Originally Posted by playwrite

Yes, tax evasion remains fairly pervasive in Russia but no where near to the extent of just a few years ago particularly amongst the really big players.

I couldn't give a shit about the "big players" -- my point all along has been human-scale. And let me tell you, buddy, the middle class in Russia pays damn near 0% in any taxes other than VAT (which is close to impossible to avoid, anyway). There's no withholding; salaries are generally paid in cash; and it is in the interests of both employers and employees to massively (like on the order of 10x in my personal experience) understate wages. And even then, simple non-payment of taxes is unlikely to result in any kind of serious penalties to a russian who isn't one of those thousand or so "big players".

Doctors and other medical personnel have not historically been viewed as prestigious positions and have not been highly paid (medical researchers are a different story).

You misunderstand the situation. The reason they are paid only a relatively normal middle-class salary is that, unlike in the US model, there is absolutely no cartelization of the medical field in Russia. That being the case, anyone with an inclination can train (and with the requisite effort, become credentialed) to be a doctor. A large pool of doctors, coupled with the absolute absence of crushing debt or otherwise ginormous buy-in to the field, means that "doctor" is just another skilled technical job there -- and it pays to match.
But now we're getting back into 'flaws of the American system'...

Well, American doctors make way more money than their international counterparts. The problem is, they report less job satisfaction and we end up with fewer doctors per capita than "poorer" (and happier) doctors in Russia and France.

Coming out of school, the average American doc is bringing along some $150-$200,000 worth of student debt. That is of course, despite the fact that most people who do make it through medical school were already born in to the top 10% of households. In some specialties, that quarter million could also be equal to an annual malpractice premium. Everyone has their hand out and it is the doctor's responsibility to pay up to a whole bunch of vaguely irrelevant special interests. (OK, someone has to pay for the education, but loans of that scope are going to cost twice the original principle to pay back)

On day 1, they doctors are so deep in financial obligations that they simply can't afford to work at anything other than insane wages. Since few hospitals hire at those insane wages, they're either going to work 60 hrs to break even or they're going to borrow even more to set up a private practice. (Including 3-4 insurance claims & billing specialists per MD)

At least we can import doctors once in a while... some people are still fooled by high nominal dollar values.

Originally Posted by Child of Socrates

I'm sorry about your illness. But your revelation does make me curious. Are you personally being screwed over by an insurance company due to your condition?

COS, I have a very rare illness and so have connected with a support group that covers the world. This auto-immune illness mainly attacks women. Nearly weekly, on this site, there is someone from the US frequently asking how they can get insurance, because of a job lose or other situations, now that they have a pre-existing condition. There are some who have insurance, but like Independent was explaining, it is out of this world expensive. Those from other countries who are on our site find our health care system a disgrace.

I have been working for a Medicare for all for many years, way before I was diagnosed with my illness. So I have seen first hand the inhumane ways the insurance industry has treated people. Plus, my husband, who works in a hospital, sees on a daily basis patients denied much needed care.

Now, I have found that I am faced with the uncertainty of having health insurance. My husband was told that the hospital may be merging his mental health and addictions units with other mental health facilities in the area, so there is a chance that he will not have a job. That prospect sends a chill down my spine because the treatment, tests and medicine for my illness are extremely expensive. We can buy Cobra for 18 months and that will cost us between 20 and 25 thousand dollars. After that, I would have to wait 6 months to get on the new pre-existing condition insurance of the new reform bill. Six months is an impossibility because just one trip to the hospital, during that waiting period, can cost thousands of dollars.

This is just my story. So you see, from my perspective, and thousands of others like me, this reform bill is like a promised life boat, but it has a huge hole in the bottom.

Originally Posted by Odin

You mis understood me, What I meant was people should never have to be in such a destitute condition in the first place.

It's God's fault (or "Nature's God if you prefer).

I mean, how more naked, helpless and destitute can you get than at the moment your mother decided to let you breathe your first breath, rather than aborting you?

Sheesh, the least "he/she/it" could've of done was give us a Kohl's gift certificate, when we're born.

Originally Posted by Justin '77

I couldn't give a shit about the "big players" -- my point all along has been human-scale. And let me tell you, buddy, the middle class in Russia pays damn near 0% in any taxes other than VAT (which is close to impossible to avoid, anyway). There's no withholding; salaries are generally paid in cash; and it is in the interests of both employers and employees to massively (like on the order of 10x in my personal experience) understate wages. And even then, simple non-payment of taxes is unlikely to result in any kind of serious penalties to a russian who isn't one of those thousand or so "big players".

