Conservatives have provided plenty of alternative proposals to the most recent healthcare debacle being called a “bill” in Congress. However, an interesting free market approach comes from Fifth District candidate, Feda Morton:
“Republicans have to do more than merely criticize Obamacare,” she said. “We must recognize that government involvement in the health care industry has driven up prices and driven many consumers to look to government to solve the problems government has created. We must offer a clear alternative that introduces free market competition in health care as the best way to lower costs and improve health services.”
1. Increase consumer accountability by providing tax incentives for individuals to buy their own insurance.
“Most Americans today are insured through their employer,” Morton said. “The tax system encourages employer-provided health care with low deductibles. People tend to believe they are getting health care free, and they lose all incentive to shop around, to look for less expensive methods of care. We must allow individuals a tax incentive to buy their own health insurance. This will lead to consumers shopping for the best price. Since plans with higher deductibles will be cheaper, people will begin to make better health choices. They will look for ways to save in order to avoid paying the higher deductible.”
Morton cited a May 4, 2004 Wall Street Journal article estimating that if the average deductible would rise from $250 to $500, and copays would rise from 20 percent to 25 percent, yearly health care spending would decline by $65 billion. “Giving cost-conscious consumers incentive to make wise health care choices would lower costs for everyone,” she said.
2. Allow Americans to purchase insurance across state lines.
“Our antiquated health insurance laws allow states to force consumers to purchase insurance only from in-state providers,” Morton said. “A patchwork of confusing and contradictory regulations drive up costs and prevent competition from insurers in other states. They reduce portability because a move across state lines can cost you your health insurance. It’s time to update our insurance laws from the horse-and-buggy days into the Internet age.
“Allowing consumer choice across state lines would give consumers greater choice in choosing their doctor, and would cut costs.” Morton again cited the Wall Street journal’s report that allowing insurance purchases across state lines could save consumers between 7 and 17 percent per year, or from $600-$1500 for a family health plan.
3. Introduce tort reform legislation.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates that capping non-economic (“pain and suffering”) damages at $250,000 and punitive damages at $500,000 could save $54 billion in health care costs. Even if the limits are set somewhat higher, savings could still be significant. Liability insurance currently costs the health care industry some $35 billion a year. While the exact amounts could be negotiated, a cap on limitless tort suits would save American consumers billions of dollars every year. Market-based health care reform must include a tort reform component.
4. Allow more medical professionals into the field.
Hospitals and doctors limit the supply of medical professionals by restricting the number of admissions to medical schools and refusing to allow nurses and other medical professionals to perform services that do not require the same level of skill required of medical doctors. This artificial limitation on supply, while demand for medical services keeps increasing, forces costs higher with no proven corresponding increase in quality. Government should ensure that members of the medical profession do not violate existing antitrust laws, stifling competition and increasing costs.
Also, doctors and nurses should have the same portability in their medical licenses that consumers should have in their insurance. They should be able to take their licenses from state to state.5. Eliminate fraud from the Medicare/Medicaid systems.
Every day we hear the stories of medical supplies being sold to deceased people or outrageous cost for equipment like wheel chairs. Where is the government when you need it to actually monitor a system they are responsible for? Billions of dollars could be saved and used for meaningful health-care needs if just the fraud and corruption were removed from the current government run programs. If Washington can’t take care of what we have now, why should we believe that they can take care of a universal system that is suppose to meet all our needs – it can’t.
In stark contrast to the top-down unconstitutional federal control of Obamacare, enactment of these free-market principles would put health care decisions, and the responsibility for these decisions, back in the hands of consumers. This gives the American people who are best equipped to make health care choices for themselves the opportunity to drive the market. Free-enterprise and less government has traditionally provided for better ways to solve difficult problems that will benefit patients, health care professionals, and other stakeholders in providing quality health care.
