Healthcare

Health Care:

The United States government has never been very good at administrating or running anything. Look at Amtrak, Social Security, the postal service and Medicare. So what on earth makes anyone, other than a bureaucrat, think that the government can run health care?

There are just a few fundamental problems with our existing healthcare that, if corrected could solve many of the current issues.

First, there are not enough doctors. It is simple supply and demand. How long did it take for you to get your last doctor’s appointment? What if there were more doctors? As supply reaches the point of equilibrium with demand, prices level out to amounts that sustain both the supplier (doctor) and the consumer (patient). We need more specialists, general practitioners, research doctors and nurses.
Instead of spending billions on government run healthcare, we should fund educational grants for all students that qualify to attend medical school. In a few years America would have more medical and research professionals to help increase supply and decrease some of the costs.

Second, the insurance companies should modify their system of payment so that the end user, the patient, has more control over costs. Our current system allows a patient to be insulated from the actual costs of health care. Many of us simply supply our doctor with our insurance card with little regard to the costs of the visit or procedure. The doctor is not motivated to offer the best value to the patient and the patient is not motivated to search of value because “the insurance covers it”. As costs rise, the insurance company passes on those costs to the consumer in the form of higher premiums. Nobody takes the financial hit directly; the consumer sees it through annual insurance premium increases that are unwelcome, but generally manageable.

Third, we need real reform to control medical malpractice lawsuits. There are countless legitimate lawsuits; however there are far too many that are not.

The majority of Americans are not supportive of a government run healthcare system. Despite this, our government is bent on pushing through legislation that would institute it. Currently there are some 1100 government agencies. It is frightening to think that we might someday soon have another poorly run government bureaucracy that will undoubtedly become rife with fraud and corruption.

http://www.usa.gov/Agencies/Federal/All_Agencies/index.shtml