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But the U.S. does profit from the oil and gas endowment on its public lands, in the form of lease bonuses, rentals and royalties paid by private concerns seeking to operate on said public lands.
And in contrast to Statoil, the U.S. profits from their position without the downside of exploration risk (i.e., dry hole risk.) Dry holes can be quite expensive, don'cha know?
The U.S. government, as the mineral owner/lessor of its public lands, actually participates in the development of natural resources on its lands without incurring any type of risk at all. I'm not sure that's a position worth trading just because somebody says they can't pay a medical bill.
The model is pretty much the same in Norway. Statoil is only one of several petroleum companies operating in Norway. You can buy stocks in Statoil. It is a publicly traded company, but the Norwegian state owns 67%. The company is also a multinational one, with activites in countries like the US, Canada, UAE, Singapore, China, Russia and Angola.
I got electricity going through my heart, from my left arm and out the right arm, 3 years back.
Called my doctor, 10 min later I took an EKG at his office, 30 min later I was at the ER for a full check up and spent the night in the heart ward.
Was checked in the morning, everything was OK. Walked down the stairs and said bye to the personal at the entrance and walked out.
Never seen a bill.
Thats healthcare in Norway.
No people who are anti-universal health care are going to tell you how much you get ripped off for taxes in Norway.
But it is much better our way. Get handed a surprise $12,000 bill when you are not prepared or expecting it. The mythology of American health care. And it is only going to get worse here. In a few years, paying for universal health care using taxes in Europe will look like a bargain compared to US individual costs. Trumpcare will bring back the medical bankruptcy trend in the US.
My employer covers the cost of my insurance...why do I want single payer?
Because employers shouldn't have to provide health insurance. It's not like PTO, it has no connection to the job being done.
I see the amount my employer pays. If they didn't have to pay that out, thrn maybe they could afford actual RAISES rather than smaller COLA. And we could all go out and buy our own insurance from the provider of our choice.
Last edited by ContraPagan; 02-03-2018 at 12:30 PM..
You pay taxes. There is no free lunch. My wife has had 400k worth of medical care in the last six months. Yes I got stuck with 10k but I can buy a six pack of beer for six bucks.
We are all aware that we pay taxes for our healthcare. We just say free, instead of tax paid medical insurance. Its bad English on our part..
As you probably have gathered, the first thing one is asked in the US is how will service be paid.
The US has about 320 million more people than Norway. The US population is substantially sicker than Norway. Norwegians seem to take more personal responsibility for their health than US people given the differences in rates of overweight- obesity.
About 80% of Heart Disease and Diabetes 2 is preventable, primarily through diet and exercise. Norway is substantially less violent than the US. No surprise projected life is higher and healthcare spending is less in Norway.
Maybe if Americans got off of their fat rear ends and took up Nordic skiing (skiing being Norway's national sport) they would be in better shape.
Nordic racing isn't for the weak. I watched a WC race recently, and several of the men, who will be competing in South Korea in a few weeks, were collapsing after skiing a semifinal heat.
My nephew races Nordic, and runs x-country, too. That boy is IN SHAPE. He's also a dead ringer for being Johannes Klaebo's (one of the top Norwegian skiers) twin.
Yes I do. Whats the cost compared to normal insurance... But, dont think my Tricare isnt part of Medicare.
Yep, I am automatically enrolled. I pay 134 a month. My total deductibles are less than 200 a year, and anything over cost goes to, drumroll, TRICARE.
Pretty good deal if you ask me.
Great deal and an amount most people pay for Medicare premiums. Then you just need to insure the 20% Medicare doesn't pay for with a supplemental plan. I pay nothing over and above those two.
Hospitals typically bill an insurer $X which is reduced to $Y based on contractual rates for service. Then, and only then, is the bill sliced/ diced to determine co- insurance and co- pays.
Assuming your friend has ACA compliant insurance, which is most insurance, her annual out of pocket is capped and includes her deductible. The annual out of pocket cap was $7150 in 2017.
Her statement of benefits would reflect the complete story.
