"people rarely shop around, people with insurance pay pennies on the dollar for services, other people are charged full price for services but rarely pay or only pay after the bill goes to collection"
This is where the Bush Admin and others really irked me with their recommendations when this issue was being kicked around late in their administration.
A $4000 tax credit (as I recall) for people buying their own insurance? My annual bill, for a middle road policy including employer contribution, is about $16,000. So I'm supposed to eat the other $1000 per month (assuming one could get group rates) and dance for joy?
Non-solution.
Another recommendation was to increase use of Healthcare Savings Accounts. That's the piggy bank solution for people with no insurance.
It makes no sense. At least not for me, or the average person. Even for a fairly routine medical history, one's costs are very unpredictable. I get lab work done every few months. Am I asked about it? Nope. The doc just checks off a few boxes on the form and shows me where the lab is. I don't even know what they're for until later, or unless I've had them before and know their purpose. Unusual complaint? Sky's the limit. I've had knee pain lately, and had an exam for it, an x ray for it, prescriptions for it, and now physical therapy planned. An MRI is not unlikely at some point. So this complaint of "my knee hurts" might wind up costing me or my insurance a couple grand- and nobody even really knows what's causing it after all that hoopla. So how much would I need to set aside every month just to be sure that everything was covered on the primary clinic basis, God forbid hospitalization?
Savings account my arse. Then again, if I had Paul Krugman's life and my wife and I were both on the payroll (at a top secret salary) of Princeton, the New York Times, a few corporate boards and lecture circuits, and lived in a $2 million apartment in NYC, medical bills would be largely irrelevant and I could busy myself redistributing other peoples' money.
