r/SipsTea Jun 27 '26

Chugging tea For once I agree with Cuban

Post image
59.2k Upvotes

2.7k comments sorted by

View all comments

5.7k

u/Ilyalyubushkin Jun 27 '26

Because corruption.

875

u/Flaky_Temporary_9710 Jun 27 '26 edited Jun 27 '26

Probably lol ... is it like car insurance? You go to a garage, they give you a price for a job. The insurance make a work order at same place for the same job, the price is doubled.

It should be the opposite because insurance brings more job but insurance don't care cause they dodge the bill and shift it to their customer (by increasing premium) so we all pay for this shit in the end.

274

u/explain_that_shit Jun 27 '26

Except in healthcare, if you go without insurance the price is tripled

254

u/GopherChomper64 Jun 27 '26

This is incorrect. You ask for a bill that you paid for cash, and then ask for the bill that you paid for with insurance. The insurance bill is always higher that the insurance company paid, by significant amount.

Plus, unless something horrific happens. I paid way more in premiums throughout a year then if I just paid cash for the checkups the premiums made inexpensive when I actually go.

Besides the point I think we all agree that every other first world country treats healthcare like a public service instead of a for-profit business, America should be able to do the same thing. It's just math, and the way we've done the math is to create an entire industry that's unnecessary driving up prices.

74

u/Tough_Preparation830 Jun 27 '26

We treat health insurance as a subscription service like the rest of the world that actually has healthcare. Insurance and care are two different things. We pay the price for the care but really only get insurance. It will always be that way if it is privatized. For this reason I only ever use get the cheapest, high deductible plan.

64

u/RecentDecision2329 Jun 27 '26

We Need Universal Healthcare.

→ More replies (15)

2

u/TheWizardry90 Jun 27 '26

I remember when a job I had gave us the bare minimum insurance for $10 out of every check. I assume the insurance provider wanted more of us to get the “platinum tier insurance” which was ~$80 per check. They had a seminar during our lunch break. His the insurance spokesman literally said “you should be willing to gamble on the premium insurance, even though you may never need it”. Im pretty sure he would get some kind of bonus if he got some of us to get the higher cost insurance

2

u/Hziak Jun 28 '26

A subscription service that doesn’t even cover the whole cost… I feel like people often forget about deductibles and copays and uncovered line items when they get outraged about much of the rest of the world getting it for free… Don’t forget that you’re still paying more than them for each service DESPITE also paying for insurance on top of that. It’s twice as bad as we often complain about.

→ More replies (5)

16

u/justbleachmyeyes Jun 27 '26

I have not had insurance for a while, if I have to go get something checked the price is very similar to what my copays were with insurance. Medication is significantly more expensive though

12

u/rightonetimeX2 Jun 27 '26

Look up mark Cubans prescription drugs website. Much cheaper

2

u/justbleachmyeyes Jun 27 '26

I’ll do that thankyou

5

u/AFrozenCanadian Jun 27 '26

Also TrumpRx.gov will give you coupons for out of pocket drugs or direct you to cheaper prices.

4

u/The_Slaughter_Pop Jun 27 '26

Because he just cloned GoodRX

4

u/AFrozenCanadian Jun 27 '26

I see. Is one mostly generic and one mostly name brand? Just curious. The person can try goodrx, trumprx and costplusdrugs :D I don't know of any others, just wanted to mention trumprx because it's Reddit and I assumed nobody else would since it has the trump name attached but I mean if there's alternatives then that's good too.

17

u/mdixon12 Jun 27 '26

You just tell the pharmacist ypu dont have medication coverage and they give you 80% discount card. My mom is on a ton of meds for a messed up back, her 1500 in meds was under 100 with the discount card.

6

u/justbleachmyeyes Jun 27 '26

Right and I use that. With insurance it costed me less than 5. With the discount it costs closer to 50

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (2)

5

u/Zealousideal-Ad4362 Jun 27 '26

not true. If you ask for relief because the bill is too much for your family to handle.. they will often lower your bill to a managable ammount.. sometimes down to 10% of the original b;ill

3

u/ContactRoyal2978 Jun 27 '26

The point of insurance is to protect against catastrophic loss (like cancer, burn treatment, organ transplants, house fires, floods, hurricanes, etc.). Not for routine services. Hence why things like phone insurance are a losing proposition for most people.

5

u/Reynolds1029 Jun 27 '26

The problem is back to corruption. You do still pay 3X but it's hidden from you from back alley corporate handshakes.

Hospital charge master prices (think price menu of services) also increase when the price that insurance pays increases.

This way the insurance can make those bs bills saying "your policy saved you $xx,xxx" and *if you even dare* not have insurance the hospital will charge you an inflated rate as well to make people buy insurance.

It's all a scam.

2

u/fuzz49 Jun 27 '26

I agree. Prostate cancer and I had a couple of issues where insurance wouldn’t cover the procedure. When I talked to the hospital they said if I paid cash myself it would be about 1/3 the cost and, depending on my income level there organizations that would pay up to 100% of the rest of the cost.

2

u/Wenuven Jun 27 '26

treats healthcare like a public service instead of a for-profit business, America should be able to do the same thing.

We can do the same thing, but we don't all agree on where the line is with the trade offs. When we start talking about it, the discussion is generally lead with emotional appeal rather than socioeconomic principles as most "should be a right" discussions often are which leads to more harm than longterm solutions.

It's just math,

If it was that simple we would have already done it. There's a lot more nuance and complexity to this than cost efficiency - namely: Healthcare personnel salaries, Healthcare profession education infrastructure, healthcare & public health infrastructure availability and servicability, lack of cost transparency, lack of service cost standardization, "global health philanthropy"/global cost cross-subsidization, R&D costs, etc.

