Progressive Leaders Join Elon Musk in Critiquing American Healthcare Costs

[Social Media]

 

Progressive lawmakers recently found themselves aligned with billionaire Elon Musk in a rare convergence of perspectives on the inefficiencies of the American healthcare system. Musk sparked the discussion on X, formerly known as Twitter, by questioning the value U.S. citizens receive from their healthcare spending.  

 

"Shouldn't the American people be getting ... their money's worth?" Musk wrote, responding to a graphic comparing the United States’ disproportionately high healthcare administrative costs with those of other countries in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The OECD, a global alliance focused on promoting economic growth and trade, has consistently highlighted the inefficiencies in America’s healthcare expenditures.  

 

Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington, chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, responded enthusiastically. “Yes, they should be — and I’ve got the solution. It’s called Medicare for All,” she stated, reiterating her longstanding advocacy for a single-payer healthcare system.  

 

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders also weighed in, echoing Musk’s sentiment. “Yes. We waste hundreds of billions a year on healthcare administrative expenses that make insurance CEOs and wealthy stockholders incredibly rich while 85 million Americans go uninsured or underinsured," Sanders wrote. "Healthcare is a human right. We need Medicare for All.”  

 

David Sirota, a journalist and former speechwriter for Sanders, took the conversation a step further. Referencing Musk’s recent appointment alongside Vivek Ramaswamy to lead the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Sirota suggested a potential solution. "I wrote a memo to Elon about ways for his DOGE to save on healthcare," Sirota shared, citing a 2020 Congressional Budget Office report estimating that a Medicare for All system could save the U.S. approximately $650 billion annually. "Seems like a great initiative to be championed by the Department of Government Efficiency!" Sirota added.  

 

This wasn’t the first instance of Sanders finding common ground with Musk. Just days earlier, Sanders endorsed Musk’s critique of bloated U.S. defense spending. "Elon Musk is right," Sanders posted. "The Pentagon, with a budget of $886 billion, just failed its 7th audit in a row. It's lost track of billions. Last year, only 13 senators voted against the Military Industrial Complex and a defense budget full of waste and fraud. That must change."  

 

As the healthcare debate reignited online, a separate tragedy brought the industry under an even harsher spotlight. Brian Thompson, CEO of UnitedHealthcare, was fatally shot outside a Hilton hotel in Manhattan on Wednesday. The assailant remains at large, and police have released surveillance images of the suspect.  

 

In the aftermath of the shooting, Thompson’s wife, Paulette, revealed that her husband had been the target of recent threats. “There had been some threats,” she told NBC News. “Basically, I don’t know, a lack of coverage? I don’t know details. I just know that he said there were some people that had been threatening him.”  

 

Adding a chilling layer to the incident, police reported finding the words "delay" and "deny" etched into bullet casings at the scene—terms frequently associated with insurance companies’ refusal to approve coverage.  

 

The dual discussions of systemic healthcare failures and tragic violence underscore the urgency of addressing inefficiencies and inequalities in the U.S. healthcare system. With figures like Musk, Sanders, and Jayapal spotlighting the issue, calls for transformative change continue to grow louder.

 

Based on a report by Newsweek 2024-12-07

 

 

 

[WDSmart]

I'm a far-left liberal and a strong progressive. I wouldn't join Elon Musk on anything. 

[rudi49jr]

2 minutes ago, WDSmart said:

I'm a far-left liberal and a strong progressive. I wouldn't join Elon Musk on anything. 

Sometimes you just have to pragmatic. ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’, or something like that.

But still, even though progressive leaders may agree with Musk on this issue, it’s very likely that they have very different ideas about how to fix this. So I’m not at all sure this will be a workable coalition.

[spidermike007]

For once I agree with Musk, health care costs in the US are completely out of control, they are so overpriced and so are prescription drugs. If there's anything that Trump can do to wrestle these profits away from these Mafia organizations like the Healthcare and hospital industry in America and big Pharma that would be a huge boom for the American people. 

 

A good friend of mine got in a bad motorcycle accident some time ago. He almost lost his leg. He got his first of 11 operations at Bangkok Hospital Samui. It costs him over a million baht. They wanted to do a second procedure. They quoted him 1.4 million baht. He decided to transfer to Bangkok. He was quoted 460,000 baht for the same procedure, at a top private hospital there. The surgeon told him that he worked at a public hospital too, and could do the same operation there, for alot less money. He told him he would get him a quote.