True for someone with insurance going to an in-network facility. There should be legal limits on charges for emergency medicine (ambulance, ER, etc.) for people out of network or uninsured, and also for non-emergency services unless the patient is given the higher price beforehand and signs on the dotted line for it. Current state allows hospitals to name any price they like and then try to collect on it. That has been abused to an absurd degree.
An ER bill for $12K is inflated by 5-10x actual cost. Hospitals need money to exist but they don't need to be able to extract 90% profit margins.
edit: that said, in the case of the poster you are responding to rather than the person in this article, a 62 day NICU stay is super expensive, hospital would need to bill an incredible amount of money to break even. Not $600K, which is again insane profit seeking, but still enough to bankrupt most families if paying out of pocket.
edit 2: Although I don't blame that person for wanting the hospital to try to save their baby and for not wanting to pay for it, as a society where most births are paid for by Medicaid or private insurance we should have a real conversation about the line over which a birth is so pre-mature we don't spend the hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of resources needed to attempt to save a baby born 3 or more months immature. Very high chance of failing, very high chance of a severe disability (which will again be carried by society at large), very expensive. That we even attempted in a case that bad is a policy failure; chalk it up as the equivalent of a miscarriage and try again.
Last edited by ALackOfCreativity; 02-03-2018 at 12:41 PM..
The US, could save $2-3 Trillion each year, by going to a Singlepayer system, with negotiation of drug pricing, similar to other OECD nations. And everybody would be covered for ANY conceivable illness.
And you wonder why the donors/lobbyist does not want to have this discussion.
While the rest of the developed world has Universal Healthcare, each country has a unique method of delivery.
Most are a mixed bag, of national and private insurance, not Single Payer. A few rely entirely highly regulated private insurance, as the primary payer.
It is quite common for people to have supplimental plans to cover that which national insurance does not pay, similar to traditional US Medicare.
The rest of the developed world is more engaged in controlling costs than the US. Fascinating that the world's largest buyer of prescription medications, Medicare, is not empowered to regulate/ negotiate prices.
The difference in the inpatient hospital experience is highly variable. Major US hospital systems in the US trend resort like compared to most hospitals in other countries. No valet parking, no private rooms/ baths, shared rooms with 4, 8 or more beds, no wifi, no TV, surcharge for linens, no choice of dining, no ordering in, no feeding of visitors. Babies tend to be safely delivered by midwives in birthing centers, not hospitals, unless medically necessary.
Hospitals tend to be run by MDs, not professional administrators with 7 figure comp. in
Arid t stays tend to be longer than the US.
The focus is on healing patients, not the frills and it varies country to country.
There is an increasing tendency of patients in the US to base their experience on the frills, instead of actual medical care. Mrs Douglas in room 621 liked the color of the paint and artwork in her room and the Tech who she thought was a nurse, was cheery and helped her order in for din- din.
The model is pretty much the same in Norway. Statoil is only one of several petroleum companies operating in Norway. You can buy stocks in Statoil. It is a publicly traded company, but the Norwegian state owns 67%. The company is also a multinational one, with activites in countries like the US, Canada, UAE, Singapore, China, Russia and Angola.
Statoil in the US:
The difference being that Statoil, when acting as an operator, necessarily assumes the exploration and business risk associated with the ventures in which it participates, which means the Norwegian taxpayer, to the extent of his ownership in Statoil, is assuming those risks.
In contrast, the U.S. government, which does not have its own oil and gas company, but rather grants oil and gas leases to private concerns on lands where it is the mineral owner, is liberated from both exploration and business risk precisely because it is not an operator. The companies to whom the U.S. government has leased bear all such risk, not the U.S. taxpayer.
The trade-off is this: The financial upside for the U.S. is limited, but risk-free. Norway/Statoil's financial upside is greater, but at the cost of assuming the far higher levels of risk inherent in oil and gas exploration.
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. Get handed a surprise $12,000 bill when you are not prepared or expecting it. The mythology of American health care. And it is only going to get worse here. In a few years, paying for universal health care using taxes in Europe will look like a bargain compared to US individual costs. Trumpcare will bring back the medical bankruptcy trend in the US.