You misunderstand the situation. The reason they are paid only a relatively normal middle-class salary is that, unlike in the US model, there is absolutely no cartelization of the medical field in Russia. That being the case, anyone with an inclination can train (and with the requisite effort, become credentialed) to be a doctor. A large pool of doctors, coupled with the absolute absence of crushing debt or otherwise ginormous buy-in to the field, means that "doctor" is just another skilled technical job there -- and it pays to match.
But now we're getting back into 'flaws of the American system'...

Nothing really here to disagree with, but just to note that if you really want to understand the Russian system, you have to 'care' (as in include it in your analysts) about the big players who make it possible. Actually, it is Putin who makes it possible by making the big players pay for the Russian medical system. It is an enormous transfer of wealth - those on the Rgiht would say from the rich to the 'everyman' those on the Left would point out that the big players are there on the backs of the everyman.

Putin, understanding Russian history and being a technocrat, just tells the big players to do it or be another Khodorkovsky, Berezovsky or even Litvinenko.

So you want to turn all health care providers here into government workers, hey?!

First Glick wants 6 years of a free SS lunch for Xers. Then Indy followed suit. Now this! I had no idea how many closeted pinko commies there are on the forum!

Are you guys conspiring to turn me to the dark side?

Given the past 30 years, I might just go along quietly.

Originally Posted by independent

Well, American doctors make way more money than their international counterparts. The problem is, they report less job satisfaction and we end up with fewer doctors per capita than "poorer" (and happier) doctors in Russia and France.

Coming out of school, the average American doc is bringing along some $150-$200,000 worth of student debt. That is of course, despite the fact that most people who do make it through medical school were already born in to the top 10% of households. In some specialties, that quarter million could also be equal to an annual malpractice premium. Everyone has their hand out and it is the doctor's responsibility to pay up to a whole bunch of vaguely irrelevant special interests. (OK, someone has to pay for the education, but loans of that scope are going to cost twice the original principle to pay back)

On day 1, they doctors are so deep in financial obligations that they simply can't afford to work at anything other than insane wages. Since few hospitals hire at those insane wages, they're either going to work 60 hrs to break even or they're going to borrow even more to set up a private practice. (Including 3-4 insurance claims & billing specialists per MD)

At least we can import doctors once in a while... some people are still fooled by high nominal dollar values.

Maybe we should offer to forgive that debt if our docs and dentists will sign on to being govt workers for life?

Try that out on your doc - just make sure he isn't holding one of your, a-hum, vital body parts at the moment that you do.

Imagine Rani as a public servant!

Originally Posted by Publius

It's God's fault (or "Nature's God if you prefer).

I mean, how more naked, helpless and destitute can you get than at the moment your mother decided to let you breathe your first breath, rather than aborting you?

Sheesh, the least "he/she/it" could've of done was give us a Kohl's gift certificate, when we're born.

If God has a fault, it would be making you a master of inane conflating.

Yeessh!

Originally Posted by playwrite

Maybe we should offer to forgive that debt if our docs and dentists will sign on to being govt workers for life?

Try that out on your doc - just make sure he isn't holding one of your, a-hum, vital body parts at the moment that you do.

Imagine Rani as a public servant!

QUESTION: Doctors are hurt financially by single-payer health care?

True and False. Doctors in Canada do make less than their US counterparts. But they also have lower overhead, and usually much better working conditions. A few reasons for this:
First, as noted, they don’t have to charge higher fees to cover the salary of a full-time staffer to deal with over a hundred different insurers, all of whom are bent on denying care whenever possible. In fact, most Canadian doctors get by quite nicely with just one assistant, who cheerfully handles the phones, mail, scheduling, patient reception, stocking, filing, and billing all by herself in the course of a standard workday.

Second, they don’t have to spend several hours every day on the phone cajoling insurance company bean counters into doing the right thing by their patients. My doctor in California worked a 70-hour week: 35 hours seeing patients, and another 35 hours on the phone arguing with insurance companies. My Canadian doctor, on the other hand, works a 35-hour week, period. She files her invoices online, and the vast majority are simply paid — quietly, quickly, and without hassle. There is no runaround. There are no fights. Appointments aren’t interrupted by vexing phone calls. Care is seldom denied (because everybody knows the rules). She gets her checks on time, sees her patients on schedule, takes Thursdays off, and gets home in time for dinner.