 

In the interim, my friend called a buddy in San Diego, who is an orthopedic surgeon. Since my friend is a retired chiropractor, who knew all the terminology, and explained what he needed, and asked for the best price. His friend called him back, and quoted him $960,000, with cash discounts! The local surgeon here got back to him, and told him he could do it for 46,000 baht. He transferred, and they did all the rest of his procedures. So, 1.4 million at Bangkok Hospital, 460,000 at the other private hospital in Bangkok (I think it was Vejthani Hospital), and 46,000 at the public hospital, with an excellent surgeon. VS. 33,000,000 baht in the US. Again, no complaints from this peanut gallery.

[John Drake]

45 minutes ago, spidermike007 said:

For once I agree with Musk, health care costs in the US are completely out of control, they are so overpriced and so are prescription drugs. If there's anything that Trump can do to wrestle these profits away from these Mafia organizations like the Healthcare and hospital industry in America and big Pharma that would be a huge boom for the American people. 

 

 

That is true. But people are avoiding the elephant in the room. And that is what we pay physicians, nurses, hospital admin and staff. It's too much, and it's crippling the entire social system. I'd include insurance admin and processing too. Reducing the pay of the paper shufflers is central to the reform. But so is a reduction in payments to doctors and nurses. Just because someone graduates medical school should not give them a direct pathway to living the lifestyle of a Renaissance Pope.

[gargamon]

35 minutes ago, John Drake said:

 

That is true. But people are avoiding the elephant in the room. And that is what we pay physicians, nurses, hospital admin and staff. It's too much, and it's crippling the entire social system. I'd include insurance admin and processing too. Reducing the pay of the paper shufflers is central to the reform. But so is a reduction in payments to doctors and nurses. Just because someone graduates medical school should not give them a direct pathway to living the lifestyle of a Renaissance Pope.

Rubbish. It's the health insurance companies. Some seem to think the CEOs should be shot.

 

Medicare for all.

[impulse]

1 hour ago, spidermike007 said:

So, 1.4 million at Bangkok Hospital, 460,000 at the other private hospital in Bangkok (I think it was Vejthani Hospital), and 46,000 at the public hospital, with an excellent surgeon. VS. 33,000,000 baht in the US. Again, no complaints from this peanut gallery.

 

I saw the bill for my heart bypass at Bumrungrad (most expensive hospital in Thailand, I think) and it was $60K USD.  Same week, I read a story about a guy in the USA that had paid over $900K for the same surgery in a US hospital.  If he had 20% co-pay, his copay would have been 3x my total bill.  And my care was world class.  Confirmed when, 9 years later, I did a CAT scan (I think) in the USA that showed my 4 grafts were still working great.

 

BTW, with Euro insurance, they paid it 100%.  I only saw the bill to approve payment.  Americans are getting hosed on healthcare and insurance.

 

There's gotta be a good market for medical tourism, given that I would have paid 3x as much deductible as my total Bumrungrad bill.  Seems like tacking on a few weeks of recovery in a tropical paradise would be icing on the cake.  Also leads me to question why US insurance companies wouldn't get in the act and offer to send their policy holders to Thailand...

 

 

 

[John Drake]

10 minutes ago, gargamon said:

Rubbish. It's the health insurance companies. Some seem to think the CEOs should be shot.

 

Medicare for all.

 

Do that. I favor it. But Medicare Part B requires a premium too, along with a 20 percent copay. People would still go bankrupt. You're only going to solve the problem by reducing the number of administrators and the pay of doctors, nurses, and staff.

[John Drake]

3 minutes ago, impulse said:

 

I saw the bill for my heart bypass at Bumrungrad (most expensive hospital in Thailand, I think) and it was $60K USD.  Same week, I read a story about a guy in the USA that had paid over $900K for the same surgery in a US hospital.  If he had 20% co-pay, his copay would have been 3x my total bill.  And my care was world class.  Confirmed when, 9 years later, I did a CAT scan (I think) in the USA that showed my 4 grafts were still working great.

 

BTW, with Euro insurance, they paid it 100%.  I only saw the bill to approve payment.  Americans are getting hosed on healthcare and insurance.

 

There's gotta be a good market for medical tourism, given that I would have paid 3x as much deductible as my total Bumrungrad bill.  Seems like tacking on a few weeks of recovery in a tropical paradise would be icing on the cake.  Also leads me to question why US insurance companies wouldn't get in the act and offer to send their policy holders to Thailand...

 

 

 

 

You wonder why Medicare wouldn't do the same. And agree to pay for medical treatment for expatriates in Thailand rather than have them go home and drain the system in the US.

[impulse]

4 minutes ago, John Drake said:

 

You wonder why Medicare wouldn't do the same. And agree to pay for medical treatment for expatriates in Thailand rather than have them go home and drain the system in the US.

 

That one is easy, but exasperating to explain.  The lobbyists want all the money spent with their client companies.  That's Big Pharma, insurance companies and all the hospitals and healthcare giants that have been bought up with private equity.

