Life expectancy rise in rich countries slows down: took 30 years to prove

    Curiously, however, for a system apparently stultified by the dead hand of government, Australia’s health system far outperforms the free market-based US healthcare system, which spends nearly twice as much per capita as Australia to deliver far worse outcomes — including Americans dying five years younger than us.

Source: https://www.crikey.com.au/2024/10/16/pubic-private-healthcar...

Bypass: https://clearthis.page/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.crikey.com.au%2F...

    Overall, we now have the fourth-highest life expectancy in the world.

   This is contrary to the narrative that pervades the media about our health system — one in which our “frontline” health workers heroically battle to overcome government neglect and inadequate spending, while the population is beset by various “epidemics” — obesity, alcohol, illicit drugs.

    In fact, Australian longevity is so remarkable that in August The Economist published a piece simply titled “Why do Australians live so long?”

The Economist: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2024/08/23/why-do-a...

AU Gov Report: Advances in measuring healthcare productivity https://www.pc.gov.au/research/completed/measuring-healthcar...

market, maybe, "free" market? I doubt it.

It's not a very free market when there is such a large power differential between the buyer and the seller. You can't exactly shop around for the ambulance or the hospital when you need it, nor can you realistically circumvent the artificially constrained supply [1] of doctors to get cheaper healthcare (unless you live next to the border).

When the alternative is a one-sided market like this, government becomes rather more appealing.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Medical_Association#R...

>market, maybe, "free" market? I doubt it.

The consumer of healthcare is doubly removed from the price of healthcare. This is the opposite of a free market.

The patient did not pay the doctor, the insurance company does. In most cases the patient does not pay for insurance their employer does.

So the normal pricing forces of a free market are removed.

Then we need to talk about certificate of need laws which restrict the supply...

Not really true, as the employer could otherwise pay that money to the employee who would then shop for his own insurance. So the employee pays, but doesn't have a choice.

and salaries are stagnant. why would they pay extra? at least they're obligated to provide insurance, even if it's terrible and impenetrable