One unsurprising side effect of all this is that the doctors I see here are, to a person, more focused, more relaxed, more generous with their time, more up-to-date in their specialties, and overall much less distracted from the real work of doctoring. You don’t realize how much stress the American doctor-insurer fights put on the day-to-day quality of care until you see doctors who don’t operate under that stress, because they never have to fight those battles at all. Amazingly: they seem to enjoy their jobs.

Third: The average American medical student graduates $140,000 in hock. The average Canadian doctor’s debt is roughly half that.

Finally, Canadian doctors pay lower malpractice insurance fees. When paying for health care constitutes a one of a family’s major expenses, expectations tend to run very high. A doctor’s mistake not only damages the body; it may very well throw a middle-class family permanently into the ranks of the working poor, and render the victim uninsurable for life. With so much at stake, it’s no wonder people are quick to rush to court for redress.

Canadians are far less likely to sue in the first place, since they’re not having to absorb devastating financial losses in addition to any physical losses when something goes awry. The cost of the damaging treatment will be covered. So will the cost of fixing it. And, no matter what happens, the victim will remain insured for life. When lawsuits do occur, the awards don’t have to include coverage for future medical costs, which reduces the insurance company’s liability.

Entire article: http://www.pnhp.org/news/2008/februa...bout_canad.php

Originally Posted by Deb C

QUESTION: Doctors are hurt financially by single-payer health care?

True and False. Doctors in Canada do make less than their US counterparts. But they also have lower overhead, and usually much better working conditions. A few reasons for this...

This is a good point. One needs to not only look at the gross income of physicians but also the cost of practicing medicine. In the U.S., med school debt service and malpractice issues (including both insurance and the cost of "defensive medicine") are big ones and dealing with the insurance bureaucracy is becoming more and more significant as well.

Hopefully the next round of "health care reform" will address cost containment, because the last one sure didn't. Yet to me cost is the 800 pound gorilla in the room, as I think the out of control cost increases are at the root of why more and more people are uninsured and why more and more employers are dropping or watering down health insurance coverage. Fix the cost problem and everything else becomes easier and more sustainable. These issues and others (such as U.S. health care consumers subsidizing the world's prescription drugs) need to be addressed.

Originally Posted by Child of Socrates

For yet another perspective, I'm married to someone with a chronic health condition and he feels the same way I do about the new law -- that it was a necessary first step but certainly not the desired end result.

Does he have affordable health insurance? Is his health insurance in jeopardy?

Originally Posted by Deb C

Does he have affordable health insurance? Is his health insurance in jeopardy?

I was turned down by BCBS in June, not because of HBP, but because of my BMI. Gotta love it.

Originally Posted by Deb C

QUESTION: Doctors are hurt financially by single-payer health care?

True and False. Doctors in Canada do make less than their US counterparts. But they also have lower overhead, and usually much better working conditions. A few reasons for this:
First, as noted, they don’t have to charge higher fees to cover the salary of a full-time staffer to deal with over a hundred different insurers, all of whom are bent on denying care whenever possible. In fact, most Canadian doctors get by quite nicely with just one assistant, who cheerfully handles the phones, mail, scheduling, patient reception, stocking, filing, and billing all by herself in the course of a standard workday.

Second, they don’t have to spend several hours every day on the phone cajoling insurance company bean counters into doing the right thing by their patients. My doctor in California worked a 70-hour week: 35 hours seeing patients, and another 35 hours on the phone arguing with insurance companies. My Canadian doctor, on the other hand, works a 35-hour week, period. She files her invoices online, and the vast majority are simply paid — quietly, quickly, and without hassle. There is no runaround. There are no fights. Appointments aren’t interrupted by vexing phone calls. Care is seldom denied (because everybody knows the rules). She gets her checks on time, sees her patients on schedule, takes Thursdays off, and gets home in time for dinner.

One unsurprising side effect of all this is that the doctors I see here are, to a person, more focused, more relaxed, more generous with their time, more up-to-date in their specialties, and overall much less distracted from the real work of doctoring. You don’t realize how much stress the American doctor-insurer fights put on the day-to-day quality of care until you see doctors who don’t operate under that stress, because they never have to fight those battles at all. Amazingly: they seem to enjoy their jobs.

