The American health insurance system is a scam
RFK JR says “The whole system is corrupt.” They found
- Hip replacement in Boston costs $17,900 at one hospital, and at a nearby hospital, it costs $74,000 for the exact same surgery
- Researchers have found MRI prices varying as much as 9x within a single city
- One analysis found that 60% of insurer-negotiated hospital rates were higher than the hospital's own cash price
“Think about that. The insurance company, who is supposed to be negotiating for all of its members and beating down the price, has actually negotiated a price that is higher than if you just walked into that hospital off the street and asked for that procedure”
“The whole system was corrupt. It was crooked. And there was no marketplace, and that was deliberate. That was by design. There was no marketplace and those are not signals of a functioning market. Markets cannot discipline prices that they cannot see”
I looked into this exact study, over 2,300 hospitals were looked at and what they found was
- Cash price is better nearly 60% of the time
- Cash discounts averaged about 64% of normal price, this is often cheaper than insurance rates
Insurance is a scam