Abe Erickson
Michael CrippenThe Free Market and Medicare.
Posted by Michael Crippen on January 5, 2010
Did you know President Barrack Obama praised the Mayo Clinic as an example of ingenuity and quality when it comes to health care? If you have followed the health care debacle this year then you heard him say that they, ““the highest quality care at costs well below the national norm.” The tone was that the Mayo Clinic is an example, because their level of service and overall health care is top-notch, yet the cost of such services is well below the national average facing the rest of the nation. The insinuation is that the Mayo Clinic along with the Cleveland Clinic serve as proof that health care cost across the country are to high, and I think only a select few who would argue against this.
This proof of the need for more affordable health care, such as it is, is given to nudge the American people into supporting the idea that the federal government has to get involved to find a solution. Not only is their involvement necessary. Pieces of legislation exceeding 2,000+ pages reveal this is a complete re-write of the health care system. Of course this involvement and complete re-write is purely for the public good, it is to make sure all Americans could get the same services at the same cost; not just the ones who have health insurance, but also all those forced into health insurance system and those without means to buy insurance on their own. I would love to get into more about EVERYTHING that is wrong with the idea of the government’s involvement in the free market and in health care in general, but alas I have not the time.
It is true, the cost of health care has risen quickly over the past few decades, but it is also hard to dispute that The United States of America has one of, if not the very best health care available in the world! If Americans wanted the cheaper health care offered by other countries you would see massive droves of people driving across the borders into Mexico and Canada. In some cases, the cost of the health care provided in other countries is so much lower than the price of the service offered in The United States that you can pay for a plan ticket and take a mini vacation to receive the needed health services. While it is true there are some who have flown to other countries to take advantage of lower medical care prices, Americans have chosen by the majority to receive medical care inside the US.
When I was in middle school there was a boy in my church would fly to Asia and get a huge discount on many things for the new school season. I remember, they bought at least 2 pairs of Nike Air Jordan’s, which in the early 90′s still cost over $100. They would buy two or three because they could get them for next to nothing compared to purchase price in the States. If my memory serves me correct they spent like $15-20 on each pair of Jordan’s.
When the President points to clinics like the Mayo Clinic and the Cleveland Clinic as examples, he is inadvertently pointing out that free market capitalist have found many solutions to the cost of health care coverage. He is pointing out, again inadvertently, the free market is capable of finding solutions on its own. Another problem he faces is free market capitalist do not support socialist reform even when flattered by the Administration, and no better case is found than the Mayo Clinic in Arizona decision to no longer accept Medicare patients. I have not heard the Mayo Clinic or the Cleveland Clinic for that matter sing the praises of health care reform, but it is evident the Mayo Clinic is calling for Medicaid reform. “We firmly believe that Medicare needs to be reformed,” Yardley said in a Dec. 23 e-mail. “It has been true for many years that Medicare payments no longer reflect the increasing cost of providing services for patients.”
The Mayo Clinic Organization lost $840 Million last year alone. So as a true capitalist not wanting to eliminate a customer base without having a better idea of how this will impact their overall business, they have decided to run a two-year test in one area before the roll out of the entire plan to all the Mayo Clinic Organization. Another example of the tone that the real health care reform should take. Should we not run small isolated test, before this health care reform bill goes into forceful action throughout every state in the United States. The Arizona clinics and hospital were chosen as the test site. Mayo’s hospital and four clinics in Arizona, including the Glendale facility, lost $120 million on Medicare patients last year, Yardley said. The program’s payments cover about 50 percent of the cost of treating elderly primary-care patients at the Glendale clinic, he said. After two years the Mayo Clinic will look at the results and decide if the entire origination should stopping accepting Medicare
I would like to see a couple of things happen in National Health Care Reform, if the federal government feels it has no choice but to get involved. One, I would like to see controlled test and volunteer states to conduct said test to see what ideas do and do not work, with honest and true transparency showing the American people the results. Let there be a Liberal Health Care Reform Test State. Let there be a Moderate Health Care Reform Test State and let there be a Conservative Health Care Reform Test State. Best of all let us have a constitutionally inspired approach at Health Care Reform that focuses on the free market and capitalistic principles. Let us have a State volunteer to test this type of reform. In the end, after say a two-year period let us take a moment and investigate which principles have had the greatest impact in improving the overall states quality and accessibility to health care insurance. If the data is inconclusive, then perhaps more time should be given to the experiment o access what the long-term effects are of the above test models.
Two, I absolutely agree that there is an emergency that requires reform in the health care arena. This emergency reform is the reform of Medicare and Medicaid and the entitlement programs that our federal government dispenses. Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security are bankrupting this system and driving up the cost of health care for everyone else!
Shawn D. said
Very good read Michael. I would point out, however, on your point of using a certain state or a few states to try this liberal way of medicine out, that it has already been tried and is failing miserably. I know most in the Republican party admire Mitt Romney, and I was one of those as well not too long ago, but the insurance reforms that he signed off on while Governor, which looked a lot like socialized medical practices, have failed to the extreme, costing the state of Massachusetts dearly in the way of their budget. It has not worked there, and the plan of the Democrats is just even worse! They take the Mass. system and make it ten times worse. If that system does not work, then I highly doubt a system, spread over a whole nation, costing trillions of dollars, will be any better in the end. Although I do see where you are going with what you are saying, just wanted to point that out.