Third: The average American medical student graduates $140,000 in hock. The average Canadian doctor’s debt is roughly half that.

Finally, Canadian doctors pay lower malpractice insurance fees. When paying for health care constitutes a one of a family’s major expenses, expectations tend to run very high. A doctor’s mistake not only damages the body; it may very well throw a middle-class family permanently into the ranks of the working poor, and render the victim uninsurable for life. With so much at stake, it’s no wonder people are quick to rush to court for redress.

Canadians are far less likely to sue in the first place, since they’re not having to absorb devastating financial losses in addition to any physical losses when something goes awry. The cost of the damaging treatment will be covered. So will the cost of fixing it. And, no matter what happens, the victim will remain insured for life. When lawsuits do occur, the awards don’t have to include coverage for future medical costs, which reduces the insurance company’s liability.

Entire article: http://www.pnhp.org/news/2008/februa...bout_canad.php

I'm all for going Canadian (if we're giving up on Justin's Russian model).

What's your plan for getting there?
- I hope it's not magic or really, really, really postiive thoughs and prayers.

Originally Posted by playwrite

I'm all for going Canadian (if we're giving up on Justin's Russian model).

What's your plan for getting there?
- I hope it's not magic or really, really, really postiive thoughs and prayers.

I'm not into "magic." But I am into belonging to movements that keep the issue up front and center.

Like:

PHYSICIANS FOR A NATIONAL HEALTH PROGRAM

or

http://www.healthcare-now.org/

And, by all means, keep the conversation going. Unless, of course, it is so smacked with sarcasm, that intelligent conversation is an impossibility.

Original Content at http://www.opednews.com/articles/Hea...00802-195.html


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
August 2, 2010

Healthcare NOW's Katie Robbins Isn't Giving Up on Universal Coverage

By Joan Brunwasser

The new health law tinkers around the edges of our failed health care system. As long as we have private insurance in the mix, we will continue to see millions of people uninsured, tens of thousands of unnecessary deaths and bankruptcies, poor health outcomes, more bureaucracy, corporate greed, and the world's most expensive health care system get more expensive.


Healthcare NOW seeks to support and grow the movement for health justice based on the merits of single-payer financing which will ensure that everyone can access the health care they need without rationing by ability to pay. Some folks see the road to single-payer through a public option, but Healthcare NOW seeks to build a movement that clearly demands a universal, equitable, and publicly accountable health system with everybody in and nobody left out. People don't want a choice of public or private insurance plans; they really want their choice of doctors and hospitals much like the choice available to people on Medicare.


Medicare, which just celebrated its 45th anniversary, is the social insurance model we need to improve and expand to meet the human right to health care in this country. This week, single-payer activists from coast to coast organized dozens of events celebrating Medicare's birthday, including a dance party for Medicare in New York City.

This anniversary holds special weight because of the formation of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, aka the Deficit Commission, which is looking to recommend cuts to Medicare and Social Security as soon as this December. In response, Healthcare NOW is urging Members of Congress and Federal Candidates to take a pledge declaring that they will protect Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security by taking them off the table of the Deficit Commission. The pledge also calls for a single-payer, Improved Medicare for All System (HR 676) to go back up for national discussion.

If these folks are serious about reducing the deficit, they should look to the kind of cost controls a single-payer system can provide. Hundreds of billions can be saved by negotiating the purchase of prescription drugs and medical equipment, along with the elimination of the waste of the private insurance companies. Of course, cutting the military budget and taxing the wealthy should also be included in any discussion on reducing the deficit, but these folks are set on cutting Social Security and Medicare. That's why Healthcare NOW launched a new (tongue in cheek)campaign"Hands off our Medicare!" You can find out more at www.handsoffourmedicare.org. It's time to be as loud as possible to stop these cuts. Our most important social safety net programs are in serious danger. We must protect the successful social insurance programs we do have, so we can continue to expand and improve them in the future.

You bring up a good point. We continue to spend heedlessly on the military and don't think twice about bailouts and tax cuts for the rich, but Social Security is always being threatened and the huge savings and benefits that a universal health care system would bring are ignored. Are you taking the fight directly to the public, since Congress and the President have been pretty deaf to the allure of single-payer?

Actually, instead of being deaf to single-payer, I think that Congress, the President, and other opponents to passing single-payer at this time, have to continue to silence the demand for single-payer health care among other progressive demands.

