Congress is on the verge of passing a health care reform bill that would mark the most sweeping intrusion of our federal government into our lives since the founding of the country. The new entitlement that would be created would nationalize the best health care system in the world and it would eclipse Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in its scope and importance.
Our elected representatives, regardless of party, know that all three of these programs are either structurally insolvent or headed in that direction. And, yet, Congress has decided that the only way to reform the system is to essentially double-down on the bet that was made with those three programs and consign one-sixth of our nation”s economy to the federal control that these failing programs have been under since their inception.
Congress believes that only through brute force and the inflexible structure of federal law can health care costs be brought under control and access improved. It believes that millions of health care consumers interacting with their health care providers are ill-equipped to make decisions regarding their care. It also believes that health care is a right, not a responsibility, and that all of us should be collectively responsible for the health of our fellow citizens.
No where in our Constitution, the Bill of Rights or the Declaration of Independence is it declared that health care is a right. Nowhere in the Constitution does it give Congress the power to require individuals, as a precondition of legal residency, to purchase health insurance or any other product or service. Yet, this is what Congress proposes.
We have the best health care system in the world. Yes, it has shortcomings, but those shortcomings have not been caused by too little government involvement in the system. Too much involvement is responsible for many of the access and cost issues that plague our system today.
Over the last 40 years, the vast majority of health care consumers have been insulated from the true cost of care. Except for those who purchase individual policies (and they are very much in tune with the cost), most of us transfer our health care costs to an insurance company via policies provided and largely paid for by our employers, or we are enrolled in one government program or another, most particularly Medicare or Medicaid, which shoulder much of the burden.
When the consumer of a good or service does not know or appreciate its cost, there is no incentive to control consumption.
Employer-provided insurance has been the preferred model in this country since World War II. Medicare and Medicaid were signed into law in 1965. I am old enough to remember that, as a child, my parents would take me to the doctor and pay his bill at the time of service or make alternative arrangements directly with him to satisfy the obligation. There was no insurance company involved in paying him. If specialized tests or hospitalization were required, my parents maintained a major medical insurance policy to partly offset those extraordinary costs. This was an efficient arrangement for all parties, and there was a much closer relationship between the consumer and provider of services and a greater understanding and appreciation for the actual cost of care. Those days are gone.
Congress seeks to address the serious issues of rising costs and lack of access by imposing central government control over the entire health care enterprise, one of the most dynamic and complicated sectors of our economy. It is going to dictate, through a labyrinth of government regulations, commissions and agencies, what type of insurance we have to buy, from whom, what it will cover and how it will be paid for. It will control through central dictates and punitive regulations what type of care and medicines doctors can prescribe, what procedures will be covered and when care will be withheld because central planners have determined it to be ineffective or not in the interest of the federal government. Look for Part II in the next few days.
Tom Lincoln is a local insurance agency owner of Lincoln Leavitt Insurance Agency, Inc.