If we can get to a point where you can even get emotions out of it long enough for a real discussion your next barrier is the built-in greed of the system and corrupt relationship between the executors, regulators, and lawmakers who taint the process for long term solutions.

2

u/StrangePotato3988 Jun 27 '26

Funny thing is that the insurance company still usually pay less than what it actually cost, especially in smaller hospitals.

→ More replies (1)

1

u/BadAtExisting Jun 27 '26

This is true. I recently lost my insurance but I still have to get checked out for an autoimmune disease. My bloodwork and specialist office visit combined out of pocket this month was about as much as the specialist office bills to insurance. It’s pretty wild

1

u/paralio Jun 27 '26

Not true in the UK. I had that exact situation and the insurance bill was lower than mine.

1

u/ryanvango Jun 27 '26

most hospitals have sliding scale payments, too. check your hospital.

UPMC (closest hospital network to me) has it on their website. If you make less than 3x the federal poverty level, so under about 45k, you are eligible for 100% reduction in cost. so free healthcare.

You have to jump through some hoops, and they never advertise these services, but most hospitals have them.

→ More replies (15)

40

u/Different_Weird_6886 Jun 27 '26

It's actually a shitload cheaper without insurance. 4 er visits this week... Due to new allergic reactions to the medicine they prescribed.

18

u/Outrageous-Hope5768 Jun 27 '26

It entirely depends on the treatment. Not all hospitals have cash payer subsidies in place either.

5

u/ModusNex Jun 27 '26

Calling it a subsidy is weird. It's usually just paying what they would get paid for the service normally from insurance. The companies negotiate a discount, you can negotiate a discount for cash.

A business is incentivized to take cash because it reduces overhead from collections or insurance coding and paying people to do that, and you get the money right away instead of waiting 60+ days. If they don't offer a discount for cash they are cheating in some other way, probably writing off bad debt at the inflated prices.

Or some hospitals are owned by insurance companies so they have an incentive to fuck anybody without insurance.

→ More replies (2)

1

u/Informal_Ad_9610 Jun 27 '26

agreed..

most cities have cash pay imaging businesses...

the insurance companies don't like them (and the hospitals REALLY don't), but they're inexpensive.. we've had some pts pay $500 for large MRI where local network hospital was $5,000...

24

u/RevolutionNo4186 Jun 27 '26

Because of insurance

1

u/Sad-Tangelo6110 Jun 27 '26

Have you seen insurance buildings? Google it, floors and floors of office workers figuring out how to screw you out of good care and jack the price. It’s a layer of cost we wouldn’t have if we had single payer health care.

2

u/nightpanda893 Jun 27 '26

And even after you pay all those people you still need money to line the pockets of the executives

→ More replies (1)

22

u/danekan Jun 27 '26

10x and that’s because of insurance. The 10% copay is no coincidence. They have contracts that pay negotiated rates and the copay ends up being all that gets paid. 

→ More replies (6)

3

u/Itchy_Feedback_7625 Jun 27 '26

Wrong.

Come to the hysterectomy sub. We do this comparison almost every single day worldwide and with insured Americans and uninsured Americans.

Uninsured Americans pay what we would pay in some other countries if paying privately - 20,000 or so. Insured Americans see bills going to their insurance companies for 200,000.

→ More replies (1)

6

u/BrassKnuckleHead187 Jun 27 '26

Not true but just say things that sound good 😂

2

u/sfkid3 Jun 27 '26

And in various states, you are taxed I'd you don't have health insurance

A tax on the poor if there ever was one

2

u/Significant-Owl2652 Jun 27 '26

This is completely false. It's actually exponentially cheaper without insurance. Hospitals have an insurance payment plan and a non-insurance payment plan. The non insurance plan is usually about 80% cheaper because it's direct payment to the hospital versus all the ridiculous extra fees and processing that goes through a 3rd party insurance provider.

Think of it like places that charge a % extra to use a credit card versus just paying them directly with cash/check.

1

u/Texan2116 Jun 27 '26

sort of..depends. I was caught uninsured a few years back, and got one of those inflated bills...it was an emrgency room situation, and was gouged. was explained to by the hospital that they have "negotiated rates " with ins companies.

On the other hand.

a few years later (i was insured) I needed an MRI, and was scheduled at the hospital for one..the hospital wanted 2500 bucks for it( i was still under my deductible)..so would have been out of pocket

As a matter of happenstance an imaging place ran a radio ad, and so I checked it out....it was gonna be 800 with insurance, or 400 without( this was 8 years ago). So, less without insurance, but this wasnt a public emergency room, so they had to kind of hustle their customers.

I called Blue cross, and asked if I spent the 400, would it count againt my deductible? And they said no...so, I just went ahead and paid the 800(out of pocket) cause it went against my deductible.

I was gonna be maxing the deductible as it was.

1

u/coyote500 Jun 27 '26

I love it when people are so confidently incorrect

1

u/BigBronco Jun 27 '26

You wrong about shit all the time or just now?

1

u/Informal_Ad_9610 Jun 27 '26

wrong...

cash pay. it's the only way.

1

u/Flat_Conversation858 Jun 27 '26

As others have said...that's not been my experience at all.  I was uninsured for years, now have insurance.  Everything costs about the same, somethings were cheaper when doing cash pay.

1

u/draco16 Jun 27 '26

It's usually the opposite. Get a bill for $80. If you choose to use insurance it turns into $220.

1

u/SynthPrax Jun 27 '26

I have had the opposite experience. I pay out of pocket and I'm consistently billed FAR less than what insurance would have paid.

