Wow - you blame these two for all the issues involving health care in the US. Ask yourself why insurers have to seek 70% discounts with hospitals for their PPO networks. Who sets a sticker price for a product so outrageously that they latter agree a 70% discount is a fair price? And insurers never achieve the same degree of discounts as Medicare. No one thinks hospitals, doctors, big pharma or medical device companies might also be part of the reason health care costs so much.
And it is misleading to single out the pay package of these two and causally link it to the reason for high health care. Most C suites are overpaid. The CFO (not CEO) for Walmart has a pay package of $39.7M. Everyone has a right to eat, just like a right to health care. Why aren't you writing about the pay packages of Walmart, Krogers. Target and Costco?
Was the HSA legislation (2002 IIRC) initiated by insurers in conjunction w/ or in anticipation of the rollout CDHP? It seems insurers (& employers) rolled out CDHP (much) faster than the uptake in HSAs happened, catching the insured off guard. Then the ACA happened which threw fuel on what was previously a small fire. Without corresponding employer &/or employee fully funded HSAs (up to at least the deductible) and of course as you noted, w/o transparent pricing, CDHP had zero chance of success for the insured. Had those two been in place, maybe even legislated along with HSA, but at the very least initiated by the insurance companies, seemingly CDHP could’ve worked.
Great letter Wendell! It’s obscene the amount of compensation these execs get to undermine incentives to use healthcare benefits.
Wow - you blame these two for all the issues involving health care in the US. Ask yourself why insurers have to seek 70% discounts with hospitals for their PPO networks. Who sets a sticker price for a product so outrageously that they latter agree a 70% discount is a fair price? And insurers never achieve the same degree of discounts as Medicare. No one thinks hospitals, doctors, big pharma or medical device companies might also be part of the reason health care costs so much.
And it is misleading to single out the pay package of these two and causally link it to the reason for high health care. Most C suites are overpaid. The CFO (not CEO) for Walmart has a pay package of $39.7M. Everyone has a right to eat, just like a right to health care. Why aren't you writing about the pay packages of Walmart, Krogers. Target and Costco?
Was the HSA legislation (2002 IIRC) initiated by insurers in conjunction w/ or in anticipation of the rollout CDHP? It seems insurers (& employers) rolled out CDHP (much) faster than the uptake in HSAs happened, catching the insured off guard. Then the ACA happened which threw fuel on what was previously a small fire. Without corresponding employer &/or employee fully funded HSAs (up to at least the deductible) and of course as you noted, w/o transparent pricing, CDHP had zero chance of success for the insured. Had those two been in place, maybe even legislated along with HSA, but at the very least initiated by the insurance companies, seemingly CDHP could’ve worked.