The
current insurance business model doesn’t work for Health Insurance. Excessive
government subsidies for healthcare have driven the cost of treatment to
unsustainable levels. Providers have no
incentive to lower their costs as long as the government is willing to throw
more money at this. The problem is the
Provider Cartel.
Congress
is to blame for allowing the federal government to pass Medicare and Medicaid
in 1965. Before that, treatment costs
were affordable. Corporations started
subsidizing healthcare during World War II, because of government wage and
price controls and unions had been carping for decades to get the business
owners to pay employees’ hospital bills.
Before
1965, healthcare for the poor was handled by counties with county hospitals,
county clinics and the county health department. In addition, physicians volunteered to treat
the poor in these facilities and with house-calls. Churches sponsored hospitals and raised money
to keep up with costs. We need to return
to county-based healthcare.
When
government ignores the Laws of Economics, particularly the Law of Supply and
Demand, it sets up a system that is designed to fail. Either consumers must pay for their own
healthcare or costs will continue to rise.
We all
know the laws of supply and demand and how that law deals with costs. When beef is too high, we buy chicken and the
cost of beef goes down again.
Norb
Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader
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