I thought John McCain’s healthcare plan was a pretty good start. A $5000 tax credit so you can buy the coverage you need to get from whoever and wherever has the best plan to fit your needs. I thought this was a very good way to promote free market solutions to the cost of health coverage, but it wasn’t enough.
In the past few elections, it seems that from Bush 41, to Bob Dole, to Bush 43, and to John McCain, Republicans are about as uncomfortable talking about healthcare solutions as much as they’re uncomforitable courting and recruiting more minorities to join the party. It’s very sad that we don’t have a clear agenda. As much as we disagree with socialized healthcare, at least the Democrats have a plan to speak of.
The most popular phrases I hear is “make healthcare more affordable.” That’s great. What we tend to not get after the phrase is how to do it. If McCain had a clear and concise plan rather than his tax credit when he said “make healthcare more affordable,” he could have scored some points with lower-income voters.
So, how do we do it?
Healthcare services are expensive, we all know that. I’ve worked in the healthcare field (with a Medicare contractor, on the private insurance side, and as a staffing supervisor for radiology technicians) for five years and I’ve seen a l lot of the costs firsthand. Have you ever had an MRI, for example? Ever wonder about how much those puppies cost? Try anywhere between $1 million and $2.5 million. Facilities that build MRI suites can expect to fork over a half million alone. Drugs are expensive, nursing care is expensive, etc, etc, etc.
While advances in technology have provided signifigant breakthroughs, it’s not cheap. Health insurance companies can’t pay 100% of the bill, 100% of the time, even though Obama and his liberal allies want the federal government to do that. Forcing them to pay more, or regulating what can be charged for services infringes on our capitalistic principles. No voter wants to hear this, so what solutions do we have?
One theory is how to deal with the drug companies. I understand they rely a lot on grants and subsdies from the government, but why hasn’t there been any more advances on curing cancer or AIDS? It seems there’s a new drug for impotence, depression, or irritable bowel syndrome every week. If we’re giving money to drug companies, then we need to see their progress in attacking diseases like cancer, alzheimer’s, or AIDS. I hate using the word “fair,” but it would seem that if we’re handing them billions of taxpayer dollars, then its only fair to see what progress they’ve made.
Do we offer tax incentives to hospitals for having the most up to date equipment, procedures, and success rates? What about incentives for hospitals to become teaching facilities? What about incentives for companies that have a fitness center or offer discounts to gyms for its employees?
Personally, I liked McCain’s tax credit idea. It sounded a lot better than making corporations pay into making healthcare affordable for people who won’t get a job, or a government run system that’s disastrous in Canada and throughout Europe. I’m not saying that these proposals are right, or even close, but we need to come up with something else besides “make healthcare more affordable” and then wanting to move on to the next subject.
What are your thoughts? I’m not just looking at a standpoint of winning elections, I want conservative ideas and principles to help our healthcare system.
What is the Republican Solution to Health Care?
What are your thoughts?
McCain's plan was pretty good
Aetius728 Thursday, November 6th at 8:46PM EST (link)I thought. And some Cato Institute reports that I read were generally favorable.
The problem was that he did not talk about it. In the last few weeks of the election, Obama ran commercial after commercial smearing his plan.
The view times I heard McCain talk about it he used the usual lines “choice and competition.” That’s great, a conservative, freemarket position. But you also need to be more animated. McCain should have been out there telling voters that he wanted every insurance company in the nation to compete for their business.
Tough Area
JakePrime Thursday, November 6th at 8:52PM EST (link)This is one issue that we really need to work on. I know very little about the inner workings of the health care system. To tell you the truth, is one area that I’m kind of at a loss on. I like the tax credit idea, but it doesn’t address increases in health insurance premiums. And wouldn’t the cost of offering large enough credits be tremendous? I imagine that accompanying cuts in Medicare and Medicaid would not be nearly enough. McCain’s proposed cuts certainly wouldn’t have covered the costs. You’d have to take a large chunk of money from somewhere, probably just adding to the deficit.
Increased Competition
JakePrime Thursday, November 6th at 8:54PM EST (link)I do like the idea of opening up competition across state lines, but there would be some issues with differing state laws. Those would have to be ironed out for something like that to work properly.
No actually they wouldn't
Brian Simpson Thursday, November 6th at 9:40PM EST (link)That was the point of a national health care market. States that have the most mandates, like New York, would lose a lot of business when people started buying policies from cheaper, lower mandate states. NY would still control their insurance board, but you could buy the insurance that you wanted. I haven’t seen hard numbers but I would bet that NY has more people who are uninsured because they really can’t afford the artificially high insurance premiums.
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Just a commoner's opinion...
mobius2702 Thursday, November 6th at 11:02PM EST (link)I’d like to see more choices in health insurance policy coverage. Some view health insurance as all-inclusive, and that’s fine with me. But I’d be more inclined to go with a health insurance policy that is treated more like auto insurance; I tap into it when something is broken. Minor maintenance and upkeep comes out of my own pocket. Only something really really bad would kick in the health insurance.
I’m sure everyone else has a different use for health care. I have been blessed with great health (although I most certainly do not live healthy), and have been to a dr twice in the last 10 years. I have a 6 yo son who has been to a doctor twice in the last 3 years, and they were both for simple check-ups.
The problem I see with health insurance is that we’re all over-covered. It’s like we’re getting our oil changes and fill-ups covered.
Another effect of being over-covered is irresponsible use of health care. My insurance premiums are going to cover someone who runs to the er for a cough.
Another thing I don’t like is that it is quite complicated. I had the option with the company I work for of opting out of health insurance and taking a higher hourly rate instead. So I began looking through various options for personal coverage, possibly an HSA-qualified policy. It was too complicated. So although the only plan offered by my employer was a cover-everything policy, I just took that rather than risk screwing something up on my own.
So here’s what I’d like to see:
1) Open competition across state lines (this is in lieu of forcing states to relax their coverage requirements… hey, if MI wants to cover splinter-removal, fine by be, but I don’t want my premium to cover it!)
2) Option 1 will lead to higher premiums in states with more stringent coverage mandates, and could possibly lead to insurance companies pulling out of states altogether. I don’t have a solution for this.
3) Make any and all health insurance premiums tax deductible, or make none of it. I don’t care which one, but it should be consistent. None of this “deductible if it’s employer provided, but not if you buy your own” or “deductible if your policy covers this but not if it covers that or doesn’t cover something else” crap. Keep it simple regarding taxes.
4) Explicitly differentiate between health insurance premiums and health care costs. I understand the two are related, but lowering health care costs does not necessarily lead to lower premiums. Lower insurance premiums are different than lower costs for care. A high-risk person is going to pay more for premiums, even though the cost of providing the treatment for disease X is the same regardless of whether the patient is from a high-risk group or a low-risk group. I don’t even know what the goal of the whole health-care debate is anymore; is it lower premiums, or lowers costs?
5) Make health care costs tax deductible, or not. This is similar to item 3. No more of this “costs are deductible if their over this amount, but only if you make less than that amount, and only if you itemize instead of take the standard; oh, and it’s all on sliding scales” crap. Simplify!
Yay! I can narrow this down to two points!
1) Simplify the tax code - it’s either deductible or it’s not.
2) Define the goal: Lower insurance premiums or lower health care costs.
Sorry for rambling.
No need to apologize, mobius.
Andy Smith Friday, November 7th at 10:33PM EST (link)I wanted to hear some clear cut discussion on this subject. It’s time the GOP gets in gear when it comes to healthcare so we can give a clear answer on how to handle it instead of just saying “making healthcare more affordable.”
Keep the ideas coming!
“Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.”-Abraham Lincoln