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The upcoming fiscal crisis will be all about DEBT. Corporate debt, government debt, and personal debt. Avoid debt at all costs for what is coming down the tracks. Exacerbating the problem is that people have been lulled into a false sense of complacency that interest rates will just magically stay low forever. Great investing opportunities ahead if you have cash on hand.
massive deficit expansion (among other things) caused the utterly destructive inflation of the 70s so wr should be worried about going on a very similar path...
Inflation of the 70s was almost entirely a monetary phenomenon.
He also said something else I've been saying forever:
Powell later added that the “single biggest thing” that drives the “unsustainability” is health care delivery. “We spend 17% of GDP, everyone else spends 10%. ... It’s not that benefits themselves are too generous. We deliver them in inefficient ways.”
It seems most of that inefficiency resides in the form of headcount.
Far too many people who are employed in and counted in health care delivery are people who do not actually deliver health care. They sit in front of computer monitors. They interact with other people who sit in front of computer monitors. They push paper. They can't even spell "EKG" or "EEG" let alone articulate the difference between the two.
A new financial system needs to be put in place, and it may be sooner than you think. It's gonna suck but it has to be done. Heck just return to US Notes.
A doctor I met from Germany says that she gets paid a comfortable salary by the hospital and a government pension so she doesn't worry much. She's already retired and said the US system sucks and the doctors here are overcharging people and they rush through everything instead of providing quality service.
But he didn’t say that the “inefficient ways” are responsible for lot of the wealth/momentum in the market and people’s pockets
Plenty of companies would lose all kinds of money if there was only EFFICIENT ways of delivering health care
Face it—
Our health care system is designed to make money for the companies involved in it, for the people who run those companies and investors who own large portions of them...
And that is true for the public and private sides
The nursing home providers who work with Medicaid patients, Big Pharma—including the companies screwing the price of Insulin up and up and up for no reason except profitability, the doctors that are involved in fraudulent practices/claims to draw millions in illegal billing...
The insurance companies that have made themselves the nexus for health care services...
Almost every aspect of this health care system is designed to make someone wealthy
That is not the case in systems run by countries
Not to say that every country’s system is run efficiently, fairly, or w/o fraud...
Yet our government does nothing to rein in costs of Medicare / Medicaid, which are also inefficient. If the government was efficient at managing our health care, Medicare/Medicaid would already be able to cover 100% of the population without any additional taxpayer funding and little to no additional out of pocket costs / private insurance for consumers.
But our government isn't efficient at it. Just because it works better in other countries doesn't mean it will here. We already have proof that it doesn't with Medicare/Medicaid spending.
It seems most of that inefficiency resides in the form of headcount.
Far too many people who are employed in and counted in health care delivery are people who do not actually deliver health care. They sit in front of computer monitors. They interact with other people who sit in front of computer monitors. They push paper. They can't even spell "EKG" or "EEG" let alone articulate the difference between the two.
I agree with that.
Much of the paper pushing comes not only from insurance companies, but also government regulations. My sister works in health care and complains about the insane paperwork required once Obamacare came into full force (and she was an Obama voter).
A friend of mine who's a psychiatrist for the indigent spends 80% of his time doing 'paperwork' with dictation software because it takes that level of efficiency to get it all done...once again required by government regulations. He hates his job. He'll be the first one to tell you how inefficient it all is--once again--I doubt he's ever voted for a Republican.
People need to get over this idea that more government control in healthcare will magically make it more efficient and cost effective. It isn't just private businesses that are corrupt. So is our government.
Much of the paper pushing comes not only from insurance companies, but also government regulations. My sister works in health care and complains about the insane paperwork required once Obamacare came into full force (and she was an Obama voter).
A friend of mine who's a psychiatrist for the indigent spends 80% of his time doing 'paperwork' with dictation software because it takes that level of efficiency to get it all done...once again required by government regulations. He hates his job. He'll be the first one to tell you how inefficient it all is--once again--I doubt he's ever voted for a Republican.
People need to get over this idea that more government control in healthcare will magically make it more efficient and cost effective. It isn't just private businesses that are corrupt. So is our government.
The good new is that America spends $1 Trillion a year treating diseases that are largely preventable. The real savings come from lifestyle change, which will allow us to do an end run around both the corporations and the government. Ordinary people and our habits will have to be the faces of real reform with health care. The government and big business will never reform themselves.
Much of the paper pushing comes not only from insurance companies, but also government regulations. My sister works in health care and complains about the insane paperwork required once Obamacare came into full force (and she was an Obama voter).
A friend of mine who's a psychiatrist for the indigent spends 80% of his time doing 'paperwork' with dictation software because it takes that level of efficiency to get it all done...once again required by government regulations. He hates his job. He'll be the first one to tell you how inefficient it all is--once again--I doubt he's ever voted for a Republican.
People need to get over this idea that more government control in healthcare will magically make it more efficient and cost effective. It isn't just private businesses that are corrupt. So is our government.
What does this paper work entail? Proving the diagnosis, treatment, result and fees were correct?
How does one catch people who do fraud?
When Obamacare went into effect, my doctor was required to put all my medicare records on a computer. That took some time. But now, others can read my record.
The trust fund programs, such as Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid, currently run a surplus. The problem is that the discretionary programs, such as defense, are underfunded by income taxes which are their primary source of revenue. About 1 out of every 3 dollars to fund these programs has to be borrowed.
If you split off the accumulated debts ($22 trillion) from the discretionary programs as a separate program, the total amount of payments over a 75-year period, the base period used in calculating future government program costs, would be about $55 trillion using 3 percent as the interest rate.
Just saw post on FB by Robert Reich about a defense company that is “voluntarily” returning almost half the profit it made from its deal w/the Defense Dept because it overinflated billing...
This is a large amount of money
And likely just the tip of the iceberg as to “overbilling” by defense contractors...
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