 

[John Drake]

13 minutes ago, impulse said:

 

That one is easy, but exasperating to explain.  The lobbyists want all the money spent with their client companies.  That's Big Pharma, insurance companies and all the hospitals and healthcare giants that have been bought up with private equity.

 

 

Good point. A closed system, where the money if funneled directly from the government to the "system."

[impulse]

1 minute ago, John Drake said:

 

Good point. A closed system, where the money if funneled directly from the government to the "system."

 

That's why God Satan invented lobbyists.

 

[novacova]

19 minutes ago, impulse said:

 

That one is easy, but exasperating to explain.  The lobbyists want all the money spent with their client companies.  That's Big Pharma, insurance companies and all the hospitals and healthcare giants that have been bought up with private equity.

 

The problem with the US Capital is that it has become a marketplace and a money scam operation from the taxpayers to large contractors and other companies and some of which is laundered into the pockets of the politicians, opposed to a place for public servants to serve the people. This insidious scam game needs to come to a halt and cleaned out.

[Airalee]

If you want make a doctors head explode in the US just say…

 

”Imagine how affordable health care would be if there was no insurance and no government funding”

 

Of course, leftists will say “but how will the poor afford healthcare?”

 

Easy.  
 

If there is nobody else paying the bill other than the customer, the healthcare industry will have to meet the market.  Doctors will only be able to charge what the market can bear.

 

When a 3rd party is paying the bills, there is no incentive for the consumer to control costs by being healthy via exercise and diet.

 

You want to pay less for healthcare?    Eat healthier and walk.   
 

Don’t be a fat slob.

 

The same goes for housing (get the government out of backstopping mortgages and bailing out banks) and education (no more loans)

[Yellowtail]

Does anyone think Musk, Pramila Jayapal, Bernie Sanders or David Sirota are going to be in the same line as Medicare patients?

 

The government ruins medical insurance and then wants to fix it.  Do we not already have Medicare for all in the with affordable care act? 

 

 

[Purdey]

Most Americans don't understand how insurance works.

 

Insurance is a way of pooling risk, not for saving up for it. 

 

In insurance, your insurer calculates the risk of people they insure and estimates how much they will have to pay in claims during a particular time period. They then charge their customers a “premium”. The total of the premiums should, if they’ve done their job well, exceed the amount of claims paid out, allowing the insurance company to pay their overhead (sales commissions and staff) and to make a profit.

 

Insurance has worked this way for over 400 years now.

 

So, when you pay your money to the insurance company, they use it to pay all the claims made against everyone’s insurance that year. They keep any surplus, but if there’s a deficit it comes out of the insurance company’s capital. That’s the deal. Every year, you pay a new premium, and the cycle starts over again.

 

Most years, you will not make any claims, or will make minimal claims. However, if you’re in an auto accident or need an expensive operation. the pool will pay the costs (minus deductibles and co-pays) even if it far exceeds all the premiums you have paid or will ever pay.

 

So people are using what you put in to pay for expensive items.

[rudi49jr]

2 hours ago, John Drake said:

 

That is true. But people are avoiding the elephant in the room. And that is what we pay physicians, nurses, hospital admin and staff. It's too much, and it's crippling the entire social system. I'd include insurance admin and processing too. Reducing the pay of the paper shufflers is central to the reform. But so is a reduction in payments to doctors and nurses. Just because someone graduates medical school should not give them a direct pathway to living the lifestyle of a Renaissance Pope.

Doctors I don’t know, but nurses, hospital admin and staff and such usually don’t get paid too much. The problem is that big pharma and insurance companies want to make big bucks, for their shareholders, their corporate managers, ceo’s and whatnot. Health care has become a huge money making business, which it shouldn’t be. At least not on this scale. 
I remember a few years ago some young punk millionaire bought a company that made a certain medicine and immediately raised the price of that medicine by like 10,000 per cent. It is just greed. 

[Yellowtail]

4 minutes ago, rudi49jr said:

Doctors I don’t know, but nurses, hospital admin and staff and such usually don’t get paid too much. The problem is that big pharma and insurance companies want to make big bucks, for their shareholders, their corporate managers, ceo’s and whatnot. Health care has become a huge money making business, which it shouldn’t be. At least not on this scale. 
I remember a few years ago some young punk millionaire bought a company that made a certain medicine and immediately raised the price of that medicine by like 10,000 per cent. It is just greed. 

Link?

[impulse]

5 minutes ago, Yellowtail said:

Link?

 

The man was Martin Shkreli, the former CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals, who was called before Cummings' committee in February 2016. After hiking the price of an old drug for parasitic infections to $750 a pill from $13.50, Shkreli became the poster boy for pharmaceutical greed that helped define the past decade.

