Blockage Of Economical Health Insurance By Decade-Long Profits
There are worries over the cost of health care as the fight now moves on to the Senate.
Supporters of reform assert that health insurance is attainable if the health care costs are now lessened.
They may have a good position there as recent studies show that these health companies have tripled their profits in the last decade.
This is during a 10-year period that has seen major losses in most economic sectors.
While it adds up that the industry would be relatively resilient–after all, the necessity of visiting a doctor or hospital doesn’t go away when the economy slumps–health care costs have soared since 2000, making health insurance less budget friendly.
Health insurance companies are normally the ones getting profit from the expensive health care plans. So, there’s no doubt that they have gained a lot from this over the last decade. According to statistics, the six health insurance companies in the S&P 500 have made over $10 billion.
These massive profits seem to be what’s standing in the way of people getting inexpensive health insurance. But I bet you did not know that insurance companies are the least profitable of the health care industry.
So, if the insurance companies are not the major reason of the shortage of reasonably priced health insurance, then who is?
Over the past decade, the medical device makers and medical suppliers saw the most improvement. They have improved their profits by 17% and 15% respectively.
The margins of pharmaceutical firms have increased their margins to 25% and they have doubled their profits too.
These industries have been entirely responsible for the advances in medicine. At the same time, they have increased the costs of insurance on the same time frame.
What can be done about this? Direct price controls are extremely unlikely, but regulations enacted as part of a health care reform bill could nudge the health care industry towards lessening its costs.
Affordable health insurance will be more plentiful if health insurers don’t need to pay exorbitant rates for the majority of their supplies and services.