When Hillary Clinton last took a stab at ‘repairing’ America's health-care system, an overwhelming majority of Americans rejected her grand vision of an enormous government-run health-care bureaucracy and they will again, I feel.
Hillary Clinton and health care do not mix.
The crux of Hillary's plan is an ``individual mandate,'' which requires that all Americans buy health insurance whether they want to or not. So much for freedom of choice!
To accomplish this, the plan will create a government- regulated national pool through which individuals can purchase insurance. Those who are already insured would get to choose whether to keep their current health coverage or purchase the new national plan.
Additionally, Clinton would force big businesses that don't offer health insurance to pay a punitive tax.
In order to sell to the national pool, the government would demand that insurers cover all applicants (``guaranteed issue'') and that premium levels would have to be indiscriminate, regardless of people's health status when they apply (``community rating.'')
She estimates that her plan would cost $110 billion per year – which, if history is any guide, is woefully underestimated.
To pay for it, Clinton hopes to exploit the significant savings from improved health-care technology, particularly from electronic medical records (which is the only good idea of the whole plan). She would also use some of the revenue from the repeal of President George W. Bush's tax cuts. In other words, raising taxes on all who actually pay taxes. Additionally, she advocated a cap on the tax deductibility of health insurance for wealthy Americans with expensive insurance coverage in effect punishing the “evil rich” for being able to afford the coverage they want.
In other words, Hillary is telling every American that they must purchase a health-insurance product the government likes. This is inconsequential if you already have a plan the government will like, but a serious problem if government makes you purchase something you don't want.
Here is the problem: individuals with costly health problems will want to gravitate toward generous and costly plans. Healthy individuals, especially the young, will want to avoid getting stuck with big insurance bills, either by purchasing the narrowest coverage possible, or by avoiding the purchase altogether. This, in the insurance industry, is called “adverse selection.” The result will be the “sick” will utilize the system at a much higher rate than the healthy, driving up the cost of medical service for all. Then HillaryCare will have to stick taxpayers in general with the soaring costs of the plans that attract the sick.
The hand of government will have to be heavy indeed. The most likely outcome is that federal law will require proof of insurance of every individual, even those without a job. Penalties for those without insurance would likely be monetary, and steep enough to force many individuals to purchase insurance products they otherwise would avoid.
It would probably take a little while for Hillary's plan to make a complete mash out of the current health-care universe. When it does, you can bet that the ``fix'' will be the implementation of socialized medicine, which has failed everywhere it has been tried.
