Fool's Gold

The game of healthcare is played with casino chips.  No one truly pulls money out of their pockets so no one knows or cares how much things cost.  This allows an opaque system of cost shifting to occur and it fool us all.  Here is an example.  More and more states are cutting Medicaid coverage for hospital stays that go over 10 days.  They are doing this to save money.  The Medicaid patients won't be getting the bill from staying more than 10 days but instead it will be passed on to the hospital.  The hospital is in the business of making money (many CEOs make over a million dollars a year) and therefore will pass this bill on to patients who have no insurance (and take their car, house, savings) or just cut staff (nursing, pharmacists, docs, etc).   Nothing exists in a vacuum and though Medicaid spending needs to be corralled in, it doesn't mean that making ridiculous cuts are appropriate either.   I do believe prices of medical care should be transparent.    I do believe we all should pay something for it or else it is devalued and abused.  Everybody should have their skin in the game.  There is no free lunch.  Sorry.

And for the record, I don't believe CEOs should be making that much money.