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Indeed, the public healthcare system in Spain, while still great compared to most of the world, is a shadow of what it once was, with the rampant privatization
by manuelflara 8y ago
Indeed, the public healthcare system in Spain, while still great compared to most of the world, is a shadow of what it once was, with the rampant privatization done by the Government in the last decade. A really sad situation. That being said, decent private healthcare here is about 100€/month, so while private healthcare is still considered "a luxury" (because public one is pretty good), it's still very very far from the cost of US private healthcare.
- antr 8y agoRampant privatization? Spain's public healthcare expenditure[1] was: 38.552 €bn in 2002, and 66.678 €bn in 2016 (latest official year), this is a 73% increase in 14 years. On other hand while population was 41.31 m in 2002, and 46.48 m in 2016, A 13% increase. This is a 53% net increase in expenditure per capita. I'm curious to know what "rampant privatization" to you means, as government/public expenditure has by no means slowed down, quite the contrary. In my opinion, healthcare expenditure is out of control. But that is a completely different debate. [1] http://www.mscbs.gob.es/en/estadEstudios/estadisticas/inforRecopilaciones/gastoSanitario2005/home.htm http://www.mscbs.gob.es/en/estadEstudios/estadisticas/inforR...
- dagw 8y agoI'm curious to know what "rampant privatization" to you means, as government/public expenditure has by no means slowed down, quite the contrary. I don't know about Spain, but at least in Sweden there's an argument that the increase in privatization in the health care sector has resulted in higher costs (and thus higher government expenditure) without matching improvement in heath care outcomes.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- pjc50 8y agoAre those numbers inflation-adjusted? Raw expenditure tells us nothing about whether or not it has been privatised, too. Often the privatised services are more expensive - after all, they have to pay dividends.
- antr 8y ago1. the numbers are government healthcare expenditure, not private healthcare expenditure 2. CPI won't change a the bottom line take-away. Feel free to run the numbers.
- dagw 8y ago1. the numbers are government healthcare expenditure, not private healthcare expenditure Sure, but what percentage of that government expenditure is going to private health care providers? And how has that number changed over time?
- RobertoG 8y agoSo, you don't take into account inflation, not GDP per capita grow, not population ageing, but the take-away should be the same.
- antr 8y agoThere is an argument made towards "rampant privatisation", i.e. a transfer of a business from public to private control. However, data shows that government expenditure has increased above CPI, the driver of prices (not an output like "GDP per capita", which for some reason you refer too as an economic driver of sorts). I cannot observe, from official data the I link to, a slow down in public healthcare investment by the Spanish government, and definitely not an increase in expenses due to the Government paying private healthcare players. Feel free to dive into the data and indicate otherwise. I'm not here for armchair politics.
- lbfkbsjcn73 8y agoOut of interest i did a very rough calculation of what inflation-adjusted numbers might look like. I pulled 4% per year inflation out of my ear, and came up with: 38.552 €bn * 1.04^(2016-2002) => 66.76 €bn ..which is uncannily close to your numbers. Inflation probably wasn't exactly 4% YoY, but if it is, then in real Euros, the expenditure per population has decreased.
- antr 8y agoPlease be a bit more serious, change rate between 2002-2016 is closer to 30%. If you want to make up numbers and conclusions be my guest. I'm not here to play Trump-mathematics
- andrenth 8y agoThe average inflation was closer to 2% according to https://www.inflation.eu/inflation-rates/spain/historic-inflation/cpi-inflation-spain.aspx https://www.inflation.eu/inflation-rates/spain/historic-infl...
- ilikehurdles 8y agoThat plus a roughly 12% growth in population over that range.
- lucideer 8y agoPrivatisation has nothing to do with reduction in government expenditure on healthcare: it's merely about where that expenditure goes. As far as I've seen, privatisation seems to normally lead to increases in government expenditure: the US has the highest per capita federal health budgets in the world (and Switzerland, in second place, is far behind)
- ilikehurdles 8y agoThe US has the highest healthcare expenditure and the most privatization. I think I’m seeing a pattern.
- antr 8y agoFeel free to share with us another official source that shows that this increase in expenditure is a result of capital going to private players. There is a big difference between "seeing a pattern" and "believing in a pattern".
- Illotus 8y agoDon't know about Spain, but in some countries privatization means basically that functions that used to be handled by government employees or such are now handled by private enterprises, however the money still comes from public expenditure. The idea is that private enterprises are so much more efficient than government that they can do the same job cheaper while making profit at the same time. Not many success stories for the public in those cases.
- 99052882514569 8y agoWhen you compute per-capita expenditure in 2016 Euros, it's a rather more modest 20% increase. €1191.25 per capita in 2002. €1434.55 per capita in 2016.