Congress to Market on Healthcare: Drop Dead
Government healthcare reform sure gets a lot of media attention. In just the last month alone there have been about 13,000 new stories containing the word “government” and the phrase “healthcare reform.” In contrast, there have been only 66 news reports during the last month with both of the terms “market based” and “healthcare reform.” That’s a ratio of almost 200 stories on government healthcare for every one story about market-based healthcare—government-based “reform” has completely monopolized the debate.
Given the momentum in Congress for some kind of government healthcare overhaul, the media attention is understandable. But at the same time that Congress debates different versions of Obamacare and considers various public options, some market-based healthcare solutions have gone largely unnoticed, despite the fact that they have successfully lowered medical costs and improved both access and quality of service.
In a new article, I outline seven such examples of market-based healthcare alternatives, read it here at American.com.
3 Comments:
Well not only is Congress turning its collective nose up at how the free market could effectively drive down the costs related to medical care but as the 10th Amendment Centers notes there is a real question about the constitutionality of the healthcare reform being foisted off onto the citizenry...
When the former Soviet Union was dissolved, always wondered where the Congress of People’s Deputies ended up. Pretty apparent they have surfaced.
My only question if these reforms, beyond HSAs were so great why did the spend deficit spend Republican Congress from 2000 to 2006 not pass them.
I think the chances of the mandate being upheld are high due to its being a Tax. The 16th amendment says congress can levy an income tax
"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived" It does not say that congress can't say you pay less taxes if you do something, in fact we have a lot of situations where that is the case, e.g. homeownership, buy a house get the interest on a mortgage off as well as property taxes. This is not explicitly stated in the amendment either. The congress could say that all red haired people should pay 20% more taxes than everyone else and still be constitutional. In the worst case the mandate would become you pay unless you demonstrate you have health insurance, which by analogy is ok.
In addition recall that a little issue called the civil war drastically changed the meaning of the 10th amendment, since no where in the constitution does it prohibit secession and the 10th amendment would clearly then allow it as a reserved power.
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