NYTimes Article: New Jersey Hospital Is the Costliest in the Nation

Mxylplyx

Diamond Member
Mar 21, 2007
4,197
101
106
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/17/b...center-has-highest-us-billing-rates.html?_r=0

edit: link fixed

How can anyone who thinks free market reform is the magic pill for healthcare defend this? Articles like this show me that our method of healthcare delivery in this country is not something that needs to be tweaked at the margins, it needs to be torn down and rebuilt. I'm liking the movement lately to expose these master charge lists that hospitals use to determine pricing, something I'm sure hospitals would rather remain hidden. It exposes just how truly broken the system is. To think of all the useful things we as a country could do with the dollars being sunk into this corrupt out of control profit machine. Imagine how much worse it would get if the government stepped away and let this industry become the free for all capitalist money machine that it so desperately wants to be.
 
Last edited:

smackababy

Lifer
Oct 30, 2008
27,024
79
86
I don't see how it is insurance fraud. They are not defrauding anyone. They simply charge a higher, out of network rate than other hospitals. Generally, insurances companies require higher co-pays or deductibles for patients who use out of network hospitals. The only thing kind of shady is the emergency room costs, because the insurer cannot charge the patient more than in network costs due to it actually being an emergency.

I think them charging so much is a bit shady, but it is a privately owned hospital. They can charge, realistically, whatever they want. The real problem will be insurance rates going up to cover this and screwing over individuals.

I don't really have any sympathy for insurance companies being screwed over because they have a history of going out of their way to screw over policy holders and get out of having to pay. My father went through lung cancer treatment and the insurance companies tried to find any way they could to not have to pay from some loophole. Thankfully, he not only recovered fully and has had not return of the cancer, the costs were all covered. They did things like contact his employer if he had ever had illnesses not reported or had anything a "prudent" person would go to a doctor for and didn't.
 

Anarchist420

Diamond Member
Feb 13, 2010
8,645
0
76
www.facebook.com
The markups done by hospitals are terrible but they are not a failure of the free market.

Doctors don't own the hospitals and the regulatory state makes it so they can't. Overhead becomes very high for doctors offices that have a lot of equipment and equipment is expensive because of patents. Doctors should quit accepting medicare though so that they won't be bound by as many regulations.

Prices would plummet in a truly free market system.
 

Mxylplyx

Diamond Member
Mar 21, 2007
4,197
101
106
Prices would plummet in a truly free market system.

You truly believe prices would plummet in the ultimate sellers market which is healthcare? What basis do you have for that, beyond some stringent ideology that free market is always better? We have the most market oriented healthcare in the developed world, and it's multitudes more expensive than other government run systems.
 

Mxylplyx

Diamond Member
Mar 21, 2007
4,197
101
106
I don't really have any sympathy for insurance companies being screwed over because they have a history of going out of their way to screw over policy holders and get out of having to pay. My father went through lung cancer treatment and the insurance companies tried to find any way they could to not have to pay from some loophole. Thankfully, he not only recovered fully and has had not return of the cancer, the costs were all covered. They did things like contact his employer if he had ever had illnesses not reported or had anything a "prudent" person would go to a doctor for and didn't.

Insurance companies are just one part of the broken system. People have always directed their indignation about healthcare at their insurance companies, because they are the ones you have to directly deal with. This article plainly illustrates the exorbitant prices insurance companies are dealing with. People waltz into these hospitals with their insurance cards in hand without a single care in the world about what ridiculous prices the hospital is trying to charge, and then bitch about their insurance companies when they try to control costs. Removing insurance companies from the equation is simple, get rid of them. Let the government be a single payer for everyone, and then we can really leverage costs down. All these doctors who say they are going to take their ball and go home can put their money where their mouth is.
 

Craig234

Lifer
May 1, 2006
38,548
350
126
You truly believe prices would plummet in the ultimate sellers market which is healthcare? What basis do you have for that, beyond some stringent ideology that free market is always better? We have the most market oriented healthcare in the developed world, and it's multitudes more expensive than other government run systems.

There is something common with ideologies, the 'pure' fixation, so that any problem is answered by things not being 'pure' enough.

Communism didn't work because it wasn't pure enough. The free market would work but ours isn't pure enough. Conservatism would work but it wasn't pure enough.
 

