couldn't have said it better. That's the point I was trying to make earlier. If Dancing David or anyone else thinks the problem with health insurance is profit, a national system would be perfect for them: they would have a multitude of non-profit options to choose from. And ultimately, if more Kaiser-like systems come along that integrate providers into the system, and are able to hold costs down, they will have an even better chance to compete nationally and do just that. A national system -- public option or not -- will have more choice and more competition than anything we have today.

And as far as I know, states could certainly still sue insurance companies if they thought they were breaking the law, they'd just have to do it in Federal Court. So consumers wouldn't lose any protection. And in many states, where regulation is lax, they could arguably gain quite a bit.
 
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