John Stossel gets it right on health care:America's health-care problem is not that some people lack insurance, it is that 250 million Americans do have it.
You have to understand something right from the start. We Americans got hooked on health insurance because the government did the insurance companies a favor during World War II. Wartime wage controls prohibited cash raises, so employers started giving noncash benefits like health insurance to attract workers. The tax code helped this along by treating employer-based health insurance more favorably than coverage you buy yourself. And state governments have made things worse by mandating coverage many people would never buy for themselves.
Competition also pushed companies to offer ever-more attractive policies, such as first-dollar coverage for routine ailments like ear infections and colds, and coverage for things that are not even illnesses, like pregnancy. We came to expect insurance to cover everything.
But insurance is a lousy way to pay for things. You premiums go not just to pay for medical care, but also for fraud, paperwork, and insurance company employee salaries. This is bad for you, and bad for doctors.
Read the whole thing.
I think most Americans would agree that it's a good goal for all Americans to have access to a reasonable level of basic health care. Unfortunately, people often confuse health insurance with health care. The two are not the same and, as Stossel points out, health insurance can interfere with receiving quality health care. Isn't it time we stop presuppossing health insurance to be a solution to health care provision and start looking for something that actually works?
(HT Instapundit)
2 comments:
It's a great idea to rethink health care and insurance, but I just don't see it happening. It would be extremely difficult at this stage to change people's thinking...not that it cannot be done, but it would require herculean effort and immense communication skills. Also, this is at a time when if anything politicians are moving more in favor of govt mandated and subsidized health insurance.
Ultimately, economics is a social science, which means that human factors enter the equation. This is where emotion and persuasion come into play, and not just pure rationality. This is where change must start, but at this point I don't see anyone or any organization with the will power or the skill to turn things around. Which means we'll just have to make the best out of the current situation.
Speaking of economists and economic pundits: I think at some point they have to move out of the rarified air of the theoretical and into effecting social change for the better.
One reason I really admire Milton Friedman was that he was able to get his ideas and thinking to permeate into the larger culture; that is the sign of greatness.
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