White House chief economist Christina Romer kicked off President Obama’s push to reform the nation’s health care system Tuesday, saying there are “billion-dollar bills lying on the sidewalk” if the nation can find a way to make the system more efficient.
The UC Berkeley economist, who chairs the president’s Council of Economic Advisers, said in a 51-page report that the broken U.S. health care system is ruinous to workers’ wages, living standards and the federal budget, and the payoff from fixing it could be huge. At the White House, she called health care reform a potential “game changer” for the U.S. economy, if it is done right.
But that’s a big if, given the increasingly vexing budget, logistical and political problems standing in the way of the president’s top domestic campaign promise.
Congressional Democrats hope to have legislation ready by August, and key leaders have been meeting privately to hash out issues.
[…]
The cost of expanding coverage to the nation’s 46 million uninsured is the biggest hurdle. Romer’s 51-page report focuses on making the stupendous price tag – an estimated $1.5 trillion over 10 years – look more affordable by highlighting the enormous waste in the current system.
[…]
Harvard economist David Cutler, who praised Romer’s report for its academic integrity, said the health care industry employs more people simply to pull patient records than it does nurses.Romer said such phenomenal waste makes it incumbent that officials reform the system.
#28, Taxing other people’s income to get free services is a fundamental right. I read it on a blog somewhere.
#31 Ah yes, the criminal class says so. LOL!
28,
Right. Because everything in the US is based on the Constitution. BTW, why did you change your name from Paddy-O?
“1 in 4 of the dollars spent on health care goes to the staff at the insurance company and the staff at the hospital to deal with the insurance company. ”
So if we go single payer, your’e essentially going to move all the insurance company employees to be government employees and layoff the rest – only now they have no real incentive to cut costs.
Working for an insurer, I can tell you that Medicare/Medicaid are BY FAR the biggest sources of waste. If government can prove they can run those efficiently, THEN they can talk about covering the rest of us.
30,
Yes. Not-for-profit is still a money making operation. Ostensibly, when you re-invest back into the company, you create a better business rather than sucking out all the cash and then re-filling it at the expense of the customer.
I think that profit and health care cannot co-exist without the logical extension being everyone paying for insurance and no one able to claim against it.
# 33 Named said, “Right. Because everything in the US is based on the Constitution. ”
No, not everything. Only what works well.
Here is what a lot of people don’t get – the reason that a lot of other countries do have reasonably effective national healthcare is primarily because physicians and drug companies in the US are the ones really pushing techniques and therapies and that trickles down to other countries. You take the monetary incentive away to push those things and you’ll be shocked how fast those things grind to a halt.
#21:
“But, public health care IS a fundamental right.”
Really? How is something that comes in a finite supply, that in order for me to have it means someone else has to give up their own time and money, a right?
What other ‘fundamental right’ is like this? Free speech isn’t like this. The right to vote isn’t like this.
When people say it’s a ‘right,’ they mean it’s wrong to withhold at-hand life-saving medicine from someone. Not that every single person has the god-given right to the most advanced medicine available at all times.
That’s ridiculous.
It’s like saying everyone has a fundamental right to the best food money can buy.
37,
CITATION NEEDED
You’re telling me that the good doctor who tries a technique will not unless he’s paid a gajillion dollars?
36,
So, you ARE Paddy-O. And what, pray tell, is constitutional in the US anylonger?
38,
Yes. Public health care is a fundamental right. Why should someone who is poor not have health care?
#38 Any “right” that requires the taking of something from others at gun point to satisfy said “right”, isn’t a “right”. That’s a simplified criteria.
#29, I really don’t have a clue about what you think you are saying.
41,
Where are these guns you’re rambling about? You’re so fun loving Paddy-O…
Or do you equate law and legislation with “guns”?
There are too many fat cats at the table for any solution to work. There could even be Constitutional issues. You literally need to give the government the power to attack and destroy multi-billion dollar corporations. What will happen is those that has insurance will pay additional taxes for low end policies, by the major insurers, backed by US guarantees. There polices are usually for catastrophic coverage, with deductibles as high as $5K per year, then 70%. These policies may keep you out of bankruptcy, but they aren’t much use with average MD or ER trip. Every Administration I remember promises huge savings by cutting waste. It always gets worse.