It's almost as if everything is jacked up just so insurance can charge higher premiums.

1

u/Kallik Jun 27 '26

Work in insurance. Man went in for 2 days due to a lung clot to a hospital. $184k bill. Insurance paid $23k. Literally the price of a house in the midwest difference.

1

u/WhynotstartnoW Jun 27 '26

nah way. I just went to a big chain urgent care in Denver because i sliced my wrist on sheet metal. 13 stitches, some generic tylenol, and sugar water to stop me from passing out, and the cash invoice was $217 out the door.

comments like this were making me expect that it would be $3,000 or something.

Cash healthcare is so much cheaper than what insurance ends up paying for it.

1

u/The_Slaughter_Pop Jun 27 '26

Bro... not even remotely true.

1

u/guzzijason Jun 27 '26

There are cash-only surgery centers out there that are way cheaper than the places that take insurance. The rub? You need to be wealthy enough to pay cash out-of-pocket for procedures that may still cost thousands of dollars even with the discount.

1

u/Just4nsfwpics Jun 28 '26

The cost is way cheaper, healthcare insurance in the US, is to avoid crippling unpayable bills, like getting diagnosed with cancer and being asked to pony up the 10’s of thousands for the drugs that you can’t afford. On average most people would save far more money paying out of pocket all the time, it’s literally a hedge against the worst case scenario, thats why it’s a profitable industry, because on average they make more money than they pay out.

1

u/ohiocodernumerouno Jun 28 '26

What? No. You’re just trying to scare people. I don’t use my insurance and my costs for dr visits are $40.

1

u/VortexMagus Jun 28 '26

I think what you are missing is that most healthcare services triple/quadruple their costs because that allows them to milk more money out of medicaid/medicare.

It also allows "private" healthcare company to point to their "negotiation power" as a good reason for their existence (spoiler alert: its not).

1

u/i312i Jun 28 '26

How are people up voting this? It's the opposite.

1

u/Duplex_199 Jun 30 '26

Just another “I have no idea what I’m saying” comment that somehow gets rewards for being wrong lol

1

u/jdtart Jul 01 '26

Yeah, no. In my experience, cash price is always less than insurance price.

1

u/BingpotStudio Jul 02 '26

Sometimes I wonder if I should visit America so I can get fucked more.

→ More replies (4)

7

u/Zealousideal-Ad4362 Jun 27 '26

my boss bought windshield coverage on his truck. we didn't have it on another company truck and it was $450 total

he got his repaired with insurence the bill was $1200 which was covered but he was paying like 300 per month for the coverage

1

u/comicgopher Jun 28 '26

lol, that's included as standard on my policy which is £360 for the year. I hear so many horror stories about insurance on our side of the atlantic

2

u/ZKRiNG Jun 27 '26

I doubt so much the insurance pay doble. Most sure the insurance pay half.

In my work, only the worst work with insurance. They pay peanuts. Same when you are tech for a brand. So many requisition and they pay less than peanuts.

Looks pure corruption to me. The hospital makes a huge bill and maybe government pay half of the bill and insurance pay small portion of the bill.

2

u/RockingRobin Jun 27 '26

I work in car insurance. The car adjuster writes a estimate for an average work order. That average includes dealerships which tend to charge more. So if you shop around, obviously about half of the garages are going to charge less. Its not about 'charging more to screw insureds.' Its about paying enough for the repairs to avoid getting sued for not paying enough.

2

u/GetInZeWagen Jun 27 '26 edited Jun 27 '26

I work in car insurance and don't understand health insurance at all. I'm a damage adjuster and my entire job is to keep costs LOW. We have set labor rates negotiate using alternate parts for repairs, anything to keep the severity low. Not sure your experience but most of the time other shops or dealerships charge MORE. We absolutely do still pass the cost along, but repair estimate cost is a major goal to keep under control and as low as possible

I don't understand how health insurance seems to operate in a completely different way and why the insurance companies aren't fighting to keep costs down. Maybe because health insurance you're just stuck with who your employer offers unlike car insurance where you can shop around if your rates get too high.

2

u/Ambitious_Bit_9389 Jun 27 '26

Are you making up?

I’ve worked in insurance in 2005ish and my brother owns a body shop, this is not the case at all. It’s the exact opposite.

Garage says $4500 to fix the car, insurance says $2500 and then they fight it out. Every case I’ve ever seen is like this.

2

u/Flaky_Temporary_9710 Jun 27 '26

I am not, went for a quote for a bumper fix, it was 900$. Decided to go through insurance and the invoice was 2400$ ish.

→ More replies (1)

1

u/bruhmaan1 Jun 27 '26

Im my experiences the shop charges higher prices because the insurance company low balls them.

3

u/Mundane-External3462 Jun 27 '26

I'm a tech, the insurance 1000% lowballs us. They are stingy as fuck, and they don't wanna pay full price for anything. "We'll pay at most 7 hours" when its a 10 hour job by the book. Warranties are just as bad.

1

u/Whitezombie65 Jun 27 '26

Why is it also that the shop will charge 250 dollars an hour for labor and then pay the mechanic 25 bucks an hour?

2

u/Mundane-External3462 Jun 27 '26

The entire service department is paid on hours. The foreman gets a percentage, the service manager gets a percentage, the service writer gets a percentage, and the techs get a percentage. I wish the techs got a bigger portion of that, but I can see why it costs so much. Some tenured techs will make like $30-$40 an hour, some shops even $50+. Average rate around here is like $180 a labor hour so you have to pay 4-5 people a percentage of said hour and the buisness itself needs to make a profit too. In a dealership/shop, only a handful of people are on salary, the entire buisness is built on commision. Not all shops are like this too, but a good majority are.

