Universal Healthcare Good for All?

There is no doubt that something needed to be done with the previous healthcare system. Is the plan that we have just passed, though, the right one? With commitments such as Medicare, the National Debt, and Social Security, our government should not be biting off more than it can chew. As of now, each citizen shares a portion of the national debt, around $500,000 per household. Still, we are pushing and pushing for more entitlements.
The first question: what is proposed in the Healthcare Reform Bill? Although a large portion of Americans show high interest and agree that it affects them personally, 69% say that it is hard to understand (1). In an anonymous summary of the Healthcare Bill, user ThomCat on DemocraticUnderground.com posted both good and bad bullets of different sections of the bill. While the pros are very good, the cons are overwhelming. In Statement 12, the user addresses the standard for the Qualifying Plan, which is the base insurance given by employers. The National Qualifying Plan prices and services are set by employers, so if employers start offering less coverage to their employees, the national Qualifying Plan goes down. Following Statement 12, the Cost Sharing Plan is addressed. The average co-pay, per person is projected to be roughly $5,000 per year, and is subject to increase, linked to Consumer Price Index. Not only will enhanced plans cost more, but the services won’t match the payment (2).
With a government-based healthcare system, we are also riding against a core principle in our country itself: a free market society. As stated in Joe Messerli’s article, “Should the Government Provide Free Universal Healthcare for All Americans,” “profit motives, competition, and individual ingenuity” have long been the cause for cost control and effectiveness (3). With a government-based plan, this is ruled out and no alternatives will be made to help lower prices. Doctors will lose flexibility and suffer from a decrease of salary, resulting in poor patient care, and healthy people who take care of themselves will have to pay for those who smoke, are obese, etc. Personal freedoms can also decline, as the government will most likely impose regulations or increase taxes on risky products like cigarettes, fast foods, etc. All in all, there is little incentive for young adults to get into the medical practice, there is no incentive to reduce prices in healthcare, as there won’t be any competition, people will lose their individual freedoms and some will be financially burdened to compensate for those who don’t pay taxes.
There are alternative ways to easing the difficulty for many of those without health insurance, and certainly, healthcare has gotten out of control. For instance, say we modeled health insurance after car insurance. If you drive, you MUST have car insurance and you must pay for it. There are dozens of car insurance companies that all compete for consumers, and thus they keep the prices relatively low. This could be done for health insurance too. Instead of employers deciding what coverage they want, what if the people themselves chose the company they wanted to represent them? And what if there was a base insurance plan, one that covered “x” number of doctor visits, “n” number of hospital visits, “y” number of prescription medicines, etc. On top of that, if someone acquired a personal injury and had to pay high medical bills for that one injury, they could up their medical insurance coverage to pay for what they needed.

For those who could absolutely not afford medical insurance, they could receive a cut on their payment, but also a cut in what services they could have. Limited Medicaid would also be available. This is considered “tough love,” however; health coverage is not an entitlement- it is a privilege. Should John Doe (who works hard to pay for his child’s leukemia treatments) have to pay double to cover Angela Jones’ child’s doctor visits for every cough she has because Angela decided to buy that big screen TV last month? The answer is no, and the current government needs to start making decisions that affect the WHOLE country positively, rather than a vocal minority.


1. Kohut, Andrew, et.al. Public Closely Tracking Healthcare Debate. Pew Research Center. 2009. http://people-press.org/report/571/healthcare-obama-economy
2. Anonymous. A Summary Review of the House Healthcare Bill. Democratic Underground. 2009.http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x8530145
3. Messerli, Joe. Should the Government Provide Universal Healthcare for All Americans? Balanced Politics .org. 2009. ttp://www.balancedpolitics.org/universal_health_care.htm