A Conservative's Concern About Health Care Reform A Conservative's Concern About Health Care Reform

To begin, I am not opposed to health care reform, as long as it utilizes sound economic principles and does not involve any control by the government. Here is my opposition to government control of health care. We can't afford it.
As a country we now spend more than the amount of money realized in revenue by our poorly formed tax system. How does that translate to main street America? On main street we have a word for it; bankrupt. This country has been, and still is, in a depression. Why a depression? Depressions typically begin with a bubble in the securities and commodities sector and involves several rapid hitting recessions affecting every sector of the economy. That happened in the late twenties and thirties. FDR had a response similar to the response today, allow government spending to get America out. The result was that the great depression lasted far longer than it would have if sound economic policies of controlled spending and sound tax reform had been implemented. America did not exit the great depression until the war industry ramped up during World War II when there was controlled government spending and sound tax reform in order to spur our industrial base. During a depression the last thing a sound economic plan calls for is adding to national debt. That has a prolonging effect.
How can we have meaningful health care reform without government control? It involves a staggered approach.
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1) Remove the anti-trust exemption of health insurance companies
I would like to point out to every member of congress that complains about the big health insurance companies that they allowed their power and uncontrolled growth by making them exempt from anti-trust laws allowing the monopoly of territorial markets. Lifting those restrictions would force companies to trim down and cut expenses because the consumer would have more choices and could fire their company if performance fell below their standards.

2) Government Provided Catastrophic Care Insurance
This is the least used health insurance, the cheapest, and yet the largest expense on the books of most insurance companies. This would be a reasonable expense for the federal government because it would not add a significant amount to the size of the federal budget. Taking this expense off the insurance companies books would cut the cost of a typical insurance policy by 40%

3) Tort Reform
End needless lawsuits. It is time to be realistic. If a loved one dies and their earning potential for a lifetime is $1,000,000.00, their death is not worth $10,000,000.00. Much of the cost of doctor's visits and health care cost from providers is the cost of liability insurance coverage. As with anything in the economy, those cost are passed to the consumer.

4) Tax Exemption for Health Care
Eliminate all taxes paid in the health care industry. Again, the health care industry does not pay their taxes, those cost are passed on to the consumer, the largest being the federal government. Can you see the irony, the government is paying the taxes that they levy. That is a shell game that must stop.

5) Re-Writing the Tax Code
Eliminate the income tax and institute a fair tax based on consumption that promotes savings and allows all Americans to pay their fair share based on what they consume. This will double the revenue to the federal government, and the fair tax calls for a prebate monthly for every American to cover the cost of essential services (i.e. utilities, etc). Even with the prebate factored in the revenue to the government almost doubles. This puts more money in the pockets of Americans to afford insurance and spur economic growth to produce jobs.

6) Health Savings Accounts for All Americans
All with reforming the tax code take a portion of the economic surplus and provide $1,000.00 per year for each American in a free health savings account to cover non-covered expenses, and allowing unused amounts to roll over to the next year and be an addition to the yearly contribution. A family of five for instance would have a $5,000.00 yearly savings
contribution.

These are sound ideas that would completely restructure, not only health care, but revenue collection and it would make health care affordable for every one without adding to the national debt. The restructured tax code would be a buffer against economic recession. These are the sound, common sense conservative principles that should be being put forth by so called conservative leaders instead of the game of politics as usual that has neutered the effectiveness of every area of our government.

How Big Does A Health Care Have to be In Order to be Big Enough

The new House health care bill is now in the neighborhood of 1990 pages.  The most important question for Nancy Pelosi and the house Democrats is how big must this beast be in order to be big enough.  The projected cost of this bill is $894 billion dollars over the past ten years.  The red tape and bureaucracy of past bill is still here.  One might wonder to whom members of the house were listening to during the heated town hall meetings this past summer.  The true danger of this bill is the same as in the past, the need to raise taxes in order to pay for this bill as it kills competition that controls cost in an open market place.

In the end many house members will again vote on a bill that they do not read because of the sheer size of the bill.  Hidden in the fine print are the true evils of a bill that will eventually turn the American medical system from one of the premier systems in the world to a sub par system that takes the control of medical care away from doctors and individuals and puts it in the hands of bureaucrats.  One can only hope there are enough representatives in congress that will vote against this monster and send it where it really deserves to be, in the trash can.