Elizabeth Barrette (ysabetwordsmith) wrote,
Elizabeth Barrette
ysabetwordsmith
  • Mood: busy

Sauce for the Gander

It occurs to me that insurance companies (in general, but especially health insurance) have gotten into a habit of promising things they never deliver. "Bait and switch" is generally illegal, and grounds for lawsuit or complaint to chamber of commerce, Better Business Bureau, etc. And insurance companies often wind up owing people huge amounts of money that they refuse to pay. That's grounds for setting a collection agency on them.

I don't expect this sort of tactic would work very often; the companies are too rich and powerful. But if a LOT of people started suing the insurance companies and turning collectors onto them, it would drive them nuts, maybe even make them stop being so horrid. And halting that kind of attack would be a giant game of whack-a-mole, because there are millions of dissatisfied customers out there.
Tags: economics
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  • 29 comments
...go 2 levels up... Expand

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bemused_leftist

bemused_leftist

September 12 2009, 15:26:38 UTC 11 years ago

With any form of actual pain treatment (all of which could be dismissed as placebo) you pay for what you get, as you get it. With insurance, you pay for what you may never need, and may not get from the insurance company when you do need it.

Deleted comment

ysabetwordsmith

Hmm...

ysabetwordsmith

September 12 2009, 18:00:28 UTC 11 years ago

>>People wouldn't gamble if they had no confidence in the bookie paying off.<<

With health care, not taking the gamble can be unbearable. But that's about what it takes to make me roll those dice: when a complaint is making it impossible for me to sleep, or work, or is otherwise unbearable. The chance of mishap for me is always high. The chance of trouble-free success is low. I consider visiting the doctor to be a very long shot made out of desperation.

>>Yeah, sure: morphine only works if you believe it does. <<

Not exactly. It works better if you believe it does. So does pretty much every other treatment. You're adding the placebo effect to the base effect. That makes a difference.

>>People who spend money on quack or con artist don't like to admit they've been had. They play back into the hands of the spin doctor, the chiropractor, etc.<<

They do the same with the mainstream options, and some of those are little better. Statistically speaking, even.
ysabetwordsmith

Hmm...

ysabetwordsmith

September 12 2009, 17:34:50 UTC 11 years ago

>>With any form of actual pain treatment (all of which could be dismissed as placebo) you pay for what you get, as you get it. With insurance, you pay for what you may never need, and may not get from the insurance company when you do need it.<<

The problem is that almost nobody working a normal job can afford more than the very cheapest medical supplies or services. Unless you are downright rich, many health services are simply unaffordable -- you pay more for an hour than you make in a day or a week, and a single significant injury or illness can cost more than you make in a year. It's a matter of trying to pay for institutional-scale expenses with an individual-scale budget. The alternatives are to do without, or to pay for "insurance" and pray that if you do need to make a claim, enough money will come back to knock the bills down to something you can almost afford.

That is evil.