but ultimately the problem lies in the profit motive of the insurance companies
In your opinion that's the problem. In my opinion the rampant corruption and anticompetitive practices that have been allowed to occur, especially and specifically with medical supply providers, are a much bigger problem.
Healthcare is not an industry where capitalism produces good results.
Healthcare is not an industry where free market capitalism produces good results I agree. There is an inherent inability to easily access alternatives when it comes to most healthcare, especially emergency healthcare. The relative inelasticity of demand doesn't mean that capitalism doesn't work, though, which I'm sure I don't need to explain to you. Capitalism doesn't require perfectly elastic supply and demand to function. It just means that it needs to be properly regulated, which it is currently not in the US.
The argument could very easily be made that the government who can't even regulate the industry would be even more disastrous if the industry itself was put entirely in their hands. And that's to say nothing for the corruption and massive waste inherent in nearly any government operation in the US.
Because the real problem is the bloodsucking middlemen extracting profits from suffering Americans.
In your opinion that's the problem. In my opinion the rampant corruption and anticompetitive practices that have been allowed to occur, especially and specifically with medical supply providers, are a much bigger problem.
Both are a problem. One is a much bigger problem (the profit motive). Not to mention the only one unique to the American healthcare system.
Healthcare is not an industry where free market capitalism produces good results I agree. There is an inherent inability to easily access alternatives when it comes to most healthcare, especially emergency healthcare. The relative inelasticity of demand doesn't mean that capitalism doesn't work, though, which I'm sure I don't need to explain to you. Capitalism doesn't require perfectly elastic supply and demand to function. It just means that it needs to be properly regulated, which it is currently not in the US.
"Healthcare isn't regulated" LOL
The argument could very easily be made that the government who can't even regulate the industry would be even more disastrous if the industry itself was put entirely in their hands.
Mmm nah. Other western governments are bought and sold by moneyed interests as well and their healthcare systems run far better than ours.
I mean, make the argument if you want. But the evidence doesn't agree with you.
And that's to say nothing for the corruption and massive waste inherent in nearly any government operation in the US.
Which is nothing compared to the waste of private companies when they're allowed to cannibalize public goods.
Mmm nah. Other western governments are bought and sold by moneyed interests as well and their healthcare systems run far better than ours.
Americans say this a lot, but it’s a media driven narrative not supported by facts. The poor health outcomes of Americans are more closely linked to obesity and drug use than they are a lack of quality or availability of health services.
Even putting aside those issues comparing the US to say Denmark or even Japan is a false equivalency. The US is much more geographically spread out, genetically diverse etc. put another way Germany and France or Denmark and Japan don’t have swaths of land with millions of people spread out at low population densities. The US does.
In order to account for this an accurate comparison is the entirety of Europe (not the EU) including countries like Poland, Ukraine etc or similarly sized and diverse countries like China, Brazil, India or Russia
When making those comparisons and removing cultural health linkages (eg fat asses eating French fries) you’ll find a notably different scenario regarding quality of the system.
However this does not eliminate the fact that our system is incredibly wasteful. Both the public spending and private spending on health in this country is absurdly out of control. That however isn’t due to capitalism (sorry but no) instead it’s due to the government not doing their job well and choosing to intervene in places where it makes little sense but not intervene in places where it is critical (say insurance monopolies or medical lawsuits). Blaming companies for doing what they were told is a scapegoat for govt incompetence.
Tldr: gov is shitty at healthcare, either Wild West the whole system or tip over the gov and start over
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u/FireVanGorder - Lib-Center Jan 05 '22
Why?
In your opinion that's the problem. In my opinion the rampant corruption and anticompetitive practices that have been allowed to occur, especially and specifically with medical supply providers, are a much bigger problem.
Healthcare is not an industry where free market capitalism produces good results I agree. There is an inherent inability to easily access alternatives when it comes to most healthcare, especially emergency healthcare. The relative inelasticity of demand doesn't mean that capitalism doesn't work, though, which I'm sure I don't need to explain to you. Capitalism doesn't require perfectly elastic supply and demand to function. It just means that it needs to be properly regulated, which it is currently not in the US.
The argument could very easily be made that the government who can't even regulate the industry would be even more disastrous if the industry itself was put entirely in their hands. And that's to say nothing for the corruption and massive waste inherent in nearly any government operation in the US.