[Rob Hood]

http://www.autoextremist.com/current/2008/7/8/rants-453.html

Was listening to some newsradio today - many analysts are painting a bleak picture. Heard that Hummer and Saab were going to be let go, maybe more. I've already seen where Chevy is not sponsoring several NASCAR races next year.

Rick Wagoner is supposed to deliver an announcement tomorrow morning at 0830 EST. Should be worth listening to.

This post has been edited by Rob Hood: Jul 15 2008, 05:59 AM

[00 Trans Ram]

Sorry - I may have muddied the waters. There's a huge difference between the government requiring that everyone HAVE insurance, and the government BEING that insurance. If the government IS that insurance, then they get to tell you what to do (because the government has the force of law). If the government is just telling you that you have to have insurance, they it's no different than the choices we have now (if I go to the doctor, I pay $10 co-pay, if I go to the ER, its more expensive).

Sam - you pay so much in health insurance because you're paying for yourself and your dependents, PLUS a few people who don't have insurance. If they had insurance, you wouldn't have to pay for them.

Let me put it into #s. I'm going to use my hospital payer mix (the mix of patients based on who pays their bills).

(IMG:http://i119.photobucket.com/albums/o145/mpatterson1410/Reimbursement.jpg)

I made it easy by assuming that, for each patient we saw it cost us $1000 to provide care. This assumes a lot of things (people with different payers are equally as healthy, they receive equal care, etc.) that aren't quite true. But, for an example, it's a valid method. Those are the actual Payer Mix and Patient counts from our facility. You'll also note that Medicare and Medicaid pay us 85% of our costs (not our charges, but what it costs us to provide care). That's like you buying shocks from Bilstein for $200 apiece and selling it to everyone here on the board for $170 apiece. If you do that, which you may do, then you're going to have to sell the corresponding springs at a much inflated price.

That's where you see the 208% figure. To make up for all the money we lose on Medicare, Medicaid, and Uninsured patients, and to make a paltry 3% profit, we have to charge insurance companies 208% of our costs. If we don't we'd lose money and close our doors. BTW, the break-even-point for us is somewhere between 191% and 192%.

So, now let's assume that everyone has insurance. Instead of us having to charge 208% to make a 3% profit, we only have to charge 103% of our costs. That is a 49.5% reduction in charges to the insurance company. So, now the insurance company paying us 50% of what they used to, so (assuming they keep the same profit margin that they are now) they will pass those savings on to you.

Now your payments are $500 per month for health insurance. Is that too much? I don't know. One thing that I do know is that I pay about $150 per month in auto insurance. For our family of 2, it's about $250 per month. So, I'm paying $250 per month to replace my car if it gets damaged, and twice that to replace my body if that gets damaged. Knowing the relative importance of my car vs my body, $500 doesn't seem like too much. (and, that's my car insurance for 2 people and 2 cheap cars - 02 Santa Fe and 06 Saturn)

[marka]

Howdy,

That's where you see the 208% figure. To make up for all the money we lose on Medicare, Medicaid, and Uninsured patients, and to make a paltry 3% profit, we have to charge insurance companies 208% of our costs. If we don't we'd lose money and close our doors. BTW, the break-even-point for us is somewhere between 191% and 192%.

So, now let's assume that everyone has insurance. Instead of us having to charge 208% to make a 3% profit, we only have to charge 103% of our costs. That is a 49.5% reduction in charges to the insurance company. So, now the insurance company paying us 50% of what they used to, so (assuming they keep the same profit margin that they are now) they will pass those savings on to you.

Who's paying for your current uninsured and Medicare/caid folks with this new "everyone has insurance" system? You can't ignore that, and keep it apples to apples.

Mark