You're in Charge

[jackfaire]

The gas company in my area is a regulated utility meaning while they can make a profit there is a cap on how much profit they can make and all policies and procedures have to be fair and balanced for the customers.

The other side of that coin is legally they can't make exceptions that they wouldn't make for everyone. So if the policy is going to hurt you they can't change it because your neighbor gets the same treatment.

Plus they get accused of being a Monopoly.

[DrFaroohk]

One more thing, ambulance rides are covered by the universial health care. The fact that you even have to pay for them is goddamn ridiculous.

Especially when they charge like $16K for a 60 mile ride. So you're saying these two guys driving it are getting paid like $100 an hour, and it uses some rare fuel that costs 1,000 per gallon, and apparently the van itself has a 20K a month payment from the bank they have to cover too. Yes, I believe that.

Just like I believe that a bottle of tylenol at the hospital really costs them 600 dollars. And I totally understand how looooow on funds these hospitals are! That's why they pay a lowly nurse 1600 a day to show up or not, right? Yes, those pooooor hospital people.

[HYHYBT]

Hospitals often *don't* make much money. You know full well that much of why they charge what they do is that, in order to remain in business at all, they *have* to make up for what they lose when people can't, or simply don't, pay their bill at all. And, knowing what even a GP who sticks to office practice has to pay in insurance, I can't even imagine what it must be for a hospital which can get sued whenever anything goes wrong with anybody, regardless of fault, considering that they deal mainly with people who have things going wrong already when they come through the door.

Fix the legal system in some way, and fix it so that hospitals get paid every time they work, and watch what happens to prices.

[Boozy]

Hospitals often *don't* make much money. You know full well that much of why they charge what they do is that, in order to remain in business at all, they *have* to make up for what they lose when people can't, or simply don't, pay their bill at all. And,

Hospital bill "deadbeats" are only a small fraction of the reason why hospitals charge so much.

What happens is that the major insurance companies negotiate with the hospital corporations to get the lowest possible price for their insured patients, so they don't have to pay much. Although it's less a negotiation than extortion, since these hospitals know that they can't stop accepting Blue Cross and stay in business, and if Blue Cross wants to pay $5 for an appendectomy, then that's what they pay.

So they end up with these razor-thin margins, and they have to make it up somewhere. The only way they can do that is by charging more for the uninsured and the people covered by the less-powerful insurance companies.

[DrFaroohk]

I heard once that a lot of what they do in medicine as well is up the prices to help cover what the insurance won't pay. Like medicare or something only pays 60% of a procedure...so if the doc only charges 100 bucks, get gets 60, so he starts charging like 140 or something to cover what he loses.

It's an old gripe of mine anyway, but I always say somewhere, something doesn't add up. ok, I get that you gotta cover expenses. I get that you have to pay your loans and cover what other people didn't pay and your cocaine addiction too...but somewhere, there's a line beyond "ALL EXPENSES PAID" and then there's "MODEST PROFIT" and then ther's "HOW THE FUCK CAN YOU LIVE WITH YOURSELF". I jsut wish they'd scale it back a bit.

[HYHYBT]

What happens is that the major insurance companies negotiate with the hospital corporations to get the lowest possible price for their insured patients, so they don't have to pay much. Although it's less a negotiation than extortion, since these hospitals know that they can't stop accepting Blue Cross and stay in business, and if Blue Cross wants to pay $5 for an appendectomy, then that's what they pay.

Yes, that too. The point is, when all is said and done, there's not the exorbitant profit left over that people like to think there is when they see the bill.

[crazylegs]

Automatic punishment for assaulting an officer? I don't like that one. What if Officer McFeely is just having a bad day and wants to beat me up? If I punch back am I "automatically" thrown in jail?

No, you're still entitled to a trial.

I wasn't very clear on that - what I meant to say was that those were the start of the tariffs after conviction in a court rather than an automatic action after the police officer stated what happened in their statement.