How much should someone have to pay for health care ?
Everyone left and right always talks about how to pay for health services. What is often left out are actual numbers. For example there is a proposal that if everyone was insured then the risk pools would balance and everything would be fine. I disagree. No one want to admit it, but the only way to make health care fair is that some people would have to have less. To illustrate this point imagine if everyone was in the same health plan. And everyone paid the same amount. I mean everyone children, old, unemployed everyone.
What would be a reasonable amount for each person to pay ?
There are 300 million people in America if each paid $1000 each a year would allow 300 billion available to pay for services.
If everyone paid $100 a month or $1200 year, 360 billion would be available.
If everyone paid $200 a month or $2400 year, 720 billion would be available.
If everyone paid $300 a month or $3600 year, 1.08 Trillion would be available.
One trillion now we are talking real money. For a family of 4 that would be
$1200 a month. That would be equivalent to mortgage payment on a $200,000 home.
One would think that would be enough to pay for everyone health care. But you would
be wrong. The U.S. health care bill is $1.7 trillion.
So the amount of spending is about 6k per person. Or $500 per month. That is $2000 a month for a family of 4.
So I ask, what is a reasonable amount of money a person should have to spend to get quality health care? Or is the question what health care is reasonable to expect?
What would be a reasonable amount for each person to pay ?
There are 300 million people in America if each paid $1000 each a year would allow 300 billion available to pay for services.
If everyone paid $100 a month or $1200 year, 360 billion would be available.
If everyone paid $200 a month or $2400 year, 720 billion would be available.
If everyone paid $300 a month or $3600 year, 1.08 Trillion would be available.
One trillion now we are talking real money. For a family of 4 that would be
$1200 a month. That would be equivalent to mortgage payment on a $200,000 home.
One would think that would be enough to pay for everyone health care. But you would
be wrong. The U.S. health care bill is $1.7 trillion.
So the amount of spending is about 6k per person. Or $500 per month. That is $2000 a month for a family of 4.
So I ask, what is a reasonable amount of money a person should have to spend to get quality health care? Or is the question what health care is reasonable to expect?
posted by Scott at 3:53 PM
2 Comments:
At first glance your question reminded me of a question like, "How much should Americans spend on food?"
Between groceries and restaurant tabs, we probably spend some outrageous amount on food, far more than we need to live, though of course a lot of marginal expense comes from the pursuit of living pleasurably.
That said, the cost of enough food for me to survive isn't much different from the cost of enough food for a baby or old person to survive. It's a uniformly low cost, that we cover ourselves (without having to think about it) in the 99.9% case and that welfare and/or charities cover for the people who do ned a safety net to avoid literally starving to death.
On the other hand, the cost of survival-level health care for myself is extremely low, unless I get into an accident or get cancer or something similar. In those extreme cases suddenly the costs become astronomical, hence insurance. Contingencies like that are the best reason to have insurance, yet I think most people are loath to see someone die simply because he or she couldn't afford insurance and then got unlucky.
(It's a different story for the people who can afford insurance but choose to go without, though it's not at all obvious how to distinguish the just treatment in each of those cases.)
A whole lot of health care money is spent for a tiny amount of people who got exceedingly unlucky - people who need new lungs, new hearts, etc.
That should be distinguished from the health care money that is spent by a large number of people with some particular thing in common (old age, high cholesterol), on medicine that enhances their lives but wouldn't even have been available a few years ago.
I would argue that the total amount of money we MUST spend is the sum of the costs endured by heart patients, lung patients, people defeating cancer, accident victims and so on. Beyond that, there's an amount we MAY spend on preventative medicine, minor checkups, et al, that as a matter of personal choice and personal freedom would (you'd think) be outside the realm of government regulation or standard insurance coverage.
(Random aside: I'm nearsighted and need glasses. Our company's insurance plan covers this even though it's a small expense that doesn't surprise anybody - either you have good vision or you don't, people never really move from one category to the other. The clearsighted people in my company are in effect subsidizing my glasses. Obviously I don't mind - and if they minded they could always find a different job - but it still seems inefficient.)
Excellent points thanks for contributing.
I do find it interesting that you would rather cut down on preventative care to serve the ultra expensive cases. I wonder if your thinking (which isn't logical from a cost benefit analysis) at the core of Americans unwillingness to nationalize.
They would rather be open to getting flu with kills 30k a year, than be stranded an left to die if they needed dialysis.
I will think in this.
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