Hayabusa Rider

Admin Emeritus & Elite Member
Jan 26, 2000
50,879
4,266
126
What it seems is happening is that one out of control hospital is attempting to bill and take advantage. I'm not a fan. We also need reform but led by people who understand health care.
 

smackababy

Lifer
Oct 30, 2008
27,024
79
86
Insurance companies are just one part of the broken system. People have always directed their indignation about healthcare at their insurance companies, because they are the ones you have to directly deal with. This article plainly illustrates the exorbitant prices insurance companies are dealing with. People waltz into these hospitals with their insurance cards in hand without a single care in the world about what ridiculous prices the hospital is trying to charge, and then bitch about their insurance companies when they try to control costs. Removing insurance companies from the equation is simple, get rid of them. Let the government be a single payer for everyone, and then we can really leverage costs down. All these doctors who say they are going to take their ball and go home can put their money where their mouth is.

Insurance companies are just doing cost control. They are trying to drop policy holders for such outlandish things such as not going to a doctor for a cold that lasted a couple of days 15 years ago.

The idea of just getting rid of insurance companies is not something that just happens. Imagine if everyone, at every insurance company, and every job associated with health insurance, were just laid off.

And the alternative? Go ask any veteran that has to deal with the VA hospital exactly how well the government runs health care. Just from a military standpoint, the on base facilities are awful. Almost everyone I have spoken to know the motto of those places: "Give 'em a 'script for Motrin and send em out the door." One of my friends tore his MCL and it took over a year before he could be referred to someone outside of the awful military "doctors" to get x-rays and then close to another year to get surgery.
 

Anarchist420

Diamond Member
Feb 13, 2010
8,645
0
76
www.facebook.com
You truly believe prices would plummet in the ultimate sellers market which is healthcare? What basis do you have for that, beyond some stringent ideology that free market is always better? We have the most market oriented healthcare in the developed world, and it's multitudes more expensive than other government run systems.
The health care sector is the most regulated one in this country. We have what's called medical fascism.

I will concede that socialized medicine (not single-payer) would bring costs down as much as a free market would, but then people could abuse the former and the State would really have no reason to improve health care. The reason I don't like socialized medicine is that people would be forced to pay for it.

It should either be a full free market system or a full socialist system if the goal is to bring costs down. What we have right now is a mishmash of regulations, individuals paying individually, and the tax payer paying and it's not working.
 

shadow9d9

Diamond Member
Jul 6, 2004
8,132
2
0
The health care sector is the most regulated one in this country. We have what's called medical fascism.

I will concede that socialized medicine (not single-payer) would bring costs down as much as a free market would, but then people could abuse the former and the State would really have no reason to improve health care. The reason I don't like socialized medicine is that people would be forced to pay for it.

It should either be a full free market system or a full socialist system if the goal is to bring costs down. What we have right now is a mishmash of regulations, individuals paying individually, and the tax payer paying and it's not working.

Free market doesn't work when it comes to necessities... They can charge whatever they want and people will pay it... There also is not time to shop around when there is an emergency.
 

Anarchist420

Diamond Member
Feb 13, 2010
8,645
0
76
www.facebook.com
Free market doesn't work when it comes to necessities... They can charge whatever they want and people will pay it... There also is not time to shop around when there is an emergency.
So you're saying that food and all farms should be publicly owned?

The socialized system is worse because you have to pay for it whether you use it or not and there is no competition.
 

Pulsar

Diamond Member
Mar 3, 2003
5,224
306
126
Make it illegal for Hospitals to offer differing price points to insurance companies versus individuals.

Done.
 

Pulsar

Diamond Member
Mar 3, 2003
5,224
306
126
Not a problem. Raise all billing to be the same.

That's fine. Then insurance prices will raise so much that people won't be able to afford it.

Insurance companies artificially raise the costs. Hospitals can obviously make a profit on what the insurance companies pay them. But we can't tell them to give everyone the prices they give the insurance companies, because I don't want to get into the government setting price points.

Instead, tell hospitals that they can't offer different people different prices. Then, they are forced to make the costs affordable or they won't get money from anyone.

There will still be insurance for catastrophic issues, just like people buy car insurance for accidents. But the middlemen in all the insurance companies who currently just add cost to the system? Poof.