Health-care insurers netted 56% more in '09

Here we are---deny coverage, raise premiums, ripp us off and give big boys bigger $$$. Need to pass and control healthcare. Terrible to pay for a drug that costs 25 cents and we pay 25 bucks. Big profits and ripp-offs does not equal good care!!!

oops wrote:

Here we are---deny coverage, raise premiums, ripp us off and give big boys bigger $$$. Need to pass and control healthcare. Terrible to pay for a drug that costs 25 cents and we pay 25 bucks. Big profits and ripp-offs does not equal good care!!!

We do need change in Health Care but you don't want the government to take it over. That 25 cent drug under Government Health Care will be a hundred bucks.

Legalized Mafia.

What happen to competition? We need a better way to shop for healthcare so these companies will focus on providing better service and competitive rates.

Overall, the profit margin for health insurance companies was a modest 3.4 percent over the past year, according to data provided by Morningstar. That ranks 87th out of 215 industries and slightly above the median of 2.2 percent. By this measure, the most profitable industry over the past year has been beverages, with a 25.9 percent profit margin. Right behind that were healthcare real-estate trusts (firms that are basically the landlords for hospitals and healthcare facilities) and application-software (think Windows). Overall, the profit margin for health insurance companies was a modest 3.4 percent over the past year, according to data provided by Morningstar. That ranks 87th out of 215 industries and slightly above the median of 2.2 percent. By this measure, the most profitable industry over the past year has been beverages, with a 25.9 percent profit margin. Right behind that were healthcare real-estate trusts (firms that are basically the landlords for hospitals and healthcare facilities) and application-software (think Windows).

And they are such absolute lowlifes that they won't even give us the common courtesy of a "reach around"

I heard on a radio news program the other day that in 1869 (I believe) insurance companies were given an exemption from anti-trust laws. Congress is talking about changing that to include them, which I believe is far overdue. If competition were increased, premiums would be more affordable and there would be no need for government health care. Currently insurance companies get together and mutually agree to not invade each other's territory, allowing them to charge whatever they want. This is why some states have one insurer controlling 80%.

LBeat wrote:

What happen to competition? We need a better way to shop for healthcare so these companies will focus on providing better service and competitive rates.

I agree with the need for real competition - but what happened to it is that Congress gave the insurance industry an exemption from the antitrust laws over 50 years ago. This lets health care insurance monopolize whole cities and states with the resultant low services and high prices. The health care bill in the House would end this insane exemption - but with this Congress, the industry has nothing to fear. This exemption is one of the big problems underlying the health care crisis in America and why the industry is so predatory, so unjustly profitable, and so utterly unresponsive to criticism and reform.

LBeat wrote:

What happen to competition? We need a better way to shop for healthcare so these companies will focus on providing better service and competitive rates.

This is the only country in the developed world that profits from the sick and the dying!

This is why we need the public option. With the public option, most of that 12.2 billion in profits could be put toward covering people with lower incomes with some kind of basic coverage.

The best control of health-care costs will come from making the insurance end of health care non-profit. That will take out the incentive for jacking up the rates and dropping sick patients with real needs, and will improve the incentive for supporting good health and good health-care practices. That should be followed by standardizing coverage and payments.

Everyone blames the docs, but that's misguided -- at least they are providing the care. They aren't the ones breaking the system. Because our system is so complicated and fragmented we have middle layers upon middle layers, all adding to the cost.

We have a group of businesses that have grown just to manage billing and receiveables for the medical providers, because figuring out the different rates allowed by each of the thousands of insurers is a huge job. National set rates would eliminate the need for this middle layer.

For-profit insurance is another middle layer with a 17-20% administrative cost under the current insurance system that is just lost money.

Other countries that went to a private but non-profit insurance systems, and that standardized what would be covered in a basic plan and the payments allowed (which currently every insurance company does independently), found their admin costs fell to between 2-5%. And they no longer needed middle layers of clerks just to figure out and handle billing and paperwork between doctors offices and insurers and patients.

They also found their NON-profit basic insurers competing to offer better "extra" services like private rooms, dental and eye care, assisted living, etc., either as part of the basic package or in supplemental coverage plans for profit.

And that's not even considering the benefits of a single-payer system, like Medicare, which runs at about 2% administrative costs, and which WOULDN'T be running near broke if everyone, young and old, was in same system.

NoBama Health Care wrote:

<quoted text>
We do need change in Health Care but you don't want the government to take it over. That 25 cent drug under Government Health Care will be a hundred bucks.

