All of that money does NOT go to profits (though much surely does). Much of it goes to:
1) Medical research (especially from the drug companies)--the US pays for about 90% of the medical research worldwide, and that's the reason we have the drugs and cures we have, the surgical procedures we have, and the reason health care is so much improved over years ago. This particular "big buisness" is the reason we can do heart transplants and have essentially cured AIDS.
The quality of health care in America is among the BEST in the world, and in many cases THE BEST in the world, period. The issue here is not quality, but helping those who can't afford this health care. Those of us in the cigar world should understand that quality usually comes at a cost.
2) Waste. This is what I'm talking about with Medicare as well. When an person without insurance comes into a public hospital, that hospital is REQUIRED BY LAW to see that patient and if needs be treat them. The idea that there are people in the country being denied necessary medical treatments that could be performed easily and cheaply if they only had insurance--this is a myth. My wife is a doctor, and she has to treat these patients all the time. Women who are on crack, have 4 kids at home, and take an ambulance to see the doctor AMA because they want to save money on a taxi ... it's insane. Medicare pays for much of this waste, but the individual hospitals pay for it as well (and they have to pay insurance to protect themselves from malpractice in order to treat these non-paying patients).
--EXAMPLE: It costs a ton of money to ride in an ambulence. Why? You have to pay 24-hour EMTs, Paramedics, Drivers, Techs, ER nurses, hospital admin, etc, and pay for vehicles and upkeep, 911 dispatch workers, etc, etc. (Think about all the people that are employed by this!) Then, YOU AND I have to pay for every person who uses the ambulance service who does not have insurance, including the idiots who use it like a taxi. These costs (the ones not covered by medicare) are passed on to us.
3) Malpractice. Everyone who works in a hospital needs special insurance. Those who touch patients need malpractice insurance. This is one of the most HORRIBLE industries there is. Trial lawyers like John Edwards have made a ridiculously lucrative career out of convincing juries of emotional people that various mistakes made by doctors and hospital workers are worth millions upon millions of dollars. If we don't put serious caps on malpractice lawsuits soon, the entire healthcare industry will collapse.
EXAMPLE--The average OB/GYN doctor who has NEVER had a malpractice suit against them pays roughly HALF of their salary to malpractice insurance. There are many people in the country that do not have a single OB/GYN within hours of their city. This isn't because they live in the middle of nowhere, it's because malpractice insurance costs so insanely much for OB/GYN doctors that they simply cannot afford to practice in certian places. In certian states it is estimated that there needs to be two or even three times as many OB/GYNs in order to meet the needs of the patients, but they'll never meet that demand because those doctors cannot afford to work there. There are places in the country where OB/GYNs make less money than a high school teacher ... OBs spend 24 years in school, work insanely long hours, and usually graduate with over $100,000 in school debt.