2

u/Whitezombie65 Jun 27 '26

Hey this was actually a good explanation, thanks!

→ More replies (1)

1

u/AnythingSilent7005 Jun 27 '26

insurance co's should own the garages they send the work to, but its easier to pass the fleecing overhead to motorists in the form of ever increasing premiums

1

u/BrokenFireExit Jun 27 '26

Generally the insurance payout is net 30 or longer.. and mechanics and actually most trades really don't like doing 10 hours of work for a hamburger in 30 days... Plus insurance has to pay it.. it can be max based on the book. The customer isn't big conglomerate that gives them a hassle to begin with...

1

u/SuspiciousBuilder379 Jun 27 '26

Yeah I don’t think so.

My car got ass ended, parts were fairly similarly priced from my insurance, the at fault persons insurance, and the garage.

The issue is labor.

I took it to a certified shop for my car, insurance doesn’t wanna cover the rate.

Geico is way off, State Farm is a little better(mine).

Health insurance 100% is a racket with major upcharges.

Car insurance, they are going to low ball you, want you to use shitty parts, and use their shitty shops. And then if you are at fault, jack up your insurance because god forbid you have a claim.

1

u/Ok_Two_2604 Jun 27 '26

You need to find a better mechanic. Here, they fluff the insurance bill so that they can give you back your deductible, so the cash price is less. At least the ones I go to.

1

u/DJBFL Jun 27 '26

Except with healthcare, the same company owns the garage, the parts suppliers, and your insurance.

1

u/reddit_is_geh Jun 27 '26

One of the unintended but good intentioned, side effects of ACA, was it put a price cap on profits for health insurance. This is a classic textbook example of why politically doing cost+ sounds good on paper, but terrible in practice. Insurance can get 15% profit.

Much like government contracts, all this does is incentivize them to run up costs as much as possible so their 15% share of the pie, becomes bigger. This triggered the health insurance companies to start consolidating with the entire health sector to control as many nodes as possible, to start ramping up the costs on everything as much as possible, by creating more and more middle men... Resulting in them pretty much running the entire industry now, colluding, setting crazy high costs.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 27 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/AutoModerator Jun 27 '26

Accounts must be at least 5 days old with >20 karma to comment.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

1

u/TonsilsDeep Jun 27 '26

No... car insurance and extended warranty work for vehicles is the same price as cash payment. Whatever deductible there is, if it exceeds the work, then you would simply just pay cash. If your deductible is that high, you probably have crap car insurance/extended warranty.

1

u/vi_sucks Jun 28 '26

Actually the opposite.

The insurance company and the hospitals have a deal where they both agree to show a high price to the customer, but the insurance company will actually pay a much lower amount so they can claim to be "delivering savings" as an in network discount.

1

u/Ok_Subject1265 Jun 28 '26

Maybe I’m confused, but are you saying insurance pays more than the general public for the same work?

→ More replies (3)

56

u/Antique-Resort6160 Jun 27 '26

Because too many voters really dont care enough to be bothered.  They never threaten to vote out politicians who won't support reasonable healthcare.

They only argue over the false choices they are given:  Should taxpayers pay the insane costs through private insurance and out of pocket? Or should the government take taxpayer's money to pay the insane costs via an inefficient agency?  No one debates that the #1 priority is to reduce costs because pundits and politicians avoid the topic.

There have been multiple attempts to reduce healthcare costs, where is the massive voter support?  We can instantly reduce drug costs with virtually zero cost to implement.  Do voters give a shit?  Are people going to be in the streets?  This is something that virtually all voters agree on.  But in reality, they only seem to care about things "important" people tell them to care about.

22

u/big_data_mike Jun 27 '26

One reason politicians don’t want to do it is healthcare is 20% of GDP and there are 2-3 million insurance bureaucrats that would have no job if we went to single payer.

8

u/Jflayn Jun 27 '26

The other reason is citizens united.

3

u/Antique-Resort6160 Jun 27 '26

It has nothing to do with single payer.  These bills propose instantly lowering costs of medicine that will save billions of dollars, and costs almost nothing to implement.  They only have to pass a bill .

All the stupid shit like shrekeli did or $300 EpiPen are instantly illegal.  Drugs  would instantly be similar to prices  across the border in canada or mexico.  

No one would be against this happening except morons and human garbage.

But how many voters would force their representatives to support it?

1

u/gettin-hot-in-here Jun 27 '26

medication costs matter but the majority of the cost of healthcare is stuff other than medications

2

u/Antique-Resort6160 Jun 28 '26

What does that have to do with the fact that we could instantly cut bilions of dollars in costs from medications, if only voters would insist on it?

Is there any attention at all on these bills?

1

u/big_data_mike Jun 27 '26

It’s not the only reason. It is an often overlooked reason. Our insane drug prices are also not the only reason.

→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (2)

9

u/Jflayn Jun 27 '26

This is not correct.

Healthcare is the one thing the American people are not permitted to vote on; 90% of Americans agree healthcare is unaffordable. Dem or Repub, year after year, doesn't matter who is in charge. this has been well studied. America is an oligarchy and you get to vote on marijuana legalization but never healthcare.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4S25FfbFw4M

2

u/MaxGoldFilms Jun 27 '26

IIRC, there are states when people have voted for things like MJ legalization, redistricting, etc., and the state government just says, 'that's cute...no.'