Are you on Medicare? Are you a veteran? If you fit either of these profiles, then you are on GOVERNMENT-RUN HEALTH CARE. Eventually you will be on Medicare, which is GOVERNMENT RUN. I am so tired of people like you bring up the Big Brother boogeyman to scare people into opposing any kind of reform that involves the government. Just look at the high-profile f-ups of Wall Street in the past several years. You have a tough row to hoe to convince me that the government can F anything up worse than the banks on Wall Street. Get a f***ing clue!

Barney19 wrote:

Overall, the profit margin for health insurance companies was a modest 3.4 percent over the past year, according to data provided by Morningstar. That ranks 87th out of 215 industries and slightly above the median of 2.2 percent. By this measure, the most profitable industry over the past year has been beverages, with a 25.9 percent profit margin. Right behind that were healthcare real-estate trusts (firms that are basically the landlords for hospitals and healthcare facilities) and application-software (think Windows). Overall, the profit margin for health insurance companies was a modest 3.4 percent over the past year, according to data provided by Morningstar. That ranks 87th out of 215 industries and slightly above the median of 2.2 percent. By this measure, the most profitable industry over the past year has been beverages, with a 25.9 percent profit margin. Right behind that were healthcare real-estate trusts (firms that are basically the landlords for hospitals and healthcare facilities) and application-software (think Windows).

Who cares how unprofitable the health insurance industrial complex is? I don't think it should be for-profit at all. Anything that involves life or death matters should not be profit-driven. We live in a society where wack-jobs will go bomb an abortion clinic or gun-down an abortion doctor in his own church because they believe in the "sanctity of life," but at the same time you can get good medical care in this country (that includes preventive care) only if you can afford it. That's how sacred life is to us in America. For shame! I am so glad the decision was made long ago to make fire and police protection non-profit functions, and that we decided every kid deserves a decent education, regardless of ability to pay, and that we started these things called libraries, where people can borrow books if they can't afford to buy them from the book store. These are all PUBLIC, GOVERNMENT-RUN functions. If the people who are today opposed to health care reform were in charge then, I'm not sure we would have made the same decisions to provide these services as a basic right of citizenship. If the tea-baggers were in charge, you'd get a bill if a cop helped you in a fender bender or the fire department came to your house to put out a kitchen fire. Health care should be a fundamental human right available to everyone, regardless of ability to pay. Only the selfish and the greedy would deny people that.

Crooks!

This article is about demonizing the healthcare insurers. It doesn't change the fact the the healthcare bill stinks. If the healthcare bill is so good, why are so many people(politicians, unions, etc etc) wanting to exclude themselves from it.

NoBama Health Care wrote:

<quoted text>
Look to Canada and YOU will get a f***ing clue.

Ask any Canadian if they would trade in their universal healthcare system for the American version of denial and non-coverage for those with preconditions and I can assure you the answer is a resounding NO!
Actually I've had to wait between ten and twelve weeks in the US to see a specialist for elective surgery.
Here is a list of myths that American's are told about the Canadian healthsystem.

10 Myths About Canadian Health Care,
http://www.pnhp.org/news/2008/february/10_myt...

Barney19 wrote:

Overall, the profit margin for health insurance companies was a modest 3.4 percent over the past year, according to data provided by Morningstar. That ranks 87th out of 215 industries and slightly above the median of 2.2 percent. By this measure, the most profitable industry over the past year has been beverages, with a 25.9 percent profit margin. Right behind that were healthcare real-estate trusts (firms that are basically the landlords for hospitals and healthcare facilities) and application-software (think Windows). Overall, the profit margin for health insurance companies was a modest 3.4 percent over the past year, according to data provided by Morningstar. That ranks 87th out of 215 industries and slightly above the median of 2.2 percent. By this measure, the most profitable industry over the past year has been beverages, with a 25.9 percent profit margin. Right behind that were healthcare real-estate trusts (firms that are basically the landlords for hospitals and healthcare facilities) and application-software (think Windows).

Barney, I don't think any of the readers believe the numbers in your post.

Have a nice day.

HowRad wrote:

This article is about demonizing the healthcare insurers. It doesn't change the fact the the healthcare bill stinks. If the healthcare bill is so good, why are so many people(politicians, unions, etc etc) wanting to exclude themselves from it.

Because it's so watered down that it's rendered meaningless.

And to think the sheep of America put up with this. It's pathetic.

Details wrote:

I heard on a radio news program the other day that in 1869 (I believe) insurance companies were given an exemption from anti-trust laws. Congress is talking about changing that to include them, which I believe is far overdue. If competition were increased, premiums would be more affordable and there would be no need for government health care. Currently insurance companies get together and mutually agree to not invade each other's territory, allowing them to charge whatever they want. This is why some states have one insurer controlling 80%.

41 votes in the Senate say NO!