Health savings accounts. Yes! Think about the original meaning of insurance. It's shared risk of infrequent events. My auto insurance doesn't pay for new tires (although it does pay for the wreck if I drive on bald ones). Why do we give the insurance company 15-20% of every $50 office visit? And I don't lose my auto insurance when I change jobs. Why is it like this?
Answer: The tax break. The "insurance" dollar passed from employer to "insurance" company is a business deduction to the employer and not taxable to the employee. This throws you into passive dependence on others for your health care and works against personal responsibility and the development of a true competitive market.
What we need is high deductible policies for catastrophic events plus tax advantaged health savings accounts for routine medical care.
Insurance companies are not getting rich on medical liability. St. Paul, which used to be the largest company in this business nationwide, went out of it completely a few years ago. In several states (New York and Georgia that I know about) the doctors have formed their own mutual insurance company because no private company wanted the business. In Massachusetts, the large institutions, such as Harvard and UMass, have switched to "captive" insurance companies, essentially becoming self insured. None of these new companies have any big pile of cash to put in the stock market.
Don't confuse the doctor's fee with the total price. Most of that $200,000 goes to the hospital, which has to provide operating rooms,nursing, critical care monitoring, high tech imaging, etc.etc. And the hospital has to carry its own malpractice insurance.
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Health savings accounts. Yes! Think about the original meaning of insurance. It's shared risk of infrequent events. My auto insurance doesn't pay for new tires (although it does pay for the wreck if I drive on bald ones). Why do we give the insurance company 15-20% of every $50 office visit? And I don't lose my auto insurance when I change jobs. Why is it like this? Answer: The tax break. The "insurance" dollar passed from employer to "insurance" company is a business deduction to the employer and not taxable to the employee. This throws you into passive dependence on others for your health care and works against personal responsibility and the development of a true competitive market. What we need is high deductible policies for catastrophic events plus tax advantaged health savings accounts for routine medical care.
Insurance companies are not getting rich on medical liability. St. Paul, which used to be the largest company in this business nationwide, went out of it completely a few years ago. In several states (New York and Georgia that I know about) the doctors have formed their own mutual insurance company because no private company wanted the business. In Massachusetts, the large institutions, such as Harvard and UMass, have switched to "captive" insurance companies, essentially becoming self insured. None of these new companies have any big pile of cash to put in the stock market.
Don't confuse the doctor's fee with the total price. Most of that $200,000 goes to the hospital, which has to provide operating rooms,nursing, critical care monitoring, high tech imaging, etc.etc. And the hospital has to carry its own malpractice insurance.