this post was submitted on 19 Jan 2026
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I hope she's criticizing for profit companies and not the concept of health insurance per se.
You give me money in exchange for a promise, and I won't honor that promise when you ask for assistance.
If a licensed physician prescribes a procedure, insurance shouldn't evaluate whether it's needed. That's it.
Health insurance is 90% of the problem
As others have said, we can look to other countries for examples of health insurance being done well. Insurance serves an important function for things that would otherwise create large debt unpredictably. It just doesn't work well as a for-profit non-utility industry.
I would say the main issue for the US is the actual healthcare providers charging so much. Insurance companies do enable that in a sense by allowing people to get healthcare that otherwise would be unaffordable. Members are insulated from the cost and simply want their desired care approved, so hospitals take advantage of this by charging increasingly ludicrous amounts. And since at minimum 80% of health insurance premium revenue must go to paying member services, this means coverage costs inevitably spiral.
Insurance companies disappearing would eventually lead to lower prices since patients would no longer be able to afford healthcare, but that's obviously not a good solution. Government regulating the price of healthcare more directly would allow insurance to be both cheaper and more optional.
No. France's health insurance has many issues, but... I recently had to wait one whole month to get non-urgent jaw surgery at the top hospital in the country. Stayed for a week. It should cost me 50€ or so, including meds and post-op care.
Nah. Germany has health insurance and while it's far from perfect, it's on a different planet compared to US health insurance.
Privatised healthcare providers are also an issue.
Or, if you want private capital involved on either side - overall de-/non-regulation is a major problem too.
There are so many instruments the govs could use but just don't bcs monies.
What's the point of health insurance anyway?
They just charge exorbitant prices for basic BS. Single bandage at the hospital? $20 please JUST for the bandage, nothing yet for the nurse, no no that's separate.
Meanwhile you could get 10 bandages at the local pharmacy for $5 and if you're nice the clerk wraps it around your wound.
The only system that makes sense is a controlled state system like we have in the EU where the prices are strictly regulated.
Hell, even here the prices are high, but not THAT high.
Technically, that's the hospital extorting the insurance company, but it's connected for sure.
Both are horrible to ever exist!
And for the same reason - it can never be a free market if demand and supply aren't both free.
Wanting healthcare when in need isn't really that much of a free choice (demand).
That means on supply side where everyone is motivated by profit you don't need any sort of collusion for everyone to consistently pump up healthcare costs & healthcare insurance premiums, there just isn't any downside.
Direct market competition is financially pointless so all you ever see is mergers.
Oh - and comprehensive national healthcare has insurance built in naturally & efficiently bcs countries have millions of people that pay for healthcare (and no profit is privatised, even better, participants aren't driven by profit).
In recent decades in Europe we underfunded national healthcare providers & are now slowly privatising it - costs are soaring (nothing compared to USA, but we know what's happening, yet we don't vote for it/representatives don't act on it).