 

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/12/31/792617538/a-decade-marked-by-outrage-over-drug-prices

[jas007]

2 minutes ago, rudi49jr said:

I remember a few years ago some young punk millionaire bought a company that made a certain medicine and immediately raised the price of that medicine by like 10,000 per cent. It is just greed. 

I think that guy ended up in prison on an unrelated charge.  He may be out now.  They had a nickname for him, but it escapes me now. 

 

Anyway, the entire healthcare industry, including the drug companies, the doctors, the insurance companies, and everyone else employed in that system, is today nothing but a "business."  They run it like any other business.  It and the military industrial complex. Both operate as ruthless capitalists.  Both have hundreds of lobbyists in DC, and both make the illegal drug cartels look like a bunch of amateurs.  Sick or injured? If you're not insured, then "sorry, you didn't pay for "protection."   Otherwise, you may just live to see another day. And, just as the health care industry would collapse without sick people, so too would the military complex collapse without a continual state of war.  And so if they can't find one somewhere, they manufacture one.  It's been that way for years. 

[HappyExpat57]

[HappyExpat57]

A "for profit" healthcare system is wrong on every level.

[Yellowtail]

1 minute ago, HappyExpat57 said:

In the same way that homeowners or auto insurance does, yes? 

 

Is Medicare not insurance? Are you for abolishing it? 

[Yellowtail]

1 minute ago, HappyExpat57 said:

A "for profit" healthcare system is wrong on every level.

What about "for profit" hospitals? 

 

Or "for profit" doctors? 

[jas007]

Just now, Yellowtail said:

In the same way that homeowners or auto insurance does, yes? 

 

Is Medicare not insurance? Are you for abolishing it? 

Medicare is run by the government.  It's a political animal and would go broke in short order if it had to raise rates at a level consistent with costs.  But it's politically popular, or at least it has been, and so it has continued and expanded in scope, like everything else the government gets involved in.  Its presence enables the rest of the system to continue on its course.  It's a parasitic symbiotic relationship of sorts.

[jas007]

8 minutes ago, Yellowtail said:

What about "for profit" hospitals? 

 

Or "for profit" doctors? 

In my mind, "for profit" is fine so long as it emerges from an arms length transaction not entered into under duress.  For example, if a billionaire wants to hire a private physician to be at his beck and call 24/7, then why not? On the other hand, if Mr. Middle Class is crossing the street and gets run over by a motorcycle, does that person have any real choice as to whether or not he wants medical care?  It's more like "give us your money, or else." I realize that may be extreme in the USA in case of an emergency and the need to medically stabilize the patient, but generally, that's how it works.  You pay if you make an appointment with a doctor, and you pay if you want your meds from the drugstore. Otherwise, you take your chances. 

[rudi49jr]

1 hour ago, Yellowtail said:

Link?

If you want links for USA healthcare has become big business, there are literally thousands to be found on Google. Here are just a few:

 

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6139860/

 

https://www.businessinsider.com/big-corporations-unitedhealth-optum-cvs-walgreens-taking-over-healthcare-industry-2024-4?international=true&r=US&IR=T
 

https://www.economist.com/business/2023/10/08/who-profits-most-from-americas-baffling-health-care-system

[scottiejohn]

1 hour ago, HappyExpat57 said:

A "for profit" healthcare system is wrong on every level.

Should it run at a loss?

 

[jas007]

10 minutes ago, scottiejohn said:

Should it run at a loss?

 

Some industries are regulated. Electric utility companies, for example, are usually privately held businesses. Their rates are regulated so as to allow for a fair return on capital. Or at least that's the theory. It seems to work better in some states than it does in others. 

 

Regulate medical care in a similar fashion?  That would mean set prices for medical procedures and for drugs. Not quite a similar situation, though. And electron running through power lines is the same as every other electron, without distinction.  But medical care? How would you account for factors that are difficult to measure?  Take heart surgeons, for example.  Some are highly skilled and at the top of their profession.  Others may sometimes be on the verge of losing their license.  Should we pay both doctors the same for the same procedure? Should we pay for mediocrity, only?  You get what you pay for.  In other words, you'd end up with a medical system that's only mediocre. 

 

Given the current structure of the political system, making those kinds of changes would likely prove impossible.  The drug companies have too many lobbyists. The AMA has lots of lobbyists.  The hospitals and other care facilities have lobbyists.  And congress doesn't seem to care about  its constituents.  Only those making big campaign contributions. 

[john donson]

ELON MUSK should start making MEDICINE at cost + little profit...  or allowed to import and double the price from india... now it is whatever they think they can milk the insurance, healthcare, sick person