Jared Rhoads
9.7K posts
@jaredrhoads
Health policy at @CenterModHealth and @DartmouthInst. #HxA. Real markets and real prices would fix healthcare.
Would you eat at a restaurant that gives you a menu without any prices on it, and then when you ask for a menu that does have prices on it, they hand you one with ridiculously inflated price labels next to each item, but reassure you that you won't actually pay those list prices--you'll pay a different, lower price based on what membership card you have. And when you ask what that lower price is, they can't reliably tell you, but promise to send you a bill in the mail a month later telling you what you actually owe. Welcome to the American healthcare system, which is the way it is not because businesses set out to do business this way, but because this is where they've found themselves after reacting to each previous policy and intervention (e.g., tax exclusion for employer-sponsored health insurance, institutionalized third-party payment, gov't reimbursement formulae, cross-subsidization of public programs, etc.)
Would you eat at a restaurant that gives you a menu without any prices on it, and then when you ask for a menu that does have prices on it, they hand you one with ridiculously inflated price labels next to each item, but reassure you that you won't actually pay those list prices--you'll pay a different, lower price based on what membership card you have. And when you ask what that lower price is, they can't reliably tell you, but promise to send you a bill in the mail a month later telling you what you actually owe. Welcome to the American healthcare system, which is the way it is not because businesses set out to do business this way, but because this is where they've found themselves after reacting to each previous policy and intervention (e.g., tax exclusion for employer-sponsored health insurance, institutionalized third-party payment, gov't reimbursement formulae, cross-subsidization of public programs, etc.)
