https://www.vox.com/a/health-prices

It’s not due to that it’s overspending on mainly prescription drugs and admin

And as I’ve shown with the amount of annual physican visits, America isn’t uniquely sick

And with the other article I sent that accounted for PPP, America still spent way more

And how would no intervention make it any cheaper

> Physician visits =/= healthiness.
> Americans don't go to the doctor as much due to cost; low labor supply of physicians (regulations have caused this)

> It’s not due to that it’s overspending on mainly prescription drugs and admin
Not all of it, much of it can be accounted for by the 2 factors I mentioned. The same goes for drugs too, an unhealthy population spends more on drugs.
> And with the other article I sent that accounted for PPP, America still spent way more
Yes I've been using PPP this whole time.

> And how would no intervention make it any cheaper
Regulations that were restricting supply no longer are, so prices fall.

Y’all are still on about this

Yeah but it's changed

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ Healtcare is one of the markets where you NEED to have intervention. There are exceptions obviously but let’s say you have a heart attack, or any other traumatic medical incident. The principles of choice in the free market don’t apply. You can’t and don’t choose your hospital, you just go to the closest one and hope. And even when you are conscious when you need to go to the hospital you’ll typically go to the closest hospital. Healthcare is one of the few industries where you can’t choose. Not to mention there is literally no transparency about prices in American hospitals so yet again free market principles of choice can’t apply. It is because of this inherent lack of choice in most scenarios that you need gov intervention.

These are fringe cases Thememelord, in most cases consumers are free to choose where they get care before and after.

Most of the time it's people walking in, not arriving on a death bed.

Well regardless of the frequency you can’t apply the free market to a life and death scenario where people more often then not can’t choose

And even if they are fringe you can’t deny their existence because they will always happen because that is part of healthcarw

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ And you can’t dent that even when you account for PPP the US spends significantly more

By fringe cases, that means it's very rare. Naturally the price of someone coming in dying will be low since the non-rare cases (i.e not a heart attack in an emergecy) will have low prices too.

> And you can’t dent that even when you account for PPP the US spends significantly more
I didn't, I was just talking in terms of PPP. I.e the differences in prices across countries.

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ No, the whole reason the free market works is through choice. That allows competition. In healthcare this principle more often then not can’t apply because when you need medical assistance you go to the closest hospital as fast as possible regardless of cost

Not to mention practically no hospitals release their prices

Rare cases have the same prices as normal cases, as normal cases are the vast majority.

> Not to mention practically no hospitals release their prices
Not *now*, because the current system (due to regulations) disincentives it.

My argument about a free market system is less about competition, but more of the costly burdens raising prices.

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ Actually I mispoke, I think it was a law or executive order by Trump but now hospitals are required to post their prices. Because they wouldn’t tell anyone their sky high prices until they got the check. Notice that only through intervention, your idea of a free market could work

I'm not for that regulation, naturally prices would be transparent if we did not have the insurance based system we did now. Insurance is only for tragic and unforeseen events - other than that it's out of pocket payments.

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ If you go to a hospital in an emergency and you have no clue what you’ll be charged, how do you know it’ll be the same price

Depends, what do you go for?

A broken bone?

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ Do you actually think they would voluntarily release prices when they could keep them secret and extremely high

The only reason why prices are bundled is because of a complex insurance system created by intervention; but like I said it's less about competition but more about regulatory burdens.

The thing is, considering the nature of emergencies and healthcare in generally none of the principles of the free market can apply

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ So even though regulation is the only reason Hospitals must release prices. We should tear down regulation, and then we’ll have a free market

If we get rid of regulation that will only lead to increaed prices

No, I'm not for such regulation. My point is in a private system the complex insurance based system incentivising bundling will be removed, allowing for greater transparency.

> If we get rid of regulation that will only lead to increaed prices
No, for example regulations restricting the supply of labor of doctors is one of the main reason why prices are very high.

But saying again " like I said it's less about competition but more about reducing the regulatory burdens."

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ But it was only through the current system and with increased regulation could we get marginal transparency

We don't have it *yet*, although it's much more nuanced than that. The one Trump is preoposing hasn't been implemented *and* it could be negative in terms of effects.

However if it isn't negative it'll yield the same effects, almost, as my free market system in this regard.

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ I’m not against opening up restrictions on the supply of doctors but some regulation like the one I mentioned about price transparanct is essential

Or we could just go to a private system where prices are more transparent, that solves it without any regulation(that could be harmful)

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ How can the free market work if no one knows the prices of operations

They do, that's the point. In a market system prices would be more transparent, due to the abolishment of the complex third party payer insurance system.

@sɪᴅɪsɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴇ Insurance isn’t the problem for minimal price transparency, it’s hospitals