[dajohnson89]

is $300 a fair price for an ambulance ride though? paying a skilled paramedic + driver for (say) an hour seems to exceed $300, when you factor in the overhead of the ambulance itself (not to mention services rendered).

edit: i ask that question, because who is going to eat that cost?

[thorwasdfasdf]

The ambulance cost should be negligable. An ambulance should cost roughly 30-50c a mile. i don't see why it would cost more than that. And the wages for a paramedic and driver should be less than 100$/hour, right?

If the hospital is charging 200$/hour or more for administration or more then they should eat that cost

[dajohnson89]

let's say the wages for a paramedic + driver (including overhead of payroll taxes, benefits, malpractice insurance, etc etc) is $75/hour. How do you figure 50c/mile? Gas? What about all the expensive medical equipment in the ambulance, skill training to use it, service it, insurance on the vehicle, maintenance of the engine/tires, compliance with whatever regulations exist on ambulance service providers....?

[thorwasdfasdf]

Take a look at this: https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/personalfinance/2017/05...

basically it says the milleage is just 84$ (that includes all ambulance related costs: maintenance, gas, depreciation of the ambulance, etc) and that's already being very generous. Another 127$ goes to state of new york. we can get rid of that entirely.

they didn't mention the cost of labor, but we can assume about 75$/hr as you said. maybe another 75$/hr for rediness. "Part of what shocked Santoro is the fact that he received what he considered very little care: An EMT took his vitals and gave him oxygen, he said"

Where the heck does alll the rest of the 2100$ go? I would guess: It's all markup that goes to administrative waste and profits.

So, let's get rid of the extra 2100$ worth of administration and keep everyone's ambulance bills lower. that will lower your health insurance bill by a huge amount too.