Callous

Last weekend, we went out to dinner in Palo Alto with some friends. As we were walking back to our car, we passed a well-dressed lady at an outside restaurant with her chihuahua sitting on her lap. On the next block were a couple of homeless men sitting on the sidewalk, asking for money and holding various cardboard signs.

David turned to me, "You know, I bet that dog gets better health care than those homeless guys."

I replied, "Probably, but the dog gets put down when it develops an expensive enough medical condition."

I'm curious. Can anybody cite authoritative stats (and the source) on the average lifetime cost of treating an indigent person through the Medicaid/MediCal/Medicare/MediEtcetera/VA systems?