Today is declared "well duh" day....

In another "well duh" moment, USA Today has an article about how much it costs those of us with insurance to cover the costs of the uninsured. Yes, Virgina....we pay for it.....

WASHINGTON, (AP) — Providing health care for the uninsured increases the annual cost of insurance premiums for the average worker by $341 and for the average family by $922, according to a study by a group promoting universal health insurance.
Families USA says its study shows the problem is not restricted to the tens of millions of uninsured Americans.

The problem affects everyone, most say, because the insured subsidize the cost of care given the uninsured. Most economists agree that some amount of subsidizing occurs, but the question has been how much.

The study, prepared by Ken Thorpe, a professor at Emory University, concluded that about $1 out of every $12 spent on health insurance premiums indirectly pays for health care provided the uninsured.

The information out there that we spend more on the end result costs of people not having health insurance than it would cost to provide them with basic health insurance has been discussed for well over a decade now. Without trying to turn us into a "socialist" country, the reality is one way or another we pay for this. The hosptials and doctors are not the ones taking a loss, and even those few that do "eat" some of the costs? I'm sure they deduct on on their taxes so we basically pay that too in their paying less in taxes from any deductions they are allowed to take.