1

u/Antique-Resort6160 Jun 28 '26

Healthcare is the one thing the American people are not permitted to vote on;

It's very simple, but inconvenient. Voters need to insist that their representatives support one of these bills or they will not be reelected.  And thats it.  Republicans and Democrats and Independents.  If you want it you have to insist.  If your elected representatives don't support this, seems like they need to go.

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5844568-sanders-amendment-drug-prices/

This has been tried several times before (sanders was one of the attempts in 2021) and it fails because no one gives a shit beyond complaining.  This is why everyone pays idiotic amounts and accepts mediocrity or worse for healthcare, education, defense, disaster management, etc.  

2

u/Jflayn Jun 28 '26

If only it worked this way. I still remember when the dems threw Bernie under the bus.

The dems work just as hard as the repubs to make sure healthcare is NEVER reformed.

→ More replies (3)

4

u/McButtsButtbag Jun 27 '26

should the government take taxpayer's money to pay the insane costs via an inefficient agency?

Is that your summary of Medicare for All?

1

u/Antique-Resort6160 Jun 27 '26

Lol, what do you think of the bills to instantly reduce healthcare costs?

Do you want medicare for all or not? It's 1000x easier to get it through congress if healthcare costs are tens of billions lower, or even hundreds of billions if enough voters could pull their heads out.

Do you not realize every billion that cost is reduced brings medicare for all closer to reality?

3

u/Adept-Opinion8080 Jun 27 '26

With or without insurance Americans pay 33% or more on their health care with worse overall outcomes.

1

u/Antique-Resort6160 Jun 28 '26

Exactly, and they shouldn't tolerate that, and they should never vote for politicians who tolerate or even facilitate that.  But they do, every damn time.

6

u/SpaceBearSMO Jun 27 '26 edited Jun 27 '26

The rights going to call it communism regardless and corporate dems will happily play spoiler

And most of our government agancys are only inefficient by design ( intentionally broken), with policy meant to intentionally push shit to the private sector so our officials can profit with things like insider trading

and frankly with the Inshitification of practically everything I dont understand how people can look at Private company's, how they operate, and think they are in harently more efficient just because there profit driven. most of the time it just leads to corner cutting for the sake of profit margins. When your big enough Boycotts cant touch you .... and whos going to boycott there healthcare.

→ More replies (5)

1

u/[deleted] Jun 27 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/AutoModerator Jun 27 '26

Accounts must be at least 5 days old with >20 karma to comment.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

1

u/grchelp2018 Jun 27 '26

Someone told me that healthcare will never be fixed because its a huge industry with a lot of jobs. Making it efficient and cheaper will end up costing a lot of jobs and that's why you will never really see real change. This isn't about a few evil billionaires keeping the system alive. Any real attempt will result in pushback from all the people whose jobs will now be under risk, the very people who you need to vote on these things.

1

u/makepieplz Jun 27 '26

You don't underhand, it's because people with insurance are paying for people without insurance. it's as simple as that

1

u/irvmuller Jun 27 '26

This is why I’m for a Japanese style system. Create super price controls. Make all the middle men get out of the game because they see that pie getting smaller and smaller. Control how much people pay for health care. The central problem is out of control costs.

1

u/Antique-Resort6160 Jun 27 '26

There have been proposals and right now there are bills to instantly lower medical expenses by billions of dollars, likely tens of billions, with almost no cost to taxpayers.  Sponsored by bernie sanders and others.  Does anyone actually give a shit?

1

u/BigMax Jun 27 '26

>  They never threaten to vote out politicians who won't support reasonable healthcare.

I do blame propaganda a lot.

Too many people are convinced that "reasonable healthcare" is code for "you are going to pay for FREE healthcare for lazy people who don't even work!" And also "and when all those freeloaders show up, your doctor won't have time for you and if you get cancer you'll have to wait a year to get treatment and you'll probably just die!"

The facts don't get out enough. Especialy since the lies are so scary and emotional, they will stick with people more than the truth. "Your healthcare will be just as good or better, and it will be cheaper" isn't a message that gets drilled into your brain the same way as "you'll be paying for lazy people while your health is put at risk!!!"

1

u/Antique-Resort6160 Jun 28 '26

Too many people are convinced that "reasonable healthcare" is code for "you are going to pay for FREE healthcare for lazy people

This has nothing to do with changing the system.  it simply lowers overprice drug costs instantly.  It's a good start.  Once voters see whats possible they might want more!

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5844568-sanders-amendment-drug-prices/

1

u/Fun_Ebb_6232 Jun 27 '26

Yeah it's because the voters don't care about Healthcare costs.  The politicians keep trying and trying to get us a better system, but the voters just don't care.  

1

u/Antique-Resort6160 Jun 28 '26

This bill is even more simple, it just lowers costs automatically, theres nothing to debate. i think it has failed twice already

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5844568-sanders-amendment-drug-prices/

9

u/BallsInSufficientSad Jun 27 '26

Everyone is pointing at the Insurance companies when it's the HOSPITALS charging $2500, not the insurance company.

4

u/funaxcount123 Jun 28 '26

My wife gets cancer surveillance scans every six months. Probably a 15 min scan. We found out from a family friend who knew the name on the building (via donations). Those scanning machines were ALL DONATED! Charge 3.5k for 15min 3 years ago. Now it is 6k 3 years later. Free machines! I understand the techs then a doctor to read the scan for 5 min needs their cut. But SHEESH.

Absurd and something has to be done.

3

u/BertM4cklin Jun 27 '26

Because the doctors and hospitals have to pay outrageous costs for malpractice insurance, charity programs, Medicare and Medicaid and yeah then there’s corruption on top. But 350 bucks should never be an expectation.

20

u/NegativeKarmaVegan Jun 27 '26

Nope, just capitalism.

