Hospital Costs And Drug Price Transparency Might Not Bring About Desired Health Care Savings

Harvard Business Review Logo“Will price transparency lower health care costs? Economic theory and hospital opposition suggest it would, but the answer is not as straightforward as you might expect and could differ from market to market. Health care is a really strange economic sector, and it doesn’t always follow the usual rules.”

  • …hospitals with low fees may demand the higher prices charged by sister institutions. Since 70% of hospital markets are so consolidated that they lack effective competition, the ability of low-priced institutions to push fees up should not be underestimated.
  • …some research also shows that in the absence of understandable quality information, some consumers assume that high price means high quality and are actually drawn to higher-priced institutions. There’s a reason, after all, that the Ritz is more expensive than Motel 6. 

Click link below to read more:

https://hbr.org/2019/07/price-transparency-in-health-care-is-coming-to-the-u-s-but-will-it-matter

 

 

Boomers Health Videos: “Back And Neck Pain – Precision Spine Diagnosis Guided Therapy” (UCTV)

 

UCTV Health and MedicineDiscover the latest tools used to diagnose and treat back and neck pain. Series: “UCSF Osher Center for Integrative Medicine presents Mini Medical School for the Public”

 

0:24 – Defining the Problem – Vinil Shah, MD

10:13 – A Surgeon’s Perspective – Aaron Clark, MD, PhD

32:57 – Spine Imaging and Pain Intervention – Cynthia Chin, MD

58:24 – Precision Spine Imaging: What the Future Holds – Vinil Shah, MD

1:06:50 – Audience Questions

Retirement Myths: Expenses & Taxes Will Decrease While Savings, Social Security & Work Will Be Adequate

From Seeking Alpha article:

 

  • Myth #1 – My Expenses Will Be Cut In Half!

    One of the greatest myths for future retirees is that expenses will drop when you retire. Some think their living expenses will virtually cut in half overnight.

    However, that is usually not the case. In fact, oftentimes retirees spend more in retirement (especially in the first few years) than they did during their working days. Why is that?

  • Myth #2 – Social Security Will Provide for Most of My Retirement Needs

    Many people are led to believe that they’ll manage to live just on Social Security in retirement. In most cases, however, that’s just not doable. Today, Social Security pays the average recipient only $1,461 a month in benefits. Over the course of a year, that’s $17,532. Meanwhile, the average retired household spends $46,000 a year. So there is a pretty large disconnect between the two. Property taxes alone in some blue states amount to what some receive all year in Social Security payments.

  • Myth #3 – I Can Just Keep Working

    Surveys show that many people nearing retirement would prefer to continue working to close any gaps they feel they have in their retirement funding. Or they want to continue working because they have no plans for their free time after they retire. Regardless of which reason, they want to keep working- and it does provide a dual benefit- it gives a further boost to your nest egg while at the same time reduces the number of years you’ll need to live off it.

  • Myth #4 – It’s Too Late To Start Saving

    They say the eighth wonder of the world is compound interest. And it obviously has a bigger effect the earlier you start saving, but you’re never too old to take advantage of its power to grow your money.

    Aside from compounding, the IRS gives other incentives to save for those nearing retirement. IRAs, 401Ks, and other tax-advantaged plans give investors that are 50 and older the ability to make ‘catch up’ contributions. Those Traditional and Roth IRAs can make an additional $1,000 each year per investor. 401Ks and like plans can add $6,000 as a catch-up.

  • Myth #5 – Taxes Will Be Much Less In Retirement

    As you’ve seen in previous points, where we show your need to save more, invest more, and possibly work more – you will probably not be reducing your overall income that much. So if your income isn’t going to drop, then you shouldn’t assume with any honesty that your tax bill will drop.

    The Trump tax cut reduced rates, but removed certain deductions. Even if we call it a wash, not many would bet that rates would drop further from here. The easy bet would be to wager they will only rise from here.

Seeking-Alpha-Logo

Read article by clicking here: https://seekingalpha.com/article/4273061-common-retirement-myths-debunked

Journal Of Obesity Study Finds Short Duration And High Variability Of Sleep Undermines Weight Loss

“Prospective analysis of 1986 community-dwelling subjects (mean age 65 years, 47% females) with overweight/obesity and metabolic syndrome from the PREDIMED-Plus trial was conducted…

Our findings suggest that the less variability in sleep duration or an adequate sleep duration the greater the success of the lifestyle interventions in adiposity.”

International Journal of Obesity

Click on Journal of Obesity to read article.