Tea Party Questions

I wonder if the amount spent is comparable between all those countries and us.Found this line on wiki:

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In 2006, the United States accounted for three quarters of the world’s biotechnology revenues and 82% of world R&D spending in biotechnology.

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Healthcare in the United States - WikipediaEdited by Catholic Scientist, : No reason given.

Which still means little.What was the source of the funding?

Yeah, there's both public and private funding...It was mainly this line:

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For profit health care has resulted in a doubling of the cost

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that I dont' think is very accurate. You can't look at Canada's public healthcare and our private healthcare, and say that our higher cost is because of that. My point was that there's a lot more involved, one thing in particular being that we spend a lot more money on research n'stuff.

I think you can most definitely say that the additional administrative costs in the US as well as the very idea of a "For Profit" hospital are the major causes of both the terrible quality of US health Care and the high costs.

But that's not part of the cost of healthcare as such, that's part of the cost of having an extremely profitable pharmaceutical industry which makes money for the US.Of course it is true that when the consumer pays for a drug developed in America s/he is partly paying for the cost of development, but the same is true when a Canadian or a Belgian pays for the same drug.The other countries with big pharmaceutical industries are the UK and Switzerland, and they have lower healthcare costs than the US. Developing profitable medicine is not a burden on the country that does it, nor is there any reason why it should particularly be a burden on the healthcare consumers of that country.---As for jar's original point, he's right. There's a big problem in the system. For example, twice as much of our healthcare spending (proportionally to healthcare spending as a whole) is on bureaucracy compared with Canada (your choice of example, I could doubtless find countries where the different is even more pronounced). The figures are about 30% of healthcare spending as against 15%. When you look it up, this is a staggering amount of money. If we could reduce our spending on medical bureaucracy to Canadian levels, that would free up 2% of our GDP to do something other than move bits of paper around.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

(1) How much profit do we make by doing so?(2) Cost of R&D are not included in figures on healthcare spending any more than the profits from selling medicine are.(3) See my previous post.

Good job Rhavin. I am in agreement, but, can I play devil's advocate for a moment? . . .IMO, the biggest reason US health care is so bad (unaffordable, not equal for all, bad quality when compared to Euro nations and even Cuba) because the people who are running the for-profit health companies, make the rules. Obama made back door deals with the pharmaceutical companies when pushing "his" Obamacare policy. Well, under these conditions, shouldn't the public expect to be screwed with this for-profit system? Afterall, how often does fascism work to the benefit of mankind?So the question is: If the PUBLIC made the rules, with NO corporate assistance, could a FOR-PROFIT-SYSTEM be developed that would be successful/affordable/good quality/for all?I would at least expect the public's system to be somewhat fairer than the current system, but still wonder if there might even be some surprising benefits when compare to socialized health care?Or perhaps my fleeting capitalist thought is as logical as a four-sided triangle. I certainly am not gonna fight for this argument, I am merely being curious.Any thoughts? It might be more credible if right-wingers answered this. Coyote?

Research is not a part of the figures for per capita spending on healthcare. The NIH budget is completely separate from the Medicare/Medicaid budget.

What are you guys referring to as the "bad quality" aspect of US health care?Don't we have some of the best doctors and most advanced technologies? Why would they do that if the quality is so bad?

Gotcha, I'm just replying so you don't think I'm ignoring it.

That is the only difference between US healthcare and healthcare in other first world nations. Americans pay about twice what other countries pay per capita. It is quite easy to see why. First, you have an unnecessary middle man: insurance companies. The only reason that these companies exist is to make money off of people getting healthcare. They offer NOTHING in the way of health services. Second, hospitals can deny treatment for non-emergencies. This allows them to set their prices at a level that leaves out the bottom 10% of wage earners. Any money lost treating lower income patients in the emergency room is added to the prices charged to higher income patients.In my own area of the country hospitals are still building like crazy, even in the middle of this recession. Some of the local hospitals claim that they are "not for profit". What this really means is that they pay employees bloated salaries and dump massive amounts of money into extravagant offices and unneeded facilities. If these hospitals were government run there would be a massive outcry, but since they are private everyone thinks it is business as usual.

No. Every dollar taken out in profit is a dollar not being spent on making the public healthier.

Maybe. I doubt it based on the track record of for-profit social services, but maybe.The problem is it would still of necessity be inferior to a not-for-profit option, because (again) every dollar of profit is a dollar not used for providing services. This means either greater expense for the public, lower services for the public, or both.

What bad quality means here is lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality rate for a higher cost. I don't doubt you can get high quality care if you are rich enough, the problem is that the way you use your ressource is plain inefficient. By any standards, I think your healthcare system is pretty bad, you spend more on it, and you get worse results for the general population in the U.S compared to other modern countries.Edited by Son, : No reason given.Edited by Son, : No reason given.

I don't have any figures, but I would say that, sure, we do have some great care if you can afford it. If you can (a) afford the monthly premiums or (b) afford to pay it outright. However, A LOT of people can do neither. The fact is: people have gone bankrupt, lost their jobs, depleted their life savings etc., all because they fell ill. So many more people can't afford basic pre-emptive care that would stop a number of sicknesses before they become serious. A number of people use the emergency room for stupid shit because their PCP won't see them due to the fact they know they won't get paid.Now tell me: does that sound like first world health care to you? It sounds like a back alley 3rd world country to me. but, that's the american way: "fuck you, I got mine".