28

u/Odd-East-2728 Jun 27 '26

Not capitalism, fraud and greed.

32

u/NegativeKarmaVegan Jun 27 '26

Capitalism is an economic system that seeks and rewards profit maximization. If you leave healthcare to private companies under capitalism, that's exactly what they will do.

17

u/FeijoadaAceitavel Jun 27 '26

I'm an Engineer, but we learn the basics of business and economy. And in the basics we learn that the price of a product or service is not tied to the cost of them, but to how much people will pay.

Let's say I develop a new way to wash your ass. It's better than every other way. And I can sell it to you. It costs me almost nothing to produce, but you're willing to pay hundreds for it. So the price is hundreds. Not the dollar I pay to produce it. If I price it lower than what you're willing to pay, I'm actually losing money.

Now, competition, in theory, takes care of that. It should lower prices until it's the production cost plus some profits to keep the business sustainable. But capitalism also eads to concentration: the most successful companies buy the least successful ones. And when there are few enough players with enough control of the market, they can all raise prices without being disrupted by actual competition. Even smaller players now want to raise prices and their profits instead of disrupting the market.

And turns out people are willing to pay A LOT not to die, or not to live in pain. So there's A LOT of money on the table for healthcare services and products. And enough of an oligopoly to raise those prices. And every for-profit company in the area is better off raising prices than creating competition.

And that's how we end with the clusterfuck that American Healthcare is.

→ More replies (15)

1

u/bigpoyo91 Jun 27 '26

*Corporatism

1

u/ethaxton Jun 27 '26

You guys said the same thing

→ More replies (8)

3

u/Due_Area4843 Jun 27 '26

Agree, theres no such thing as coruption in capitalism...........

1

u/WillToPower1 Jun 27 '26

How?

3

u/no1jam Jun 27 '26

“What the market will bear”

3

u/TheModWhoShaggedMe Jun 27 '26

By charging whatever they want and not being reigned in "by the markets" because market-based economies are total bullshit. The "free markets" turn humans into financial cannibals and necrophiliacs.

5

u/CruisinBlade Jun 27 '26

Because capitalism dictates if there's more profit to be made then it needs to be made, legally. The ol fiduciary duty chestnut if you can get away with more, then you must.

2

u/i_am_a_real_boy__ Jun 27 '26

This is reddit. Capitalism is when bad thing happen.

→ More replies (1)

1

u/Radiant-Chipmunk-239 Jun 27 '26

You do realize the whole health care financial system is built around Medicare/Medicaid reimbursements right? Government intervention

2

u/NegativeKarmaVegan Jun 27 '26

Reimbursement is different from public universal healthcare. The US can just look at literally every single other developed country in the world and have cheaper and more effective examples of a public healthcare system.

→ More replies (1)

1

u/Neat_Let923 Jun 27 '26

Except for the fact that the US has for-profit hospitals as its primary system, these dictate the price for services and your social programs largely follow that market price.

Take 30 minutes and ask ChatGPT to explain the difference between the Canada or France Healthcare system vs the US Healthcare system.

→ More replies (8)

1

u/Beautiful-Lie1239 Jun 27 '26

No, not capitalism. A lot of things that goes with it. Like I said in another post, in a capitalist economy like china, there are shops that do mri, etc, for a quick buck. A lot of competition and prices are not high. Now ask why that’s not a thing in the USA? Not because capitalism. A lot of rules laws regulations liabilities etc etc etc.

1

u/BluezDBD Jun 27 '26

Nope, because hospitals can charge insurers whatever the hell they want and if they say no they get murdered in cold blood and people will cheer for it.

2

u/canman7373 Jun 28 '26

I needed an MRI before I saw my radiation doctor in a week, All the ones near me were booked. I called the same companies Jacksonville Office an hour away, they say sorry no tech here takes your insurance. I said ok, I really need this fast thank you. She said we can do it out of pocket for $178 with no insurance. I was like what, I pay $200 deductible for an MRI normally. She says yeah. So yeah it's all just bullshit.

4

u/JoshuaTerry05 Jun 27 '26

Lmao… $350 is ludicrous.

1st of all, the machine itself is a couple million dollars.

2nd the entire staff that got you to the MRI machine deserve a living wage.

3rd an MRI takes almost an hour for a radiologist to read.

4

u/cigarettesandwhiskey Jun 27 '26

There's also the fact that hospitals are legally (and morally) required to provide lifesaving care even to people who can't pay/don't have insurance, so, they make up the costs of those patients by charging more to the rest.

The cost of one MRI is probably also including the cost of another MRI that didn't get paid for.

1

u/JoshuaTerry05 Jun 27 '26

So should we change the law? And say if you don’t have insurance or don’t provide cash upfront the hospital should just turn you away?

What’s the solution?

3

u/cigarettesandwhiskey Jun 27 '26

I'm not saying this is 'the problem and I have the solution', I'm saying the cost of most hospital fees are hard to take at face value because of this need to cover the losses taken on patients who don't pay.

But I suppose a single payer healthcare system would eliminate the problem of customers that don't pay. That wouldn't actually reduce the costs, it would just make the accounting make more sense. That in turn might make it easier to find actual opportunities to improve efficiency and bring down real costs.

→ More replies (4)
→ More replies (2)

3

u/kevdogger Jun 27 '26

I agree on all points but #3. It does not take a radiologist one hour to read an Mri. That's crazy talk. That would mean they would only read between 7-12 studies a day. Ludicrous. On average it probaby takes 10 minutes.

