The problem with reading these types of books

Is that I go completely CRAZY. I picked up The Healing of America by T. R. Reid earlier today and I've already found approximately 6,493 items I want to share. But I don't really want to do an extensive recounting of events as told by the author so I'll just share the latest since it continues a discussion I had recently, specifically the cost of health care in the U.S. and ways to control that cost.

"The United States is the only developed country that relies on profit-making health insurance companies to pay for essential and elective care. About 80 percent of non-elderly Americans have health insurance; generally they get it through the job, with the employer paying part of the premium as well. The monthly premium goes toward paying the worker's medical bills, but the insurance firms also soak up a significant share of the premium dollar to cover the costs of marketing, underwriting, and administration, as well as their profit. Economists agree that this is the most expensive possible way to pay for a nation's health care."

What do we typically hear as the reason for our skyrocketing health care costs?

1. Our providers - doctors, nurses, hospitals, drug companies - make more than their counterparts in other developed countries.
2. We pay too much for our drugs.
3. Our penchant for filing malpractice suits against doctors translates into exorbitant malpractice insurance that the doctors have to pay for.

But economists have concluded that lowering fees and prices, cutting American physicians' pay to European levels, making it illegal for drug companies to charge more for drugs sold in the U.S. than they do elsewhere, and banning malpractice suits or limiting compensation for medical malpractice would not be nearly enough to "bring our medical spending down to levels in the rest of the developed world."

In countries that do use insurance plans, the insurance plans "exist only to pay people's medical bills, not to provide dividends for investors."

And now, since I'm starting to feel the need to jot down something from every sentence I'm reading, I'm going to stop. For now.