Single Payer Health Care Financing Presentation – Three Part Series
PNHP, Single Payer Healthcare Financing Series, Kip Sullivan JD
Kip Sullivan’s Three Part Presentation on Healthcare Finance Managed Care and Single Payer in Minnesota and the US. Answering the question of why Healthcare is so expensive in the United States as compared to other countries.
Part 1: Single Payer Health Care Financing – Angry Bear
Part 2: Single Payer Health Care Financing – Angry Bear
Part 3: Single Payer Health Care Financing – Angry Bear
Also: Kip Sullivan on the Creeping Privatization of Medicare (corporatecrimereporter.com)
Given that ‘Single Payer Health Insurance’ as a guv’mint program funded by taxation is unlikely if only because of baked-in (red state) opposition to ‘socialized medicine’ in The Land of the Free (the red states), and the ‘influence’ of Big Insurance, Big Healthcare (and various other Big entities), ‘Medicare Advantage’ – such as it is – as long as it’s permitted by the guv’mint, will be the way to go, if only to avoid the various hassles of dealing with three (or more) ‘medical cards’ and the complexities of ‘co-insurance’ and denial of benefits. Obviously, tremendous opportunities exist for various additional megacorps to get involved.
Fred:
Who or what do you believe is subsidizing your wonderful managed care plan? Medicare, maybe? I really have a hassle with carrying those 8 x 11 -inch medical cards around . . . not. If I walk into a hospital or urgent care, most pull my electronic records up. If I went to a different doctor at U of M, they just ask if I am still insured with the same companies.
Your MA plan takes the healthiest of patients under its care and Medicare subsidizes MA’s patients at a cost higher than what they would cost under Medicare. All of those extras are paid for by Medicare. And there is the 20% of Overhead, Medicare pays for in clerical costs just so MA plans can compete with Medicare.
Thanks to a Congress influenced by commercial entities makes it possible. The care is no better, it is more costly, MA cherry-picks its patients, and in the end when MA refuses care patients come back to traditional Medicare. And those returning may be denied MediGap or pay a higher fee.
Single Payer eliminates all of the commercial interests. We could do it like the Europeans do it, a basic plan calibrated by income. If there is a deductible to be had for those healthier or unhealthier than the average citizenry, it too can be calibrated. The only issue with this is people error on the side of being safe, so they pay too much for a lower deductible when they could get by with a higher deductible.
Over all, there in “no” Medicare Advantage plan which has saved money in healthcare. They have all failed to save money or if they did have lower costs, it is due to reducing services as Kip so apply explains.
I’ve ‘appreciated’ PNHP’s urgings on a national single-payer health program for many years. I just don’t see much likelihood of it happening any time soon, due to center-right tendencies (at best) in much of the population (and many – if not most – physicians.)
I’m also a fan of the National Fair Vote Compact which would get around the inequity built into the Electoral College, which also doesn’t have much of a chance for implementation, ‘going forward’.
National Popular Vote Interstate Compact
The GOP Is Succeeding Because We Are Not a True Democracy
NY Times – Jan 3
One can’t really blame the Electoral College directly for what has happened to the Supreme Court, but you can perhaps blame the Supreme Court for what has happened to the Senate and the Electoral College, starting with its ‘Bush v. Gore’ and ‘Citizen’s United’ decisions.
Wait a few years, TrumpCare will magically appear.
What is TrumpCare
What is Trumpcare? | Health Care Reform | JAMA Forum Archive | JAMA Network