On Health Care

We have a mess. The insurance companies (acting as bookkeepers) are driving up cost since they are not "mutual companies" where profits go back into the business but rather are "public companies" where profits go to shareholders.

Doctors and hospitals react to insurance companies by increasing fees and services to cover enormous "bookkeeping and accounting" requirements, malpractice "insurance" and to pay for R&D.

The American people can't look to the private sector to "do the right thing" and make health care affordable, so the public looks to the government to help the "insurance companies and health care providers" do the right thing. But what can the Federal Government do? Is there a model? Certainly not Europe where so many countries are going bankrupt with these social programs.

I'm thinking the American people would love to pay their own way but it's really hard if not impossible to pay out of pocket for health care AND insurance. You'd think with all the smart people we have in the USA that we could come up with a plan, a model that we could try on a section of people/location (and don't say Massachusetts) - I mean a plan like none other.
I went to the hospital for 1 night, a couple of years ago. I got some antibiotics and an IV for dehydration and some medicine to keep me from throwing up. The bill was $12,000. The "adjusted" bill after insurance was $7,000. My deductible was $7,000. I called the hospital and said that to get all the money I'd have to take it out of my IRA but I could come up with $5,000 would they settle for that. They said yes. What is all this about... this inflated bill. Something is amiss and believe me the government with more forms to fill out and a building full of employees and computer systems to manage it won't fix anything. I'll try to think of a solution. Stay tuned.

I'm checking this out:   Single Payer System.... http://singlepayeraction.org/about.html