Fixing America’s Healthcare
Yes, it’s 10pm on Saturday.
But it’s been an exciting day at work.
Can’t really post details of our business to the blog, but let me put it this way.
I’m learning a ton and meeting some cool people (not least my coworkers in the office who are more and more impressive as I get to know them).
Launching a product is tough. Most days you work your butt off and don’t really make any progress that you can measure. Today we made very tangible progress on all three of our main products. Sweet.
So here’s the scoop:
- Beginning of man through 1944 – health insurance is just like car insurance, homeowner’s, life, etc. If you want it you buy it.
- 1945 – Roosevelt fears postwar inflation (think Weimar and WWII) so we have wage controls, but the economy is booming. Workers demand more $$. So they compromise by allowing employers to give unlimited health benefits in addition to wages, “under the table.” From this point on, employer-sponsored health benefits have a 2-to-1 tax advantage over the indivudual market.
- By 1980 – over 80% of U.S. jobs offer health benefits. Individual policies are unaffordable and no one has one.
- 1980-2004 – health costs skyrocket, mainly due to advances in technology and better access to care.
- 2005 – for the Fortune 500 as a group, healthcare costs exceed profits. Healthcare costs are growing at >15% per year. Companies like GM question whether their business model even makes sense (must grow 15%/year just to break even!).
By 2006
- Fewer than 60% of U.S. jobs provide healthcare.
- 46 states have liberalized their individual insurance markets.
- Tax advantages are extended to individuals for self-employeds and for others in the form of HRA’s.
- 16 million Americans have individual health insurance policies.
By 2015 – At least another 50 million Americans will have individual policies.
The only people who know what individual health insurance is are the people my age – no longer covered by mom and dad, and can’t get the jobs with benefits (or think working for a big corporation is lame).
But soon everyone will know.
In 2005 about 2 million Americans filed for bankruptcy. For half of them the primary cause was health costs. Get this: three quarters of those people had health insurance! Health insurance they lost when they got so sick they could no longer work. That is F’ed up.
“A broken health care finance system is bankrupting middle class America.” (Steffie Woolhandler, Harvard Medical School)
The only real insurance you can get is on the individual market, and in 46 states it’s sensibly priced — depends on your health record, just like car insurance depends on your driving record. If you’re diabetic or otherwise uninsurable, you get yourself on state-guaranteed coverage (“The best-kept secret in America” says that old guy on TV) and us taxpayers take care of you, just like we do the 42 million Americans in poverty (Medicaid) and our 48 million elderly (Medicaire).
We all know America’s healthcare system is an embarrassment. Everyone deserves affordable healthcare. The way to get it is to purchase an guaranteed-renewable individual health insurance policy while you are young and healthy, and keep it for the rest of your life (they can’t raise your rates for illness or injury).
And that’s why I’m working on StuHealth. 90% of students are young and healthy. My challenge is to make them think about this and get affordable permanent coverage while they’re still young and healthy. Before they become a bankruptcy statistic.