I have a hard time figuring out how an individual healthcare consumer would have any rational reason to "monitor and control their own costs"? If I'm sick, I want to be made better. If I have cancer, I want it cured, etc.
There's no point at which the average person with a reasonable prognosis for even 1 more year of life says "gee, that sounds expensive, perhaps I should just die instead, so as to control my own cost to society [or my insurance company]."
I would suggest that insurance policies be required to send a certain amount back to the purchaser each year in the form of a check -- say 20% of premiums. The total amount would be reduced by the amount of services used that year.
If I'm sick, I want to be made better. If I have cancer, I want it cured, etc.
I completely agree that if you have a life-threatening illness cost is not an option. But as a healthy young-person, when I get a cold or something I just take some aspirin and wait to get better. Same goes for ear infections. There is a lot of room for flex in how people get treatment for non-life-threatening illnesses. What the stats show is that the less skin in the game people have, the more likely they are to go to the emergency room for things like common colds.
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I have a hard time figuring out how an individual healthcare consumer would have any rational reason to "monitor and control their own costs"? If I'm sick, I want to be made better. If I have cancer, I want it cured, etc.
There's no point at which the average person with a reasonable prognosis for even 1 more year of life says "gee, that sounds expensive, perhaps I should just die instead, so as to control my own cost to society [or my insurance company]."
I would suggest that insurance policies be required to send a certain amount back to the purchaser each year in the form of a check -- say 20% of premiums. The total amount would be reduced by the amount of services used that year.
If I'm sick, I want to be made better. If I have cancer, I want it cured, etc.
I completely agree that if you have a life-threatening illness cost is not an option. But as a healthy young-person, when I get a cold or something I just take some aspirin and wait to get better. Same goes for ear infections. There is a lot of room for flex in how people get treatment for non-life-threatening illnesses. What the stats show is that the less skin in the game people have, the more likely they are to go to the emergency room for things like common colds.