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.
#62
There isn’t an easy solution because it’s been so horribly maligned. I would call to get the government and third parties out of paying for our health care. Imagine if we had to pay for food like we pay for health care.
For one, i’d make health care premiums Tax deductible. And I would focus on getting back to where the patient actually pays instead of a third party. HOw to get there is tricky. But that process would definitely bring smart solutions other than just handing it over to the government.
#64–Warden. A fair start. You say: “And I would focus on getting back to where the patient actually pays instead of a third party.” /// Thats what we had before the government programs and what we had was a whole bunch of people without healthcare. I don’t think even a few doctors today will go back to taking chickens and green beans as payment for services.
So, again, how you going to deal with the unwashed hordes who can’t pay for healthcare? You know—DEAL WITH the real issues.
#58, BullshitBill,
So, you live in Quebec. Beautiful province. I was there for a week last year. I visited St. Mary’s Hospital in Montreal a couple of times to see an old friend who just a knee replacement. From the time of the auto accident it took him two weeks to have the surgery. They could have done it sooner but he was in rough shape. He had a semi-private room. Very nice, clean, fresh, bright. Helpful nurses, good physicians, decent food.
Quite a bit different from the hospital my wife works at here in the US. Oh yes, her hospital passed their last accreditation. But given the choice, I would pick St. Mary’s with no questions asked.
A few years ago my father was put on an 18 month waiting list in Canada for a knee replacement. A couple of months later he started having real problems. He had the operation three weeks later. He was 85 at the time. During the two days he was in the hospital it cost him a total of $2.00. That was for a phone call. Can you point to any American insurance plan that would authorize an 85 yr old for surgery within three weeks and then charge him $2.00 his end?
Wasn’t this discussed here just last month? Oh well. There’s also a legal angle to the cost overruns. Not just the cost of litigation, but the costs of avoiding litigation: “defensive medicine”, ordering more tests and procedures than are strictly necessary. If a doctor doesn’t order a test, and the patient dies or suffers for that reason, out come the lawyers. Hospitals need to retain their own lawyers and have high levels of malpractice insurance.
You won’t get the costs down far enough unless you tackle the legal side: let doctors use their judgment about what tests and procedures to do, without fear of being sued. No, I’m not saying that they should be indemnified against all malpractice, but they should not be forced to practice expensive “defensive medicine”.
It’s also worth noting that in these discussions, seldom are regulatory inefficiencies brought up. Also, it’s unlikely to ever happen that other government policies, which are seemingly unrelated yet have definite effects on the demand for and cost of health care services, like our agriculture subsidy programs, will get a serious rethinking in the process.
What everyone is missing here is that although the insurance companies suck up a whole lot of the $$ for healthcare, if you eliminate them then what do you do with the millions of now unemployed insurance industry workers????
Oh, and as for a business that the government took over and made a success, try Conrail. A rarity, and as a Libertarian, I hate to admit it, but they did in fact take a bankrupt set of railroads, streamline and upgrade them, start making a profit, paid back the gov’t investment and sold it to private owners at a profit. It can happen.
66,
He paid 2.00 for a phone call? What a rip off!
🙂
#57, “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.”
So what you are saying is the point of gun control laws is to make it easier to subdue the citizenry into compliance? Interesting…
# 71 Sea Lawyer said, “So what you are saying is the point of gun control laws is to make it easier to subdue the citizenry into compliance?”
Yes, when criminal elements persuade a gov to steal from the citizenry, armed forces are needed to beat said citizens into compliance and prevent the people from resisting the theft.
Before all the troubles were solved in #64, I was laughing at the original article, the last sentence about how much money would be save if patient files weren’t handled so much – it’s the government that requires that paperwork….duh.
Speaking of government requirements, aspirin and bandaids wouldn’t cost $100 if Government didn’t require hospitals to treat everybody who arrives at their doors. So, contrary to the popular montra cited above, the poor in American DO get all the medical care they want and DON’T pay a dime. This ‘poor’ includes all the non-citizens who happen to visiting our country.
So while the average citizen struggles to pay health premiums and worries about potential bankruptcy caused by astronomical health costs, costs which are a DIRECT result of government requirements. This same government has the balls to say the system is inefficient and THEY are the only ones who can fix it.
Crooks like this make greedy insurance executives look like petty pick-pockets.
#58: The problem is that you live in Quebec. No hospital in Ontario that I ever went to sounded like that.
74,
No hospital in Quebec is that bad I’ll bet. He’s just being a troll. No evidence. Just a string of naughty words…
#66 Fusion:
“A few years ago my father was put on an 18 month waiting list in Canada for a knee replacement […] Can you point to any American insurance plan that would authorize an 85 yr old for surgery within three weeks and then charge him $2.00 his end?”
First of all, 18 month waiting lists for *anything* are unheard of in America.
