Reshared post from +Paula Jones
"The group found that more than half of individual policyholders saw their rates go up, not down. It was even worse for small businesses: 90 percent of them got rate increases instead of decreases. And, as consumer advocates had feared, hardest hit were indeed older workers and people living in rural areas, most of whom saw good coverage options previously available to them disappear."
Maine’s Free-Market Health Care Dream Turning Into Nightmare for Many
What happened in Maine is a sobering reality check on the oft-repeated myth that getting rid of ObamaCare and other consumer protections is the answer to our health care problems.
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Of all of the industries out there, health care is the one that absolutely should not be a "for profit" industry.
Of all of the industries out there, health care is the one that absolutely should not be a "for profit" industry.
I agree for-profit for health care is a problem but I do so with one reservation. If you don't allow profit, where will a drive to research and the strength from competitive forces come from? Even the most anti-free-market person must agree that the free market does have some benefits in these areas from competition. What can be done to create these forces for good if one makes the system entirely not market driven?
I agree for-profit for health care is a problem but I do so with one reservation. If you don't allow profit, where will a drive to research and the strength from competitive forces come from? Even the most anti-free-market person must agree that the free market does have some benefits in these areas from competition. What can be done to create these forces for good if one makes the system entirely not market driven?
"Non-profit" doesn't mean that they can't make money. It simply means that there are no shareholders that by definition have to take priority. That is the problem with healthcare right now. Once you start putting out shares, then your obligation is to the shareholders first, the customers (read: patients) second — and when it comes to something like health care, that's the absolute wrong priority to have.
This is the same reason why I will always choose credit unions over banks.
"Non-profit" doesn't mean that they can't make money. It simply means that there are no shareholders that by definition have to take priority. That is the problem with healthcare right now. Once you start putting out shares, then your obligation is to the shareholders first, the customers (read: patients) second — and when it comes to something like health care, that's the absolute wrong priority to have.
This is the same reason why I will always choose credit unions over banks.
FYI- NIH does tremendous amount of research at public cost and it does an amazing job…..which is the way it should be….BUT Nothing is stopping Pharmas to put money in research. It is after all a free market economy and the one that finds the cure first, should be able to make profit out of it. We can debate how much profit is enough…but then we all have teh right to determine what is enough for us.
Problem also is that we are a litigious society and sue the crap out of anyone and everyone. Which definitely increases the cost on top of existing costs of research in the 1st world economies. Pharmas have biggest problem in human trials, so by the time a drug reaches that level, it has already cost them close to the tune of $1 billion (making some numbers up here as I don't recall exact ones), that has not included the human trial cost yet. Something goes wrong, and they get sued heavily (again there is no way to put a $ figure on a human life)…so they have to take all of those costs into consideration when they price a drug. Normally, there are more misses then hits for a pharma company, so they have to recoup money somehow.
FYI- NIH does tremendous amount of research at public cost and it does an amazing job…..which is the way it should be….BUT Nothing is stopping Pharmas to put money in research. It is after all a free market economy and the one that finds the cure first, should be able to make profit out of it. We can debate how much profit is enough…but then we all have teh right to determine what is enough for us.
Problem also is that we are a litigious society and sue the crap out of anyone and everyone. Which definitely increases the cost on top of existing costs of research in the 1st world economies. Pharmas have biggest problem in human trials, so by the time a drug reaches that level, it has already cost them close to the tune of $1 billion (making some numbers up here as I don't recall exact ones), that has not included the human trial cost yet. Something goes wrong, and they get sued heavily (again there is no way to put a $ figure on a human life)…so they have to take all of those costs into consideration when they price a drug. Normally, there are more misses then hits for a pharma company, so they have to recoup money somehow.