Secondly, I am a stickler for the Constitution and what it says. In the Tenth Amendment, and I am paraphrasing mind you, it tells us that the powers NOT afforded to the federal government are the states responsibilities respectively. Having said that, unless we are to fight about the legality of Interstate commerce and what it has to do with health care, we must admit that these issues MUST be left up to the states, leaving the people to chose if they want a system like this or not. If the people are not happy with a system in one state, they may leave and go to another. This is something the Founders saw as a necessity to the ills of the federal government and what they could do if given the power to oversee everything on a nationalized level.
Right now, if I lived in Mass. and did not want to buy health care, even though I am forced to in that state, I could move to Vermont, New York, PA, or any other state that does not have these requirements for their citizens. In a federally ruled health care system, that option is out the window, unless of course we all move to Nebraska with Ben Nelson and not have to pay for the rest of the countries health care!
What we need are options, in my opinion. First, we need to set up a national health care bank that is run by the private industries. This bank could hold all the nations health insurance companies, having them all compete for your business when looking to change plans or to get brand new insurance coverage. This bank, in reality, could still be run by the federal government, but with little oversight. Have the feds stay on top of what the prices are, making sure there is no fixing of prices for certain people with certain conditions, having nothing to do with setting the actual price for said insurance plans. This would allow the MANY insurance companies that are right now held to very selective states to go out to other states, where there will be more people with more competition from other insurance companies that have been in those states for years. You would think this would be the first thing we came up with in a capitalistic society, yet look at who represents us and I guess that tells the whole story.
Secondly, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security…no matter how hard it is to prove to your constituents that it needs to be done, needs to be phased out. Set a limit…for all intents and purposes here, let us say the age of 28. No one under that age will be required to PAY Medicare tax or social security tax, leaving them the option to start REAL medical savings accounts that are NOT controlled by the federal government, but by private industries and banks. Allowing people to save this money, without the threat of taxing the money or having to give a portion of it up over a certain many years will allow younger people to save for those times later in life when they need health care the most. Couple this with what I have said above, would not only give the people cheaper health care options, but would boost the economy at the same time. It is a win win situation. The only problem foreseeable is with how to pay for the next generation of people on these social programs. But if we are to spend a trillion dollars over the next ten years anyway, spend that trillion to get us off the social programs. Once they are gone, we will see HUGE boom in markets, although 40 to 50 years down the line is too long to wait for some.
I do not want to take up too much more of your time, since I have written a lot already…lol…But these issues are not going to go away because we want them to. We need solutions to fix the problems, and the solutions that are out there, not just mine but many others, would fix these problems over the long term. To me, I do not think there is a short term fix. When a junkie is addicted to crack, that junkie does not give up that drug over night! It takes months if not years to kick the habit. Same thing with social programs. We need to get the junkies off these proverbial “drugs” so we can make things better!
Michael Crippen said
Excellent points especially about the need to get the government and essentially the people off of Medicare and the other grossly expensive government entitlement programs. I agree with you and it is my stance that the Federal government has no place in health care.
I too am aware of the issue in MA, under “Romney Care” and I am soooo very glad you brought it up. I was hoping someone would. See that is my point we have at least one state recently passed something along the lines of what is being proposed now. It is no surprise to me that it is a colossal disaster.
The point I was trying to make and probably poorly so, is that why is there this huge rush to push this through without an evidence that this sort of thing has ever worked, you now like ever!
One of the things I love the most about this country is that every State is a little bit different and if you don’t like hwo things go in one state you can move to another. As I understand this is something that Ronald Reagan loved about this country also. By the way in my lifetime I have lived in 5 different state and also in West Germany during the 80′s and four different states in my adulthood. You are right too, with the kind of reform especially the health care reform Americans will have no where to escape these policies.
Shawn D. said
I want to start out by saying that I was not calling out your show in particular when I said on my show last night that people are talking too much on health care. There were a couple other shows that I have went into in the past week or so, everyday, and they spend their whole two hours on health care. At that rate, you could read the bill in a couple weeks, so I am not too sure what new they had to bring up. When shows like yours bring up NEW material that can be discussed, I am all for that because health care is an issue that needs to be brought up. I hope that clears things up. I am not out to call anyone out…well, at least not your show anyway. There are a few shows that I have called out and they sent the trollers after me for doing it.
I understand your point, and I thought that is where you where going with the whole article, just thought I would throw my two sense in and talk about some solutions as well. The Mass. experiment is never mentioned by those in the Democratic party when talking about health care reform, and I find that strange. At least they could find the good things that came out of it. My thinking is that Mass. did not go far enough for them, and that is why they are silent on the issue. Either that or they are afraid of the backlash from Mass. when the people there hear about the Congress talking up a program that just does not work at all.
It was a great piece man, keep up the great work!