Posted on 06/25/2009 6:41:22 PM PDT by caper gal 1
I’m old enough to remember when average people could go to their doctor and pay an easily affordable bill afterwards. People today don’t seem to believe this but I found a document among my mother’s papers recently when I emptied out her apartment and it is powerful ammo in the fight against this march to socialized health care rationing.
In 1968, just three short years after LBJ’s government got in the health care business, my father was attacked and beaten severely with a tire iron. He spent a week in ICU and had surgery to remove portions of his skull, and a second surgery to put plates in to replace those portions.
He worked as a maintenance man at a manufacturing plant, and my mother was a nurse. The document is a claim they filed against his attacker to be reimbursed for the medical expenses they had paid. The total bill for ambulance, two hospitalizations, surgeries and drugs? $1,168.52. They paid it out of pocket. They didn’t have health insurance. They didn’t need it because health care at that point was still market based. Adjusted for inflation to current dollars that bill would still be only $7,155.13, far less than you can rack up today in less than an hour in your local ER.
I have this doc saved as a .pdf doc but don't know how to post them here. If some one will let me know, I'll be MORE than glad to do so.
My sister was born in an army hospital in Germany in 1962. She was 6 pounds and the bill was $6. We used to joke that they charged by the pound.
BUMP
BUMP
I guarantee they’re not $5 or anywhere near their inflation adjusted equivalent.
Same here. 1976, 1978 my sons’ births were around $1200.00. I had no insurance so I just saved the money and paid cash! Imagine that!
Upload it to Rapidshare.com, and post the link on this thread.
My mom recently showed us the receipts from my older sister’s birth (in 1955). The grand total was $300.
Check out plastic surgery and lasik surgery. They keep getting better and cheaper. No insurance, no government.
Done.Thank you SO MUCH. Here’s a link and will link above.
http://rapidshare.com/files/248713992/1968_Medical_Expenses.pdf.html
I found the (handwritten) hospital bill from my birth in 1945. Three days - they didn’t kick the mother out in those days. $35 and change.
Yes it was.
The government abetting the insurance industry and criminal businessmen using illegal alien labor killed our stellar health care system.
Totally agree.
Not only was it affordable, but doctors made housecalls.
My husband opened a family practice office in 1980. Office visits were $6-$15. His office was staffed with only two full time employees-one nurse and a receptionist and a part-time typist...no computer...just a handwritten super bill which the patient mailed to Medicare or their insurance. Things changed with the onslaught of HMO’s, DRG’s and government coding.
Same thing with auto insurance and auto body repair prices.
Monday my dentist took half an hour to complete 3 run of the mill fillings for minor cavities. Got the bill today: $504. Just for the fillings. Nothing else. Ugh.
Well, you are correct, everyone could use a better cake recipe. But you are also correct that the BIGGEST contribution to medical cost hyperinflation is the tort actions of money-hungry medical malpractice attorneys like John Edwards. And many others. All substantial contributors to the Democratic party.
That is so true. But the problem is not only due to government health programs like Medicare. Health insurance in general, particularly employer-paid health insurance has an inflationary effect by dampening price competition and price awareness.
This is really where reform should start. You can’t have cost controls without price disclosure. No true market system can exist if you can’t compete on cost.
Think of how much more efficiency and discipline could be brought to the system if we had menu pricing. Think of the money that clinics and physicians could save if they received payment at the time of service. They could spend less time and money on billing services and personnel. Cash flow would also improve. Health insurance should be catastrophic. For routine care (doctor visits, labs, minor procedures), people should use tax free instruments such as MSAs.
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