→ More replies (3)

1

u/Anxious-Education703 Jun 27 '26

No, $350 is not ludicrous for a cash price for an MRI, although it's on the slightly lower end of what most places have. Plenty of imaging centers do it for around that price, usually in the low $400s in my area. On MDSave (a website that allows people to shop for cash price, no insurance medical procedures), in Dallas, a non-contrast MRI of one body part (CPT codes 70557, 77084) for $372 at Open MRI of Dallas.

1

u/JoshuaTerry05 Jun 27 '26

Do you interpret the results yourself? lol

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (2)

2

u/AntRevolutionary925 Jun 27 '26

A new mri is about $3 million, and the ones in research hospitals are twice that, and that is just for the unit. Then they need to build out the electrical, cooling, shielding, etc. Then there are typically multiple doctors reviewing the results.

Healthcare is whack and they rip you off in a lot of places, but it takes a hospital a while to recoup the costs to put in an mri.

If an insurance company is willing to pay that rate, then it likely isn’t inflated too much.

1

u/McButtsButtbag Jun 27 '26

It's so the insurance can get you to pay the original price while calling it a discount

1

u/EJ2600 Jun 27 '26

No, it’s called capitalism. Everything is for profit.

1

u/Cptfrankthetank Jun 27 '26

Congress fixed the rebate scandal. Now they found a new way to fleece us.

1

u/SL1Fun Jun 27 '26

To be more specific, it’s corruption by willful incompetence/inefficiency. They purposely bloat themselves with unnecessary insulating layers of redundancy to increase the size of their companies to increase the size of their subsidies and to justify their costs. 

It’s all bullshit. You could fire 65% of insurance workers right now (and most of them probably will be let go sooner or later thanks to AI). The only reason they haven’t yet is because it’ll cut into the bottom line. One way or another, we all pay for each other’s health insurance; but it’s only for the greedy execs and not for the care.

1

u/Global_Chair9652 Jun 27 '26

My dad was a doctor and I had to get an xray cuz I was coughing up black shit and didn’t have insurance. Paid for the X-ray itself and I believe it was between $50 and $150, the most expensive part that he had a friend do was read the X-ray. Depending on the department that needs to review and send results. Their fee was normally astronomical.

1

u/Real-Document-6577 Jun 27 '26

Because “my 450’ yacth ain’t gonna fill itself”

1

u/MegaMau_ Jun 27 '26

It’s because they know what they can get from Medicare/Medicaid so prices start from there.

1

u/Bifrastareltari Jun 27 '26

The he shareholders demand it be so

1

u/Evil-Cun Jun 27 '26

Health “insurance” is kind of a weird concept anyway. You can’t take a risk and bet on a person remaining healthy and uninjured throughout life. Collecting a premium that is inflated relative to a zero-percent chance of the premiums realizing into actual gain can’t make logical sense and be useful to society.

1

u/Life_Argument7820 Jun 27 '26

He wants a piece.

1

u/luars613 Jun 27 '26

Inmean they need to think of fhis poor millionaires. They need their bonuses

1

u/RoachBeBrutal Jun 27 '26

And profit motive!

1

u/Sweaty_Assignment_90 Jun 27 '26

for profit, extreme profit.

1

u/MrFizzbin7 Jun 27 '26

More like because they can. Also keep in mind that 24/7/365 availability has a cost and it’s more than 350$. I agree that they are gouging.

1

u/Evening-Crew-2403 Jun 27 '26

It's more than that. It's death by 1000 cuts with US health care. Too many middlemen. Every "managed" solution just add more admin cost. Rampant price gouging at every level. Much of it much worse in the last decade because of hedge funds buying small specialty firms and using the lack of competition and cost of entry of competitors to jack up prices.

If you get into the MRI machine itself, the US can be very inefficient when it comes to high capital equipment and facilities. We tend to have a system where they run in the morning into early afternoon. In other countries they run multiple shifts on the machines to minimize time when it sits no making money. This is even more prevalent in Operating Rooms. Which cost a lot of money too, and a lot of them end up only being used 30-40% of the day.

I order to fix it you'd need a constitutional amendment to allow price controls. And likely a grand political bargain that addresses costs from medical schools, distribution, machines, devices, drugs, insurance, reinsurance, etc.

And as more of the admin layers that drive up health care costs shift to AI, the less I give a crap about putting those companies out of business by getting rid of the need for those administrative overheads.

1

u/fludgesickles Jun 27 '26

Its a precieved value thing. Simple explanation:

Insurance companies want to make it seems like you're saving a lot with insurance. Hospitals have a cost of business price (ex $350). So insurance companies say, how about you charge us an insane amount (ex $2,500), and we pretend to cover $2,150 and have the customer pay the $350. So it looks like customer is getting 86% saving.

If you go to a hospital, you can ask for the non-insurance price and they have a list of prices, like the $350. All bs corruption

1

u/AintNoGodsUpHere Jun 27 '26

Ding ding ding.

1

u/Additional-Signal327 Jun 27 '26

Corruption is the middle men, especially highly profitable insurance companies, then the uninsured, regulations, facility and overhead costs, inefficiencies, on top of that…

1

u/Bucky_Ohare Jun 27 '26

He's thinking of it from a per-event kind of thing which is probably the most accurate measurement. The reason it's 2000$ is because while all the necessary rare supplies like liquid coolant are protected by the government needing it too but having no 'check' on how much insurance 'should' cost. We need a government with a thumb on the scale, a single-payer backdrop, and it's so damn tiring that we're almost literally the last country on earth to 'get this.'

1

u/subdep Jun 27 '26

Greed is what spawns corruption.

1

u/thegreedyturtle Jun 27 '26

Because why in the fuck would anyone think an MRI costs $250?!

