All that allowing Insurance Companies to sell across state lines does is bring down the regulation of the Insurance Industry. The state with the least regulation will have PO boxes galore that will become the new corporate headquarters of XYZ insurance. It isnt about saving the customers money it is about bringing down regulations to the lowest common denominator.

Articles about selling over state lines.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/02/selling_insurance_across_state.html
http://blogs.forbes.com/rickungar/2010/10/06/would-the-sale-of-health-insurance-across-state-lines-really-benefit-americans/

You will see in those 2 articles information about what happened in the Credit Card industry

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/credit/more/rise.html

So here are a couple more pieces of documentation for you to read.

Why Your Stitches cost $1500
http://www.medicalbillingandcoding.org/medical-costs-1/
http://www.medicalbillingandcoding.org/medical-costs-2/

Some tidbits.
Myth - Americans drink and smoke to much
Myth - America has larger Elderly population
Myth - Obesity in America Skyrockets costs
Myth - Malpractice is out of control
Truth - Providers charge more because they can
Truth - Astounding Administrative Overhead
Truth - Massive Outpatient Care Costs
Truth - Out Dr's are overpaid

The study comes from a Medical Billing and Coding.Org which is dedicated to students and professionals in the Medical Billing and Coding industry.

Each time someone brings a point you mark it as annecdotal, don't answer and move on.

Besides the obvious glaring issue that some of the big issue today in healthcare comes because of monopole and free market isn't going to regulate that.

And the end goal of free market isn't to be fair to everyone and healthcare is one area where the goal isn't to maximise profit...

PS : when I speak of monopole I don't speak of insurance I speak of the fact that a lot of the new biotech treatment are only available from one company ( like Enbrel that mentionned above).

How is free market going to lower the cost of the a prescription when it is only available from one company ? 

You do know that isn't actually a study right.

It was a picture put together via copying different things off the internet form different sources on a website that gets paid to refer students.

The biggest source  for the chart beingbeing Erza Klein...

Who... well I'll let him say it.

"I used to have political aspirations," said Klein. "...in the sense of getting my name on a ballot and promising Iowans more ethanol subsidies than they could handle. But over time, I found that I enjoy writing far more. More to the point, I think that the creation of a media environment that can sustain and propel progressivism is more important than any single elected official. I'd trade a liberal O'Reilly (or Limbaugh!) for 5, 10 congressmen. The media is as effective and important an agent for change as the legislative bodies, and I think it's where I'm happiest and most effective."

So, someone who aspires to be the Liberal Bill O'Reily.

I only stated 1 portion of a post as anecdotal as a means to understand the context between a single person account and the general overall quality.   The second refernce to being anecdotal was simply because he said hsi story wasn't an anecdote which by the very definition of an anecdote, it was.  So it was only to clarify the defintiion for him.   If you are inferring that I am somehow negating his point solely on the grounds of his point being an anecdote, then that is your own issue.  That's called projection.

I'm going to asume you mean monopoly and not monopole - a single radio antenna or a concept in physics.  The monopolies of the healthcare industry are because of government intervention.  Ever hear of the Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973?  The government basically created the HMO's.  And the free market handles healthcare just fine.  I already gave a perfect example of that with elective cosmetic surgeries and procedures.  Why isn't Lasik monopolized?  Why isn't Lasik increasing in costs? 

Did you know that if you pay cash for standard check ups, doctor visits, basic procedures, even hospital stays that you can usually negotiate the prices and get it down 40%?  Ask yourself why they'd allow that.

True, the goal of the free market isn't necessarily to be fair to everyone.  I can concede that.  BUT, the goal is to be successful and when in a completely competitive market, the entity with the best solution for customers will win out...because it is they who decide how successful a company can be.  It is in therefore in the best interst of the competing entities to outdo each other in costs and services else lose out on business to the other guy and therefore lose out on profit.   See, greed can be a useful tool when balanced properly by risk factors.  You take away the risk factors, which the government intervention does, and they don't care hwo good of a service they are providing or how much it costs to the paient...they have to pay it anyway.

As for your example regarding new procedures being exclusive to the provider that developed the procedure.   Let me ask you this, how many people would go through the ordeal of funding and developing a new procedure if they knew it would get taken away from them the monent they invented it.  You want ingenuity yet what you propose stifles it greatly.   How much ingenuity came out of communist Russia?  Do you know why China is now advancing so fast in ingenuity?  Because they've adopted a capitalistic business environment over the past 2 decades. 

Your presription question: Doctors and hospitals get kickbacks for prescribing the new exclusive drug so the drug company charges a premium for the drug itself so both the manufacturer and the doctor/hospital profit big time.   The government encourages this through subsidies to these drug companies.  Get rid of all this financial extortion and you lower the cost already.   Now, opening the market up more freely enables more competing drugs...so not so exclusive anymore.  Again, lowering the costs.

The drug I am talking about has been on market for 9 years, there's no new exclusive kickback..

And fact remains that the free market pressure will not apply to drugs that are only available from one manufacturer ( which is the case for pretty much every new biotech discovery) so saying that free market will lower the costs is just a plain misrepresentation. Those drugs take dozens of years to develop, it's not like others companies can release a comparable product when they see one taking off...

By the way, the same drug costs half the price in France. Is it because it's less regulated ? Nope, the government actually forces the manufacturer to lower their prices on prescriptions.

And funny enough, they haven't decided to leave that market despite those pressures...

When the news came that they had an agreement the asian markets reactied positive, when their were more details about the agreement the markets fell and even the nasdaq had a hard time.

More proof that investors have no idea what they want. For the fatcats at the end of the day this was the best possible deal. They could have gotten stuck with tax hikes, and then what would they have done? Killed the stock market and thrown a hissy fit before flying off in their private jet to their tax-haven, that's what.

Viper1,

You keep going on about others anecdotal comments. Yet I havent seen you post 1 link to a study supporting your points.

As for Lasik, why wouldn't the cost for a procedure that relies heavily on cutting edge technology (lasers and computers) reduce in cost over time. Most items that are computer based reduce over time. Look at the supercomputer you probably have in your pocket.

Kasz216,

Ezra Klein was 3 of the 13 sources and the major piece from Ezra Klein is just an industry report he provided a link to.

the markets fell because of the latests manufacturing report not because of more details about the bill.........

Yeah it is more of an combination of reports,  the reports were not out when I checked yesterday while the markets fell in Asia/Europe...  though.


http://www.zacks.com/stock/news/58195/Stock+Market+News+for+August+2,+2011