Public Option
There was a lot of fear regarding a Public Option because there was talk that the federal government could, over time, do things that started to put insurance companies out of business. And these fears were very real because the government could easily charge lower prices, subsidized by the taxpayers, who then simply put the insurance industry out of business.
Droves of people realized this fear and spoke up during the town hall meetings and so the likelihood of the public option is quite low. The only real risk of the public option now is for one of the more radically liberal Democrats to try and sneak it into the bill at the last minute—we’ll have to wait and see.
Mandatory Insurance
We do have uninsured people in this county and that is a very real and serious problem for taxpayers because they are paying the bill for them every time they go into the ER with no ability to pay. We can’t sweep this under the carpet, but that doesn’t mean that the solution is a public option. What it means is that we need to get these people affordably insured so that the costs are known, not hidden and nearly impossible to track.
Because of these reason I whole heartedly believe that we need all citizens to have some form of affordable insurance—because we’re paying for it anyway, let’s make it official so that we can figure this thing out and manage it correctly. However, having said this, I am a conservative person and I only favor a mandatory insurance option under the following conditions:
- There is not a public option—no triggers, nothing. Our government has proved to us in the last few months that they are power crazed lunatics and I don’t want them having a trigger for a public option, especially if insurance is mandatory.
- There are different quality tiers of insurance, low-cost, mid-cost, premium-cost and luxury plans available for people to choose from based upon their financial choices.
- The taxpayers supplements the low-cost insurance to the poor.
If we do what I describe in‘National Healthcare Debate 101′to lower costs then having everyone insured is a good thing because everything is above board, we can actually start to manage this better because all of the hidden costs that we are currently paying are now measurably tracked into the legitimate system. Also, a larger insurance pool is always the better management choice.
Illegal Aliens
Taxpayers are paying for illegal aliens when the go to the ER as well—this is especially troubling when children are involved. Do you want to turn away some desperate mother with her sick child just because she’s an illegal alien? Of course not and I don’t either. But it’s still a problem that is easily solved. Open up our immigration to make it faster and easier for immigrants to get work visa’s here. We simply need to require the employers to purchase some very basic, and cheap, major medical coverage for themselves and some low-cost insurance for any minors.
I want to see the illegal part go away! So do what it takes to get these workers in here legally and cheaply! This is not that hard to do—politics is getting in the way and if you look deep you will see that the labor unions are behind this because you can push illegal aliens around and they won’t complain; politicians look the other way on this as well. We need to stop this and figure out how to make it so that it’s easy for young, healthy, hard working immigrants to work here legally. We obviously have the need and a workforce willing to work cheaply, so do what it takes to make it happen legally—this will radically shut down the illegal aspect, and it will incent people to become legal immigrants.
This also solves many border patrol problems because reduces the traffic illegally coming across the border so that the only one’s sneaking over are the people that we really don’t want over here.
Oligopoly
Allowing insurance companies to conduct business more freely across the country is going to pressure some smaller businesses to be bought out as the largest firms evolve into a few behemoth oligopolies. I would like to see Congress provide ways that allow smaller firms to join forces more easily in an effort to try and compete rather than being swallowed up. There are industries that operate more efficiently with oligopolies because the economies of scale work well in their favor. Regarding healthcare insurance, they have similar efficiencies that banking does when they become large because the costs for their technology services can be spread over a large pool of members to cut costs. Because of this we will see many mergers and acquisitions in the industry similar to what we saw in banking when that was deregulated nationally.
Costs
Lastly, I want to talk about quality of insurance. I believe that all US citizens deserve high quality insurance no matter what their income level is—so I do not sub-standard coverage for the poor, or even good insurance, I want everyone to have high quality care. Having said that, if someone can afford premium care or luxury care that exceeds an already high quality coverage, then good for them, that’s the part of the American dream that we all have a chance to chase after.
I say this because many people these days seem to forget that money doesn’t grow on trees—everything has costs, and we don’t have unlimited money, even the government. The government doesn’t spend money that they didn’t tax or borrow! It’s not limitless, and medicine does cost money.
We have a new issue before us that is very difficult to navigate through and I’m very interested in researching and thinking more on the topic. But let me give you a taste for what the debate is:
What if a homeless drug addict staggers into the ER, is dying, and it will cost the American public $100,000 to keep them alive in agony for another 30 days—was that a wise choice? At what point do we simply acknowledge that death is a part of life? When does society say, ‘we will provide you with great coverage, just not Bill Gates or Warren Buffet coverage because we just don’t have the money.’?
I’m very interested in this topic because I am a Christian man, who is prolife, and I greatly value every life that God has created. So I’m not anywhere near the views of liberal extremists who are willing to let people die to save a few bucks on healthcare costs. But I also realize that we have finite resources and $50K spent to buy just 1 extra day of struggling life for someone is tragic when compared with what other good that could have done instead. So where is the line for compassion, for solid affordable healthcare coverage that values all life, yet is reasonably economical?
I ponder these questions because no matter how much we spend on healthcare we can’t cheat the inevitable… death and taxes; so what is compassionate, values life, but is reasonable and not insanely burdensome on those who remain to pay the bills? A very interesting topic that will someday impact us all, more to come on this.