First of all, we as a nation are faced with the century long propaganda war largely represented with the corporate driven talking points charging supporters of national health insurance with wanting a "socialist take over" of our health care system. We fight the same monied interests today as we did every time a national health insurance plan has been proposed seriously in the nation's history yet polling continues to show that single-payer health care is supported by a majority of the public, nurses, and physicians.

In addition, blatant lies are used to bury support for single-payer and progressive solutions. A recent example of this tactic can be found in the skewed results of a series of "town meetings" organized by a private company, AmericaSpeaks, funded by the Peter Peterson Foundation. Peterson is a well known opponent of social security and has been gunning for its privatization for decades.

During the AmericaSpeaks meetings, there was a point when the proceedings were actually interrupted to address the number of times single-payer was called for by the participants even though it was not given as an option for reducing the deficit or controlling health care costs. That message was not delivered clearly in the follow up report from AmericaSpeaks. In addition, the report falsely claimed that most of the participants favored raising the eligibility age for Social Security. Actually only 39% of participants claimed that they favored such a change though they originally claimed 52% claimed they supported raising the age.

Of course, we as a movement must become strong enough to overcome these challenges, and that's what we are faced with now. We must ask ourselves and find the answers in the true grassroots to how we can avoid these freight trains of regressive policies and build a movement that is bold enough to direct the agenda to meet the needs of the people. Healthcare NOW is committed to educating and advocating at the grassroots level for these critical policies, and we need to empower the public through the grassroots to organize and fight for these important issues.

www.healthcare-now.org and www.handsoffourmedicare.org.

The fight for single-payer continues

Originally Posted by playwrite

If God has a fault, it would be making you a master of inane conflating.

Yeessh!

How would you reply to the oft-heard PROGRESSIVE whine & despair: "people should never have to be in such a destitute condition in the first place"?

I mean, which came first: the "people" or the "destitute condition" of said "people"? Does the answer matter? If not, why whine the question?

Speak, playwrite!

Originally Posted by Deb C

Doctors in Canada do make less than their US counterparts.

Well, that settles that. Canadian socialism: Good | European socialism: Bad | American free enterprise capitalism: evil.

, I guess.

Originally Posted by playwrite

If God has a fault, it would be making you a master of inane conflating.

Yeessh!

Playwrite, don't feed the trolls!

Originally Posted by Ragnarök_62

Playwrite, don't feed the trolls!

I agree wholeheartedly.

Originally Posted by Deb C

I'm not into "magic." But I am into belonging to movements that keep the issue up front and center.

Like:

PHYSICIANS FOR A NATIONAL HEALTH PROGRAM

or

http://www.healthcare-now.org/

And, by all means, keep the conversation going. Unless, of course, it is so smacked with sarcasm, that intelligent conversation is an impossibility.

Okay, that's more what I was hoping to see. More power to you.

It seems we've come to that age-old issue of tactic - evolution v. revolution. The latter sees nothing good until nearly all can be gain, and incremental gains should not be pursued for the effort to make those gains just delay the penultimate achievement by diminishing the force for change. On the other hand, the former group sees the impossibility of gaining the penultimate all at once and that attempts to do so just delay what partial gains could have otherwise been obtain.

I really don't know which is the best tactic. I guess it would depend on whether or not the partial gains that can be obtain are inclusive of your own personal priorities.

What I do know is that in the present political environment, it doesn't help either side to really piss off the other. We need each other.

Be careful who you climb in bed with - their sole purpose may be just to divide us so that nothing progressive gets done.

Originally Posted by Deb C

Does he have affordable health insurance?

Absolutely. He's covered under my plan.

Is his health insurance in jeopardy?

Not at all. We're pretty lucky.

Missouri voters reject key provision of health care law

http://www.thelocal.se/28150/20100803/
> A 32-year-old took the needle into his hands when he tired of the wait at
> Sundsvall hospital in northern Sweden and sewed up the cut in his leg
> himself. The man was later reported to the police for his impromptu handiwork.
>
> "It took such a long time," the man told the local Sundsvall Tidning daily.
>
> The man incurred the deep cut when he sliced his leg on the sharp edge of a
> kitchen stove while he was renovating at home.
>
> "I first went to the health clinic, but it was closed. So I rang the medical
> help line and they told me that it shouldn't be closed, so I went to
> emergency and sat there," the man named only as Jonas told the newspaper.
>
> After an hour-long wait in a treatment room, he lost patience and proceeded
> to sew up his own wound.
>
> "They had set out a needle and thread and so I decided to take the matter
> into my hands," he said.
>
> But hospital staff were not as impressed by his initiative and have reported
> the man on suspicion of criminal dispossession (egenmäktigt förfarande) for
> having used hospital equipment without authorization.
>
> While Jonas admitted to the newspaper that he has no prior experience of
> sewing up himself he sought to play down the fuss that his handiwork has
> caused, arguing that "through the ages people have always sewn themselves up".