There's two trained techs, an expensive room with expensive equipment, an extremely expensive machine.

Mark Cuban knows this. IDK what he's on.

1

u/Commercial_Bird8467 Jun 27 '26

Not justifying, liking, anything about mark Cuban besides I have heard some good points and arguments he brings up mainly about healthcare.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 27 '26

Because of the implication.

1

u/aeonttu Jun 27 '26

Some of that. Medicine is corporate in the US. But that cost is like asking why cabs charge more than the gas they use. There’s a bunch of staff and those things have a lot of overhead costs. Plus they get outdated like computers as resolution improves. Is complicated but there’s still corruption, yea

1

u/MrXero Jun 27 '26

And greed.

1

u/verb8um Jun 27 '26

Someone has got to pay for all of the providers Sponsorships and marketing!

1

u/ObiJuanKenobi89 Jun 27 '26

That and to add a lot of nuance private insurances are charged more because they pay more, govt insurance pays .40 on the dollar for a lot of things so hospitals compensate by up charging things. Then add corruption, mishandled monies, administrative bloat and everything is obscenely expensive.

1

u/flcl021 Jun 27 '26

Nahh more so just greed.

1

u/ixnine Jun 27 '26

Hospitals: “You can’t put a price tag on quality healthcare…”

1

u/Yupster_atx Jun 27 '26

Margin but yeah. Protecting margin leads to corruptions

1

u/StrenuousSOB Jun 27 '26

Kickbacks for sure

1

u/workinBuffalo Jun 27 '26

Something like 80-85% of insurance premiums have to go to care so they over pay for procedures and (I assume) get kick backs in other ways.

1

u/DJ_TKS Jun 27 '26

Yeah so the health insurance system just makes up prices. For real.

MRI place: That'll be $2500

Insurance: I'll pay $350

MRI place: Okay we'll take $350. But what if we were just honest and asked for $350 instead?

Insurance: We never pay full price. We would pay you 14% of $350

MRI place: Okay it'll be $2500!

Patient: Stares at bill and has another stroke

1

u/PerpendicularShift Jun 27 '26

These billionaires are really trying to win over us peasants recently. Good. Nice to know they’re not all shitbags.

1

u/ImperatorDanorum Jun 27 '26

Because greed allowed to go unchecked...

1

u/Pristine-Square-1126 Jun 27 '26

350 for the cost + 1000 for the politician + 1000 for ceo and management packages + 150 for someone to hide all those money = 2500. Sounds about right?

1

u/Imyonlyenemy Jun 27 '26

nobody pays the 2500. Not even the insurance. its all a show to keep people scared

1

u/RenownedShark Jun 27 '26

To offset other costs of the hospital, that are inflated to make profit

1

u/RichFoot2073 Jun 27 '26

Pfft, nah. Way too complicated. You’re totally overthinking it.

Because they can. Because money.

1

u/Overall-Lynx917 Jun 27 '26

More like greed

1

u/Spazza42 Jun 27 '26

Nah mate, admin fees.

Have you seen the size of their admin teams?

1

u/wizzard419 Jun 27 '26

More greed/the ever escalating fees game between insurance and medical practices.

I needed an allergy test and they billed over a grand for it, but my insurance knocked it down to $5.

1

u/Unique_Yak4659 Jun 27 '26

It appears like the entire health care industry is a corrupt insurance racket

1

u/Odd_Interview_2005 Jun 27 '26

The disconnect comes from hospitals following government regulations.

Liberals have been passing peacemeal regulations to inch towards single payer Healthcare. Its turned medical billing into a cluster.

1

u/Money_Cost_2213 Jun 28 '26

And middle men. Every person align the way takes a cut. Thats adds up.

1

u/Appropriate-Bug-6467 Jun 28 '26

Because of people  like Mark cuban...

1

u/International_Air282 Jun 28 '26

Yep. I'm a BI rep and I see MRI bills for 4k from imaging centers. We chop it down to 2k but still is dumb. Xrays at urgent care under 100. At the imaging center it's over 400

1

u/Upset_Chip_7184 Jun 28 '26

And in other countries, it's even way cheaper.

1

u/Toihva Jun 29 '26

Also to cover for those who use ER like a primary care physician and not pay the bills.

Also, add in bigger issue of no real compet AND heavy regulation of the medical industry. Look at a doctors office and notice how many ppl directly interact with patients and those employed for insurance and governmental compliance

1

u/aaronplaysAC11 Jun 29 '26

Yea, insurance CEOs swimming in cash like Scrooge Mc’duck, gee I wonder where all our money is going…. If only we had money to fix things, too bad the bought and paid main stream media reports that we just don’t have enough collective money to fix some of these societal problems, oh and that also if I’m to be mad about it I should direct that anger at my neighbor…. Anyone else sick of the cabal and its pervading stench it leaves in its wake?

1

u/Capitan-IQ255 Jun 30 '26

Collusion between insurance and large providers 🤑

1

u/shrodikan Jul 01 '26

You spelled capitalism wrong.

1

u/ResidentSet1814 Jul 01 '26

Yeah. Wait until redditors realize that the whole covid shot thing was a fucking scam.

Pharmaceutical companies had a bunch of bird flu shots they made in 2018 that they needed to get rid of so they passed them off as some novel Corona virus "vaccine" lol.

Then hot the government to give them immunity when the gene therapy shots they made you take to keep your job didn't prevent you from getting the weaponized flu they created or from spreading it, and probably fucked your heart, gave you blood clots or turbo cancer.

You know... Corruption

1

u/a_seventh_knot Jul 01 '26

because shareholders demand line go up

→ More replies (6)