There are many people who have ideas about how to lower health care costs. Pres O and company want to offer a government run health care option to compete with the other companies. The republicans want to offer tax credits to offset the cost of health plans and trust the free market to correct the high prices. I must admit that I am more with the republicans on this. However, there is one problem. The free market will never correct itself until my solution to higher health care cost is truly considered by Americans.
And what is my solution. Well here it is: Just say no (Sorry Nancy, Sorry War on Drugs, I stole it). The only way we will ever see reasonable health care rates is when we start say no to procedures we might not need, when we start saying no to procedures that are simply too expensive, when we ask what something costs before agreeing to it. You see, the insurance companies and the medical practitioners love the setup we have now where cost is never even mentioned because we the consumers just agree to whatever procedure is available knowing we will only at the time pay a small deductible or percentage at the time.   But then we the consumers complain when our health care rates go up double digit percentages points each year, all the time forgetting that in large part they went up that much because we just consumed health care without any concern for costs. We must change this. We must when hospitalized say no to 10 toothbrushes. We must say no to another test to confirm what we already know. We must even consider saying no to prescriptions we might not really need. This is the solution to higher health care costs.
Phil,
Good to see you blogging again!!! So seeing how saying “no” will never happen (though a good reminder to us all) you feel that the tax credit plan is, overall, the best of the two options? I am not saying that the government run health care system is, ultimately, the best solution….do you feel that a tax credit will take care of what seems to be a structural issue?
And, out of curiosity, what are your hang-ups with a competitive, alternative, government-run health care, specifically aimed at covering people who have no insurance or simply can’t afford private insurance. It seems that some of your solutions are part of the package deal of “socialized” health care…..unnecessary procedures, etc.
Love to hear your thoughts. And, again, good to see that you have broken the addiction to “face-crack”. 🙂
Tom,
Good to see someone is still reading :). It might encourage more thoughts. That said, I know all of my ideas seem like they will never happen but they main reason they will never happen is because such ideas are dismissed quickly in order to keep the status quo. I am not sure that I agree with always applying the lesser of two possible evils approach. If we are going to make a massive change, let’s do something right, not just easy. As I have posted before, I think the real solution is to get the government out of the welfare business altogether, and returning caring of the poor to the church.
But to answer you question. I don’t either option. Here is my problem with the government run option. First, what does the government manage efficiently? Secondly, having one “competitor” having total control of the rules and regulations making a very uneven playing field. And if we end up with no competition, that is bad in every way for health care. Furthermore, while the aim might be cover those w/o insurance, if the plan in substantially cheaper than other plans many will join by choice or because their employer will “choose” it for them. And the more people in the plan, the harder it is to manage well. And that goes back to the problem with the government managing anything. Lastly, my problem is that Gideon was on government health care for a year, and the only place to go was a place with bars on the door, and the facility as a whole was far from nice.
The tax credit idea seems to be just a encouragement to the health care companies to eat that credit up with additional premiums. And while republicans won’t admit it, this credit is just welfare.
What is the real solution? Well besides the point of this original post (that is OP, not OPP for the 80s-90s hip hop crews, I believe that the real solution is to make health insurance something that primarily covers catastrophic cases and not everything. If people had to pay for general care, two things would happen. First, more appropriate choices would be made. Having to pay immediately has a way of stopping unnecessary procedures. Also, once people start being concerned with what they are paying for things, this will encourage true competition and competition almost universally results in lower prices. Insurance should only be for things like long hospital stays, major surgeries etc. And even there, prices should be mandated to be shared before the procedure in order to encourage competition. Consumers must almost encourage their insurance companies to negotiate for better prices instead of just paying claims regardless of price. There is a dangerous alliance between insurance companies and health care institutions and practitioners which must be broken if things are to ever get better. They have developed this system where cost is never mentioned due to policies of co-pays etc and this fact is perhaps the greatest poison in the whole system.
I do not concede that we must quickly just choose one of the bad plans. Let us do more thinking and then make choices. And let that thinking be done primarily by consumers and not, as is now the case, by insurance companies and health care practitioners.
Phil,
Please don’t take my “that will never happen” as quickly dismissing your thoughtful ideas just to keep the status quo. It is based, more or less, unfortunately, on where we are at as a society. I don’t see the majority of people really wanting to think through these issues, let alone seriously wanting to make the necessary changes to see it happen. We could proclaim all day long that we need honest and thoughtful solutions (which i agree!) and then make the necessary changes to achieve those solutions (i agree too!). However, our society is not willing, overall, it seems, to think or make changes. So what do we do in the mean time? In the mean time do we apply something a little less evil? I don’t know.
And with Chloe and Noah being on government assistance I too feel the sting of only going where “government” says you can go (or to those physicians who choose to participate)…but, fortunately, our experience has been really good. And i guess i come from the other side of the fence at this point where Toni and I have had to move to government provided health care – and it has been a blessing to us. Is it ideal? No. But given our job situation, finances, etc., it has covered us when we otherwise would have had to gone without insurance.