Suppose that whenever you go to the super market, there are no prices posted, and the clerk has to file a claim with your food insurance provider, who then processes the claim, and reimburses the grocery store company. Your “food benefit” is provided by your employer, who receives a tax deduction. However much food you consume, it doesn’t feel like it costs you anything. Furthermore, every state has a different set of laws defining what food has to be covered, and what food cannot be covered.
What do you think the price of food would be?
Why is health care any different? If anything, food is more essential to health than medicine. For those who can’t afford food, we have food stamps.
It is a series of historical accidents that have created the ridiculous health care system that we have today. Of course it needs reform, but the Democrats are not reforming it, they are expanding the existing Rube Goldberg system, actually making it worse by turning it into Meddie Mac, to join Fannie and Freddie.
We need tort reform. We need to eliminate state insurance laws and allow competition across state lines. We need to separate insurance from employment. We need medical price transparency. We need to make individuals responsible for their own routine health care, just as they are for ordinary car repairs. And food. And then we need a means-tested health care stamps program for the poor.
This is the opposite of the Democrats’ plan. It lowers costs and lessens government control instead of increasing costs and government control. The more of people’s lives that are controlled by the government, the more power and access to money the politicians have. So it tends to usually look like the perfect solution to any problem, for both Parties, but especially for Democrats. It rarely is though.