Jeff Hurvitz: Insurance anger has no easy answer
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Insurance is a concept which dates back to around 1750 BC, when the Babylonians set up a system to safe guard the arrival of ships at sea. The U.S. initiated its version by the 1760’s. It has always existed as the Law Of Large Numbers, a structure based on a sizeable pool of participants providing the capitol for the few impacted by significant loss at any given point.
That a U. S. citizen would assassinate the head of a major insurance company because of a perceived injustice, and receive a certain groundswell of support , is beyond comprehension. The killing of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson was allegedly carried out by a 26-year-old with a problematic back and hatred for coverage denial by large corporations. It was followed by countless “likes” on social media. It represented another fissure in our fragmenting country: small guy versus big guy, good versus evil. But why?
For over 20 years, I have been an agent, an independent contractor representing companies for Long Term Care Insurance. The toughest part of my job has been telling an applicant that they have been denied coverage based some preexisting condition. I was the messenger who carried the decision handed out by Underwriting. Underwriting based their decision on a set of actuarial charts that predicted when a person might go on claim, for how long, and would they have paid enough into the companies’ coffers for it to be a prudent business decision.
And let’s not kid ourselves, companies that sell insurance must survive based on profit. It is part of our free enterprise system. That’s true whether one is providing Life, Health, Fire, Home, Auto, Property & Casualty, or Long Term Care insurance. In the case of the large publicly traded company through which I placed most of my business, I would hop onto their quarterly earnings report conference call every three months. The picture conveyed to shareholders would influence the stock’s performance and then the company’s financial standing.
The U.S. version of insurance was boosted by the Social Security Act, established in 1935. It has stood the test of time and protected countless millions of citizens. Insurance companies have always provided important security blankets. There is a cost for that protection and they cannot accept all applicants. If the government ever got fully involved, that scenario could change. But with that change could come dubious government decision making along with the elephant in the room: how to fund that huge undertaking.
In an industry that has existed for thousands of years. our present systems may have their flaws. But hey provide important protection for policyholders. Unless and until a better concept comes into fruition, we have the luxury of our status quo.
Should the time come for some change, it cannot happen through the use of a gun. If convicted, the alleged assailant of Mr. Thompson may not own a policy, rather a legacy of evil. Let’s encourage civility, as we search for improvement in such a long-established industry.
Jeff Hurvitz (jrhurvitz@aol.com) is a freelance writer and native Philadelphian.
Yeah … no.
Obamacare changed everything.
With ObamaCare, the government made a sweetheart deal with the insurance industry: the government would mandate and subsidize that all citizens purchase what the industry was selling. In return for this windfall, the insurance industry would act as gatekeepers to “bend the cost curve down”.
That’s not a free market, that’s not healthcare, that’s not even insurance.
That’s a racket.
People should not have to go into debt because they can’t afford insurance or due to medical bills. The Affordable Care Act has 21 million Americans who receive medical care, what are you going to replace it with so they can keep their health coverage?
I second the yeah… no.
People pay through the nose. Almost people do. And then they tey to collect on anything and get denied to some extent.
Insurance is no longer a free enterprise – it’s required. Owning anything of significance in our society requires some insurance.
You can’t say it’s free enterprise and that profit is part of it while you abruptly turn away from HOW MUCH profit they make. And that the abrupt increases are not because they necessarily lost money the last few years, but that there is inflation and they need to “catch up”, as I’m told from those in the biz.
When you are legislated to be required in someone’s daily functioning life, you don’t get to say it’s just a free market system. It’s not. The PUC allows rate increases. Insurance losses for them. We get screwed as the insurance find new ways to bury us in paperwork and denials requiring lawyers.
Insurance is a dirty business. Killing that young father and husband was shameful. People’s reactions were shameful when supporting Luigi.
But Insurance companies have been sucking the life out of this country’s Middle class for decades.
George Washington, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison… they decided that violence was required. They used guns. So, knock off the silly “politically correct” narrative nonsense.
Now, those specific people were elites of English ancestry, and many had family roots extending across various regions of the British Isles, including Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. Additionally, some traced their lineage back to the early Dutch settlers of New York (New Netherland) during the colonial era, while others were descendants of French Huguenots. Those are facts. They were educated, connected with big networks, with deep expansive families.
What happened in 1750 BC? Not sure. Was that when King Aeolos gave Odysseus an ox-skin bag which contained all of the strong winds?
People keep doing the same things. They follow the same patterns. We keep getting the same results.
Insurance is a scam and dramatically increases costs. Especially everyday healthcare costs. Remember that doctors visited homes in movies? If we decided to get rid of insurance… subsequently, all costs would fall because people would not be expected to pay excessive and inflated prices. Insurance queers the market.
I understand the shooter was not turned down by United Healthcare and was not an insured of that company. The shooting seems to have been motivated by a sense of terrorism to make a “statement” and not the character portrayed in the movie “Law Abiding Citizen” being put upon by the medical profession and insurers. Since insurance can be generally described as a hedge against loss by a purely fortuitous event, you can see that health insurance is not really insurance, but loss transfer from one party to others, a great deal of items covered by health insurance are things which are routine and can reasonably be expected to be incurred during a lifetime, certainly not fortuitous events. I grew up and was first married during the period when doctor visits were paid in cash. prescriptions were cash only and trips to the hospital cash, with balances due in 30 days. It seems from this distance that the costs were minimal, but what is forgotten is treatments were rudimentary. All of the medical treatments today were just dreams then so of course costs were minimal. Society is not going back to that era. For all the talk of universal payers. universal heath care and so on, just take a look at Canada’s health care, the UK’s National Health Service and you can see a real mess. In the UK, people are being treated in corridors because there are not enough beds, in certain instances ambulance calls are being treated in the parking lot. Both systems have years long waiting lists and even keep a record of how many die while on a waiting list. Think about all this if you ever need a high tech, expensive medical procedure.
“In the UK, people are being treated in corridors because there are not enough beds” Last year I was brough in by ambulance to a metro Philadelphia hospital and had to remain in the hospital for a week. In the first 16 hours there were no beds available and I was placed in empty office that had been renamed a “patient pod”.
Of the top 33 devolved nations in the world 32 of them have socialized medicine, America is the only nation that can’t. So much for the myth of American greatness. In countries with socialized medicine prescriptions cost very little instead of hundreds of dollars, doctors appointments cost less than 100 instead of several hundred, and hospital stays do not mean you have to put yourself in debt.