Posted on 12/16/2023 8:47:11 AM PST by lowbridge
The issue is what is a credit report.
If it does not include material information of interest to potential creditors then it becomes something new—an unreliable credit report.
This is like saying that a basketball team is not allowed to look at height when evaluating prospects.
Yeah—it is unfair that short folks are discriminated against by basketball teams.
But—putting them on the team anyway does not solve anything for very long.
BAD STOCK MARKET INVESTMENT debt is such a vicious cycle. It truly hits low-income earners, but it forces them to stay low-income earners because they can’t never get out from under it.
STUDENT debt is such a vicious cycle. It truly hits low-income earners, but it forces them to stay low-income earners because they can’t never get out from under it.
RACE TRACK debt is such a vicious cycle. It truly hits low-income earners, but it forces them to stay low-income earners because they can’t never get out from under it.
QUESTION: Can Hochul identify a SINGLE form of debt that isn't "cruel" and doesn't hit primarily low-income people?
Well, at least this cockamamie law applies only to earners, right? So people on welfare, retirees, etc. won't be able to profit from it.
Regards,
Yup—another variation on this theme is college education and college loans.
The “experts” noticed that folks with college degrees had much higher lifetime earnings than those without college degrees.
They concluded it was unfair that black people did not have as many college degrees as white people.
Therefore they came up with “affirmative action” to get more black kids admitted to college—and college loans to help the pay for it.
What they have actually done is created greater poverty for many blacks—who borrowed money to pay for college, realized they could not cut it—and dropped out with the worst of both worlds—a ton of debt and no college degree.
Even for those blacks who did get college degrees the majority still ended up in major trouble—deep in debt and often lacking the skills to survive long in the cold cruel job world where a college degree may get you in the door but won’t keep you there for long.
Short people are short because of genetics. There’s nothing they can do about their height on a basketball court
Credit scores reflect people’s borrowing history
If they have to borrow to pay a medical account that is something they can’t have planned for in this economy. No one says I have to plan my spending around the chance I might get cancer. The best medical insurance covers 80%. The best out of work plan doesn’t cover more than 10% of salary for time away from work
It’s tens of thousands. No one is going to plan for that in this economy. It’s a risk. They’re penalized enough for being short of money, dinging them on a credit report takes more money from them
Who says, I need to put away $50 k in case I get cancer in an economy where a high majority is paycheck to paycheck?
The basketball analogy is valid.
An unforeseen medical expense is not genetic but for these purposes it might as well be.
It is an unfair random occurrence.
If we change the rules to compensate people for unfair random occurrences we are just lying to ourselves.
Life is unfair—denying it just creates new problems.
The $100 actually billed to the insurance carrier is mostly from a negotiated contract price for the service or good. Or it's the Medicare rate if you are a Medicare patient.
Normally Medicare pays 80%, or $80 for a $100 "invoice". The patient is responsible for the 20% difference. In certain cases, the patient balance is written off if the patient qualifies based on income and other factors. If you are actually paying the balance, the provider has no reason to find out if you qualify for a write-off.
And the whole system just gets more complicated from there.
“ If we change the rules to compensate people for unfair random occurrences we are just lying to ourselves.”
Silly.
The rules of the basketball court are the same as any physical measurement rules
Credit score rules are made up as evidenced by this ruling. Same as the overinflated rulings of medical expenses
Hospital administrators and doctors are famous for being stupid and overinflated with economics
Pharmaceutical companies sit on 500 billion while charging too much for drugs to old people with no active income
Basketball ? What?
No
Credit reports are used to evaluate whether or not potential creditors can pay their bills.
If they become unreliable then folks who loan money will have to use other metrics—and they may be metrics you don’t like.
They may have to violate your privacy in a dozen sneaky ways since they can’t rely on credit reports—or they may refuse to loan you any money at all no matter who you are because they have no reliable metric.
There is no free lunch here.
“sticker price”
Thanks for the explanation. I got more out of your explanation than anything the DME or insurance company explained.
So the “bill rate” is entirely fictitious like “sticker price” on so many products?
Before my time, but I think the disconnect between the bill rate and normal provider pricing expectations all started back in the 1960's, when Medicare first came into existence. Then private insurance got involved and things just got more and more complicated.
Credit reports should -and DO as it turns out - leave out the insane cost of medical care
My mother told me once that when I was born my father had just got out of flying with the Marines they had no medical insurance yet. I cost $75
We have come to expect outrageousness in medicine. This ruling is a testament to medical cost outrageousness
i bought one of those unicorns.
It got cancer and I had to put it down. I couldn’t afford the veterinary bills.
Well, a federal law required them to publish their rates per procedure about ten years ago.
Now…understanding your procedure and everything it entails pretty much requires a degree in medical coding and hospital administrative procedures.
But…the prices are available.
I can answer that.
There is the retail price. That’s the $300.
Then there is the Medicare contract price. That is the price that Medicare tells providers it will pay. Honestly, that is the basis for most hospital based healthcare costs.
The insurance companies will look at the Medicare contract price and determine what their base will bear—that is, what do their customers need and what can they pay to insure a profit for the insurance company.
This is the price the insurance company will contract with your provider. That is the $100 price.
Since you haven’t hit your deductible or out of pocket, they will pay the 85% of their contract price. You owe the $16.
Think of the first price as the un-discounted suggested retail price. And no one pays retail.
In a lot of cases its the few thousand before the deductible that end up as bad debt for the hospitals. Unfortunately…it’s THAT money that ends up paying for the hospitals uncovered expenses.
If someone is in the ICU, $12k is about one day of coverage. My wife was in cardiac care for two days, and it was about $8k a day. ICU is a step up.
Thanks, LT. I logged onto my insurance account yesterday and was astounded to see the total value of services provided to me this year was over $11,000. I’ve been to the doctor once, to Urgent Care once (COVID), had some routine lab work done, got the CPAP machine, and had a retina specialist examine my right eye. I couldn’t believe the total to-date is $11k.
That’s one of your best posts ever.
It’s outrageous
The medical billing sticker price is also called the “Paymaster” rate according to a long Fortune article I read several years ago. Fortunately there is no “adjusted market value” markup like at the car lots.
If you look at the profit margins of most hospitals you would see it is usually less than 3%—at least on not for profit systems.
Where those hospitals are getting killed is on the cost of capital to stay up to date on the “tech” side. Most of them had bonds in the 4-5% range. They just went up to the 9% rate. For facilities with razor thin margins, this will be the death of the mid sized non profit. They are already cutting services left and right.
Nursing and support staff are in short supply. So those costs are skyrocketing.
Healthcare is already a controlled market because of Medicare. Dont let anyone kid you, the government already sets the price. And they are not keeping up.
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