Health Care Costs: Eroding Your Wages

The Atlantic Business Channel:

This amazing graph bouncing around the web is the most striking example of why health care reform isn't just about reforming care. It's about reforming the economy. New bumper sticker: "Reform Health Care; Get a Raise!"

Read the whole story: The Atlantic Business Channel

Comments

[UninsuredGuy]

According to the Nursing Zone, the number of people w/out health care access skyrocketed from 56 mil. to 60 mil in just 2 yrs. In addition, a Fidelity survey finds almost half of U.S. employees believe their employers won’t provide health insurance, 2019.

www.medtipster.com recently launched an early version of its drug price comparison Web site. Consumers type in their drug name, dosage and ZIP code, and can find prescription drugs available on discount generic programs and where they can find them in their neighborhoods.

[BabblingBrooks]

Propaganda warning!

This is part of the politicomedia push to nationalize health care.

The real problems will not be addressed.
The costs will increase.
Rationing will ensue.
You won't like it.

[BabblingBrooks]

Wait till the fuel costs and the costs of everything else steal your pay raise and a large chunk of your paycheck before the pay raise!

[jmpurser]

Oh please! Took your RAISE???

Our current health care system is at the heart of 60% of bankruptcies and is simply killing other Americans all for corporate profits.

And our politicians don't have the "will" to change it.

[MelRoy]

Anybody else see this piece? Apparently, 60% or more personal bankruptcies in the United States are due to healthcare costs.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090604/hl_nm/us_healthcare_bankruptcy

[DeliLeftOvers]

It's not just the premiums going up. It's every time your plan comes up for renewal the benefit coverage goes down and the copays go up. How many drugs have ceased to be covered or raised up on the "Tier" schedule? A ten dollar copay 5 years ago is now twenty five dollars. Your deductable for the year increased from $750 to $1500.

Used to listen to my mother complain about how every year when the social security increase arrived, so did the increase in the cost of medicare, essentially negating it. No difference.

[liberalbug]

Actually, the pay raise hasn't happened for two years now and won't happen until 2011 at the earliest, but yes, health care premiums went up a shoot-load anyhow, along with everything else, so no, premiums going up didn't erase any raise, but they did amount to a pay cut. And the government wonders why the middle class is shrinking?

[maxfax]

Let's remember that not only premiums increase, but coverage is cut by increases in your deductible, and the amounts the insurance companies will pay your health care provider.

They do whatever they want, all for their profit not for your health care.

[rad21]

Health-care costs does not only erode wages, it can cost the very viability of the company.

One of the first major organized groups to desert Hilary Clinton in on her health-care plan was the Detroit Auto manufacturers and the UAW.

Now they cry that health-care costs made them uncompetitive with other US manufacturers of cars.

[SCG]

Yes, and financial stress erodes your health, so it's a green recycling thing.

[Lefty Larueaux]

I work in the Supermarket sector for a unionized company. For years we have been dealing with this tradeoff -- a larger wage increase or more funding for health insurance. We have pretty darn good insurance, but even that is being eroded by the spiraling healthcare costs. If Congress starts taxing my health benefits to pay for national healthcaare, that would be a pretty large tax increase for a person who doesn't make a sensational salary. No one working at a unionized supermarket is getting filthy rich off of their paycheck, but we do get a taxfree benefit. I would tell Sen. Baucus and Barak to keep their "GD" hands off my healthcare. I can tell them one thing for sure; these supermarket operators sure aren't going to raise my pay voluntarily. We'll have to drag them kicking and screaming to the bargaining table to get our due, just as the CEO has to drag the board of directors to the bargaining table to get his golden parachute and other various and sundry bonuses and perks.

[schatsie]

Oh my, about the CEO dragging the Board of Directors,,,that is a joke, they just trade goodies between themselves and do not include us in the game....those boards of directors are VERY VERY VERY WELL compensated for hours of work...not week, months and years, just a few hours....and they get a free meal and expenses....

[MelRoy]

As I understand it, if you already have employer-provided insurance you can keep that. You don't have to have private healthcare insurance, too.