My grandfather was given a hip replacement and it cost him pocket change. Not sure what health insurance he has.
We could all go back and forth on this, but the simple fact is that with health insurance (even without it) in America, you’re never put on a waiting list for a year and a half.
True story:
Friend got lymphoma, but had no insurance. Went to the welfare office, they told him to (ha!) quit his job so that he’d qualify for, I dunno, medicare or something. Within a *week* he was getting chemo and a a check for groceries and rent.
No insurance, and no waiting list.
So, I just don’t believe it when people say poor Americans are left out to dry when they get sick.
ah no…its staggering fraud, not waste.. they have recently made huge cut backs in the amount “service” you can get..both in care and supplies.
however, i get a calls from a few suppliers offering to split the profits on an electric scooter about 3 times a year(8 years now) -this is on top of offers to split other medical supplies as well..
the poor are a non-issue..
they cant wait to sign you up
for medicaid.. it’s the working middle class that need it..
yada yada
-s
# 59 “Named” – Here are some citations for you.
Here is a recent article from the Montreal Gazette discussing how it’s going to take three years to reach the goal of cutting emergency room wait times to 12 hours from the current SEVENTEEN HOURS.
Here is an article about bladder cancer patients dying while on the waiting list for a surgery that any illegal immigrant in the States would recieive immediatly and for free.
In the time it took you to call me a liar and a troll you could have found these and many more on google – asshole.
Mr Fusion – What if your 85 year old dad did not want to wait 18 months for knee surgery? The answer is – too bad for him because there is no choice. You either wait or travel to another country and pay cash.
What people pay Canada in taxes for health care would pay for top of the line premium coverage in the states. As bad as American insurance companies are they are a hell of a lot more responsive than any government. Again – the only people that benefit from these systems are the ones who do not work and pay no taxes.
#78 And that is that.
#28, Cow-Patty,
# 21 Named said, “But, public health care IS a fundamental right.”
Umm, no. Per the US Constitution, it isn’t.
Uummm, could you show us that part of the Constitution that say the public health is not a right?
#80 You haven’t finished your school assignment I gave you a couple of weeks ago. When you do you won’t have such silly questions…
Bullshit Bill
Damn spam filter ate my post. I’m going to break it up to send it.
… a waiting patient may be reminded of the show “24,” because patients can sometimes wait a full day to receive treatment, according to attending physician Dr. Robert Saqueton.
Bullshit Bill
Last June, a 49-year-old woman died on the waiting room floor of a New York hospital ER — one of the almost 400,000 patients who, the CDC found, had waited 24 hours or more to be treated in a hospital emergency room.
BullshitBill
As many as one-quarter of all heart attack patients had to wait 50 minutes or longer before seeing a doctor.
Bullshit Bill
Parents and advocates report that in recent weeks across the state, at least a dozen children and teens in crisis – threatening violence to themselves or others – have waited three, five, even seven days in hospital emergency rooms or medical wards for psychiatric beds.
So, how much better are the Canadian Hospitals? The other thing to keep in mind is the length of time in the ER is not the time it takes to see a doctor. In most cases it is the time it takes until a bed is available.
#81, Cow-Patty,
So where in the Constitution does it ban public health?
#83 Yes, that story appeared last year. It was a gov’t run H.C. facility in NY. Hmmm…
#78, BullshitBill,
Mr Fusion – What if your 85 year old dad did not want to wait 18 months for knee surgery? The answer is – too bad for him because there is no choice.
I guess you didn’t read the entire post. Here, let me repost the relevant section.
A few years ago my father was put on an 18 month waiting list in Canada for a knee replacement. A couple of months later he started having real problems. He had the operation three weeks later. He was 85 at the time. During the two days he was in the hospital it cost him a total of $2.00.
The first list was the elective surgery list. The second list was the urgent list, while serious, not life threatening. If he needed bypass surgery it would have been immediate.
#87, Cow-Patty,
Where in the Constitution does it ban Public Health Rights?
BTW, there were over 400,000 people spending MORE than one day in the ERs.
BTW, that NY Hospital was City owned, but run by a “for profit” company.
# 89 Mr. Fusion said, “BTW, that NY Hospital was City owned”
Correct. Some nut posted the same story here last year trying to push Gov owned HC, that is until it was pointed out that his example came from a gov owned facility. That nut left DU forever.
#83 – A lot of people were fired for that event. How many government pencil pushers have been fired….for anything….ever?
#84 – Most of the 50 minutes is the time it takes to process the government required paperwork
#86 – When are you ever going to actually read the document to realize that government doesn’t give citizens anything (including the obligation to make all citizens have health care)….it’s the other way around.
#86, “So where in the Constitution does it ban public health?”
lol, I see your methodological approach to arguing constitutional interpretations is as compelling as ever.
I also have a right to good looking women! I wonder if I sued MF I could get some of his wife’s nookie. Afterall he’s being greedy with the booty.