Originally Posted by The Grey Badger

http://www.thelocal.se/28150/20100803/
> A 32-year-old took the needle into his hands when he tired of the wait at
> Sundsvall hospital in northern Sweden and sewed up the cut in his leg
> himself. The man was later reported to the police for his impromptu handiwork.
>
> "It took such a long time," the man told the local Sundsvall Tidning daily.
>
> The man incurred the deep cut when he sliced his leg on the sharp edge of a
> kitchen stove while he was renovating at home.
>
> "I first went to the health clinic, but it was closed. So I rang the medical
> help line and they told me that it shouldn't be closed, so I went to
> emergency and sat there," the man named only as Jonas told the newspaper.
>
> After an hour-long wait in a treatment room, he lost patience and proceeded
> to sew up his own wound.
>
> "They had set out a needle and thread and so I decided to take the matter
> into my hands," he said.
>
> But hospital staff were not as impressed by his initiative and have reported
> the man on suspicion of criminal dispossession (egenmäktigt förfarande) for
> having used hospital equipment without authorization.
>
> While Jonas admitted to the newspaper that he has no prior experience of
> sewing up himself he sought to play down the fuss that his handiwork has
> caused, arguing that "through the ages people have always sewn themselves up".

The attribute of the current US healthcare system that we rank the highest on is responsiveness. We cannot afford this anymore. We will move from a system now rationed by ability to pay to a system rationed by time. It is inevitable.

Need a hip - sure ,we can do that in about 18 months.
Need mammography for a lump - sure, in a couple of months.
Need to get sewn up - have a seat right over there. We will get to you in a few hours.

That's the way it seems to work in the rest of the world. It actually is probably cheaper and fairer. You just hope you are not the one being asked to wait.

James50

Originally Posted by James50

The attribute of the current US healthcare system that we rank the highest on is responsiveness. We cannot afford this anymore. We will move from a system now rationed by ability to pay to a system rationed by time. It is inevitable.

Need a hip - sure ,we can do that in about 18 months.
Need mammography for a lump - sure, in a couple of months.
Need to get sewn up - have a seat right over there. We will get to you in a few hours.

That's the way it seems to work in the rest of the world. It actually is probably cheaper and fairer. You just hope you are not the one being asked to wait.

James50

One hour? Couldn't the staff have simply given the poor fellow a strong anesthetic, like perhaps a strong dose of morphine?


Out of sheer necessity we have good emergency care. We also have more medical emergencies related to poor service to poor people and to bad health habits of poor people (especially smoking, drinking, and bad eating habits). That's even before we contemplate gunshot wounds and other violent crime, fires (poor people seem to be more vulnerable) and vehicular accidents.

Leaders of Cigna, Humana, UnitedHealth, WellPoint and Aetna received nearly $200 million in compensation in 2009, according to a report, while the companies sought rate increases as high as 39%.

Reporting from Washington —

The top executives at the nation's five largest for-profit health insurance companies pulled in nearly $200 million in compensation last year — while their businesses prepared to hit ratepayers with double-digit premium increases, according to a new analysis conducted by healthcare activists.

The leaders of Cigna Corp., Humana Inc., UnitedHealth Group and WellPoint Inc. each in effect received raises in 2009, the report concluded, based on an analysis of company reports filed with the Security and Exchange Commission.

H. Edward Hanway, former chief executive of Philadelphia-based Cigna, topped the list of high-paid executives, thanks to a retirement package worth $110.9 million. Cigna paid Hanway and his successor, David Cordani, a total of $136.3 million last year. (snip)

Last year was highly profitable for most of the country's big publicly traded insurers. In the first two quarters of this year, profits for many insurers have continued to soar more than 20%.

http://www.latimes.com/health/la-fi-...,7386070.story