The benefit of having a national healthcare system is costs are driven down organically (due to higher volumes of business) - that especially affects prescription costs. Nationalized healthcare also drives private healthcare costs down because they share the same facilities (hospitals, labs and even doctors) and because once nationalized medical care comes on board, it is no longer based on supply and demand - and demand for healthcare will always exist. As part of a wider strategy, the healthcare industry is going to have to employ many more people. Really, the only losers are going to be healthcare insurers who currently charge "what the market will bear" and get away with it.

Not for very much longer, they won't.

[vippy]

The only recourse we have is to vote all incumbents out of office, vote new ones in and leave them there for only 4 years. If we don't do this things will never change, why should they?

[frantaylor]

I don't need to see this on HuffPo. I can see this on my paycheck stub.

[jsgaetano]

Yet another way conservative policies have helped destroy the middle class.

[schatsie]

these people have no clue what the word conservatism means or they would not be clearcutting trees, mountaintop removal and strip mining and water pollution,,,, THEY ARE A DISGRACE TO THE WORD CONSERVATISM,,,they are worse than Marie Antoinette...They are saying that YOU AND I are lucky to loose ALL our 401ks, so we can start all over again and work until we are 90 with 2 weeks of vacation......

[jsgaetano]

That is actually what they want- the world in ruins except for gated communities and exclusive islands where the wealthy live, with the rest of humanity either serving the whims of the rich or starving to death.

Check out a third world dictatorship- that's exactly what conservatives want America to look like.

[blood1]

Assign one night where you will stay home and waste it by watching a full evening of "prime time". While wasting you brain...count the number of Pharmaceutical Advertisements are shown.

Next, notice how many of the diseases mentions are not curative?
Are these diseases "life threatening" or just nuisance irritants?
If you decide that you have this disease and want the "newest drug"...who makes the money?

If you had a public funded healthcare that did had determined this was not a "real disease", but a nuisance and would not pay for some obscure test required for diagnosis (which means expensive) and would not pay for the ONLY Drug licensed by FDA to treat it (which means expensive)...what would you think about your healthcare plan?

I am just asking...because that may be a scenario we could face .... there is never anything for free, so we need to decide what we are willing to give up in order to get Universal Healthcare....

DISCLAIMER: I am retired, healthy and am not taking any prescribed or over the counter meds...so I am obviously biased!

[BBackSoon]

To just make changes to Health Insurance without also getting into Pharmaceutical and Health Care Practices would make no sense. That would be like changing your oil but leaving the old filter in place.

Each and every part of our Health Care System is geared around profit. Pharmaceutical Companies develop drugs that Treat problems they don’t cure them, No money in cures only in treatments. Corporate Doctors offices want to write you a script and have you come back in a few days where you will have to pay for meds, and pay for a second office visit. And health insurance is all about taking in more money than they pay out.

At some point we need to remove some of the profit motive from our health care system.

[Samalabear]

Many of the "diseases" that pharmaceutical companies come up with for their ads are far less of a problem than you will have once you start taking the pills and experiencing the side effects. Most of these diseases can also be addressed very well for most people through diet, exercise and other lifestyle changes. The side effects from many of these drugs, on the other hand, are far from being nuisances. They are real, life-changing, often cannot be cured and are often deadly. Over 100,000 people a year die from pharmaceuticals that were given as prescribed.

One of the reasons you are healthy is because you are not taking pharmaceuticals, prescribed or otherwise. I was also quite healthy until in a period of intense stress I stopped eating right and then I let my doctor convince me to take Paxil to help with the stressful situations. Talk about the ruination of a life. After 7 years on the drug and a three-year grueling withdrawal I am hoping that I will ultimately recover with some decent quality of life. There are no pharmaceuticals or over-the-counter drugs in my life either. I had to cut out diet soda and limit caffeine to a bare minimum because of the withdrawal. I had suffered from constant and worsening headaches over the years. No more aspartame, no more Splenda, no more headaches. I was on meds for migraines at one point at the height of my diet soda consumption.