To some extent, but to a large degree these costs ultimately get dumped on the providers when patients can’t pay which results in higher charges for everyone and higher insurance rates.
The rest of the cost gets dumped on government and our taxes go up.
It isn’t like the costs of pre-existing conditions go away if they aren’t covered by insurance, and we don’t stop providing care for people when they hit their lifetime coverage limit. The costs just get shifted to somewhere less visible.
To me the strongest argument for single payer is it will make the total costs we pay as a society more visible and therefore more manageable.
As it is today the system is so opaque and there is much shifted cost that no one can get a handle on it.
It isn’t like the costs of pre-existing conditions go away if they aren’t covered by insurance, and we don’t stop providing care for people when they hit their lifetime coverage limit. The costs just get shifted to somewhere less visible.
Is there anything less visible than the transactions that are paid from an insurer to a doctor or medical facility?
To me the strongest argument for single payer is it will make the total costs we pay as a society more visible and therefore more manageable.
More "visible?" Maybe in aggregate. But at some point the number just becomes multiples of a bazillion and nobody cares anymore.
If you really want visibility, just have people pay out of their own pockets for most of their medical care. You can be damn sure the costs will go down if that were the case.