National Health-Insurance Option: A Good Idea
As the debate over how to fix America’s health-care delivery goes on, one issue seems to generate more heat than light. That issue is the Obama proposed national health insurance option. Note the word “option” here. President Obama has not proposed, and says he does not want, a fully nationalized health-care program like Canada and England. Some liberal Democrats have proposed such a system, but that is not what the Obama Administration is proposing.
There is an advertisement running on television right now that shows a government official with clipboard standing in a physician’s examination room shaking his head no when the physician proposes a therapy to the patient. This is what logicians call a “red herring.” It implies a proposition that is not actually being made than offers a refutation of that ghost proposition. The idea is to distract people from the real argument being proposed because the real argument is difficult to refute.
Once again, just to keep us on the same page, the Obama Administration is not proposing a fully nationalized health care system, in which government officials would dictate health-care options to doctors and patients. Now that we know what the administration is not proposing, let’s take a look at what it is proposing and why it is a good idea.
Obama has proposed setting up a government-run health care insurance program to compete with other private health-care insurance companies. Under the proposed program, if you have health-care insurance that you like and it is affordable, you can keep it. If you don’t have insurance, but you want it, you can purchase it from any private company you wish or the government-run insurance. The government-run insurance program will operate just like a private company. It will offer a set service at a set price. People can purchase it or not, their choice.
The reason the government option is necessary should be obvious to any observer. Over that last several decades, health-care costs have outpaced inflation by a wide margin. Health-care insurance companies have a product we need and they can and do charge just about anything they want for it. There has been very little real competition among them. This is one case where a free market simply has not worked.
We need the government option to keep the private companies honest. The government-run option will offer a really competitive option that will force private companies to keep their prices reasonable. The government-run option will simply be one player in the field of health care, along with all the other companies that are out there.
Some say well the government-run program will simply drive the other companies out of business and eventually there will be nothing left but the government-run program. However, the government system will have to compete in the same environment as the private companies. If the government can offer a satisfactory service at a lower price, the others will have to make their own adjustments to stay in business. If private companies can offer a better service at a better price, people will be free to choose use them. This is the way the market is supposed to work.
So, don’t be fooled but phony advertisement sponsored by the Insurance Council. They don’t want the competition. Their profits are too good as things are. We need affordable health care and to get that we need the proposed government option.
- Bob Hertzog's blog
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It seems all the talk is always about the insurance,and never about the cost of the product. A $50 or 5 cent asprin, We can make it as reasonable or ridiculous as we choose. It seems for now, were stuck on ridiculous.
the hardest part of doing nothing, is knowing when your done.
You've looked at this national health care option from the consumer's view. Let's look at it from the provider's view.
In order for the national health care system to be competitive, it will have to hold costs down. That means it will only pay a set amount of money for any prescription or procedure, just like any other insurance company. BUT to be competitive, it will have to pay the provider LESS for these services than the average insurance company. Now here's the crux of the issue: will the provider have the option of NOT accepting the government's insurance plan BECAUSE it pays less than any other insurer? If so, then we will have a tiered health care system wherein the best docs will not be available for those on the national health care system. This option will cause the worst docs to be those most available to the less well-heeled amongst us. A very uneven delivery system at best, and something that fosters social and racial stratification, etc.
On the other hand, if the provider is forced to provide services to this national health care system, then the insurance playing field is artificially flattened and your claims of the advantages of competition are imaginary. In this scenario, the desirable provider will probably sharply curtail his/her practice in an attempt to control loss of prospective income and there will be covert discrimination in patients accepted into the practice, even moreso than there is today. It will also have a damping effect not only on medical school graduations, but on rural delivery of healthcare, not to mention what it would probably do to medical centers in decaying urban areas like Detroit, Chicago, and even Muncie and Anderson, etc.
So, Bob, will the provider be free to accept this national health care insurance or not?
- Thomas Paine
Hi Space... Thanks for the comment. One of the provisions of Obama's plan is to hold down cost. We'll have to wait until we get a look at the full plan.
Hi Bard... thanks for the comment. You raise some good points. However, as I suggested to Space, we need to see the final draft of the plan before we can decide how it will work. Personally, I would hope for as much freedom of choice as possible. I just want to say that we should not be afraid of a government run "option," as long as it stays an option.
Hi Space... Thanks for the comment. One of the provisions of Obama's plan is to hold down cost. We'll have to wait until we get a look at the full plan.
Hi Bard... thanks for the comment. You raise some good points. However, as I suggested to Space, we need to see the final draft of the plan before we can decide how it will work. Personally, I would hope for as much freedom of choice as possible. I just want to say that we should not be afraid of a government run "option," as long as it stays an option.
Maybe we should 'wait until we get a look at the full plan' before we make the decision that it's a good idea.
- Thomas Paine
Bob have you heard if they are going to limit the number of people that can actually qualify for the National Healthcare plan like the did with Indiana's HIP plan? Because I know of several people that do not have insurance for several reasons, but HIP is now unavailable unless you have dependent children until they can open it up again, and with the number of unemployed in our state I only see uninsured as a growing problem.
"If we ever forget that we are one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under."
Hello just4fun... Thanks for the comment.
I had not heard that they intend to limit the number of people that will be covered. I would be disappointed if that actually happened. Of course, as we have said, the final draft of the plan is not out yet. There will be a lot of negotiation and argument before it comes out.
Costs too much, throw out the whole idea. Can't spend a trillion to save money when we are spending money we haven't printed yet.
Sup, logic is NOT the OS under this administration. You should know that by now!
- Thomas Paine
Hi Space... Thanks for the comment. One of the provisions of Obama's plan is to hold down cost. We'll have to wait until we get a look at the full plan.
Hi Bard... thanks for the comment. You raise some good points. However, as I suggested to Space, we need to see the final draft of the plan before we can decide how it will work. Personally, I would hope for as much freedom of choice as possible. I just want to say that we should not be afraid of a government run "option," as long as it stays an option.
Maybe we should 'wait until we get a look at the full plan' before we make the decision that it's a good idea.
An inspection of the plan has shown that it's NOT a good idea:
LAWMAKERS WARNED ABOUT HEALTH COSTS
Source:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/16/AR2009071602242.html?wpisrc=newsletter
Congress's chief budget analyst delivered a devastating assessment yesterday of the health-care proposals drafted by congressional Democrats, fueling an insurrection among fiscal conservatives in the House and pushing negotiators in the Senate to redouble efforts to draw up a new plan that more effectively restrains federal spending.
Under questioning by members of the Senate Budget Committee, Douglas Elmendorf, director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, said bills crafted by House leaders and the Senate health committee do not propose "the sort of fundamental changes" necessary to rein in the skyrocketing cost of government health programs, particularly Medicare. On the contrary, Elmendorf said, the measures would pile on an expensive new program to cover the uninsured.
Though President Obama and Democratic leaders have repeatedly pledged to alter the soaring trajectory -- or cost curve -- of federal health spending, the proposals so far would not meet that goal, Elmendorf said, noting, "The curve is being raised." His remarks suggested that rather than averting a looming fiscal crisis, the measures could make the nation's bleak budget outlook even worse.
...........Talks in the Senate broke late yesterday, with plans to resume next week. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) said the group is considering about a dozen options to cover the estimated $1 trillion cost of its package, including reductions in Medicare spending and additional tax increases.
- Thomas Paine