The Health Care Dictator

The Health Care Dictator

by Mark Luedtke

One of many big lies about U.S. health care is that we have a free market system. In fact, 60% of all health care expenditures in the U.S. are paid by taxpayers. That means our system is already 60% socialized, and that's the root of our current problems. Hillary Clinton wants to make it 100%.

Because the federal government had instituted a wage freeze during WWII, in 1942 the government created a tax break, a health insurance subsidy, so companies could reward workers with 3rd party payer health insurance. The result was a sudden increase in demand for health care services with no change in supply, driving up the price. Increased prices hurt the poor, so government pumped more money into health care, further increasing demand, and further driving up prices. We've continued this spiral at an ever increasing rate ever since. Because Americans don't pay for our own health care anymore, we're not very healthy, further driving up demand and prices. Quality of service also suffers because health care providers must satisfy 3rd party payers, not patients.

A nightmare of regulations at all levels of government compounds the problem. Every government dollar and regulation increases government, health insurance company, and health care provider bureaucracies. Decades of regulations have turned insurance companies, hospitals, clinics, and doctors' offices into reflections of expensive, wasteful, government bureaucracies. Doctors spend 14% of their income filing paperwork. Hospitals spend 25%.

Despite the government involvement in our health care system being the root of our current problems, Hillary's plan demands significantly more government involvement.

If elected, Hillary would dictate that every individual in America carry comprehensive health insurance, pretending this is like mandatory car insurance. She doesn't mention that car insurance only covers catastrophes, not maintenance, nor does she mention states' significant non-compliance. Hillary “envisions” a day when she dictates that all Americans will have to show proof of health insurance in order to get a job,but not illegal immigrants although her plan will cover them.

Hillary would dictate that every employer provide health insurance for their employees or pay a punishing tax to the federal government. Our biggest economic problem right now is that our archaic federal tax structure is driving businesses out of America to business friendly countries. Hillary's dictate will exacerbate that problem.

Hillary would dictate an expansion of government supplied health insurance to compete with private health insurance by opening up the Federal Employee Health Benefit Program to everybody, allowing younger people to buy into Medicare, and by expanding SCHIP to cover well-off families who currently buy their own insurance. Medicare is currently going broke even faster than Social Security, and this will accelerate its demise. All these dictates will transfer business from the private sector to the government, further reducing competition in the private sector leading to higher prices and poorer service.

Hillary would dictate that insurance companies could not refuse nor charge higher rates for people with higher risk. Premiums for healthy people would rise dramatically to subsidize the expenses of those unhealthy people, driving up prices.

The health care dictator learned one lesson since her disastrous socialized medicine plan of 1993 – marketing. She claims this program will cost only $110 billion and add no new bureaucracy. Both claims are false. Every dollar spent, and experts say it will be much more expensive, increases costs and the existing bureaucracies of government, insurance companies, and health care providers. Each dictate does the same. Just like all the government money spent on health care since WWII, the new funds will further drive up the cost of both insurance and health care, forcing more Americans to illegally go without health insurance.

Hillary knows her plan will fail because she designed it that way. Then she can force socialized medicine on us. Socialized medicine advocate Timothy Noah recognizes this in Slate, "The best argument in [Hillary's plan's] favor is that it probably won't work and that when it doesn't, the federal government will have an opportunity to take over. This time, though, the path to single-payer health insurance (shhhhhh!) seems a bit smoother." If elected, Hillary's plan is the last, flawed step before complete socialized medicine.

Some Republican plans aren't much better. Mitt Romney and Arnold Schwarzenegger both implemented state plans with similar dictates. Massachusetts residents have ignored the individual coverage mandate in such large numbers that the government was forced to forgo that dictate. Both plans are doomed like Hilllary's. Plans advocating health saving accounts would offset some damage from government subsidies and 3rd party payers, but they are still big government plans based on manipulating the income tax devastating our economy.

A better solution is to adopt the FairTax and deregulate to end 3rd party payer system. The FairTax would replace all federal taxes including the 22% average embedded tax in all American-made products and services with a 23% inclusive sales tax. Every American would keep 100% of his paycheck and save that money with no tax penalty. All corporate taxes and tax subsidies would disappear. This would dramatically reduce the government money and mandates that have broken our health care system. Competition would flourish. Prices would drop. Service would improve. Americans would pay for their own, inexpensive health care and catastrophic insurance and become more healthy. Freedom is the answer to our health care problems, not a dictator.