#44, how exactly are laws enforced?
LIEbertarian BS regarding “rights” is besides the point.
Society, ie==ALL OF US, are better off when everyone has access to healthcare, unless you think a privileged few living behind steel bars surrounded by security police is the freest society imaginable.
There are no rational arguments against healthcare for all, only dogma from those who view themselves as disproportionately benefited under an unfair allocation system.
Why have food inspectors inspecting all foods for everyone (yea, I know). Why not just let people buy the food inspection services they want under a free market?
Same with healthcare but too many in USA are too stupid to see it.
“Damn, you people against this are either unfeeling, heartless monsters… …”
That’s how the pros win arguments.
# 47 Sea Lawyer said, “#44, how exactly are laws enforced?”
Don’t waste your breath. If the guy hasn’t heard of police he is brain dead and not worth responding to…
47,
Depends. Sometimes you get a fine. Sometimes you get a court summons. Sometimes you go to jail. And sometimes you get a lawyer and get out of it altogether! Guns not need be there…
“LIEbertarian BS regarding “rights” is besides the point.”
If the debate were simply one of cost/benefit analysis, then your point would be reasonable. But when a moral argument continually made to demand Universal Healthcare, then it is certainly not “besides the point.”
#53–SL==what is the “moral argument” against healthcare for all when a society has the ability to provide it? A quick review suggests you think funding universal healthcare services through taxation is an immoral position? HAW!!!!! Please tell us that is not your position and rather tell us the high moral position that supports allowing some to live in luxury while other suffer?
What high moral philosophy is that?
50,
Easy there Paddy-O. Don’t you have a multi-billion dollar corporation to run?
“Depends. Sometimes you get a fine. Sometimes you get a court summons. Sometimes you go to jail. And sometimes you get a lawyer and get out of it altogether! Guns not need be there…”
LOL. And who’s to say I don’t just decide to not show up to your silly court summons for failure to pay taxes then, since guns need not be involved?
#56
Guns are only needed by your police to protect themselves from a society which has lax gun laws. Go to other countries, like England, and you will find police without guns.
I am an American living in Canada. People here (in Quebec) pay crushing taxes (start with a 20% sales tax) and in return get “free” healthcare at filthy understaffed hospitals. People die in ambulances parked outside of packed emergency rooms here. Most doctors are not allowed to take private clients and are forced to work for the government.
After a lifetime of having half their income stolen from them in the name of healthcare, just about anyone who can afford to will go to the US and pay out of their pocket for surgery and other lifesaving procedures.
The only people who benefit from this system are thos that do not work (in many cases who’s families have not worked for generations).
I can only imagine that the American version of this system will be orders of magnitude worse.
58,
Such anecdotes! Why don’t you leave and go back to the US? I fail to understand why you are forced to live in a place you hate. Got a criminal record? On the run? Owe taxes?
oh, and as for your anecdote… CITATION NEEDED.
56,
Ah. Failure to pay taxes. I understand your fear of the jackboots now. You Americans are scared of two things… COMMIES and taxes.
#58–Bill==isn’t it interesting that your personal experiences, even “if” true, still amount to a lie?
http://nationalreviewofmedicine.com/issue/2006/05_30/3_policy_politics01_10.html
I drove by a wreck on the road yesterday. American Highway Safety certainly is non-existent.
Silly.
Here’s the problem. Those stating the inefficiencies in the health care, and there is plenty, is to take it out of the marketplace and hand it over to the government. Exactly where has the government EVER shown to be efficient with the allocation of anything?
While they have pin pointed a big problem, their push to nationalize health care doesn’t fix the problem and will make it worse.
#61–Warden==so your solution is what?
#60, it’s interesting that Fig 3.7 of that report you linked shows Australia as the only other listed country, besides the United States, where growth in private health care expenditures was lower than public growth. The Swedes were evidently seeking quite a bit more of their services outside the public system over the years studied.
#61, well, I’m not leaping to the conclusion that things would get worse under a government program, because among other factors, it’s very dependent on what the government program is. Is the government just making the payments, or is it actually taking over the running of hospitals?
I also don’t believe any of the projected monetary costs to any such program. The commonly used rule of thumb is to take whatever numbers the government advertises, and then double it.