You are wandering lost in the desert for several days without water, parched, your lips cracking, tongue swollen, eyes rattling around in your skull, desparate for an oasis. A man appears, and you think you are saved; he tells you he’s got just what you need, water. But instead of life-sustaining liquid he gives you empty water bottles and a coupon for free water, usable at a well that has yet to be drilled.
Your hopes dashed, you expire.
Pres. Bush’s health reform plan provides individuals with tax breaks to help them buy insurance that for many does not exist. Sort of like water in a desert.

Continue reading Bush’s empty water bottles

There hasn’t been much in the popular press about consumer-directed health care of late. What a relief. That doesn’t mean we can bury the idea, as economists and policy makers of a libertarian bent are going to keep returning to the “market as solution to all” mantra until we successfully implant a wooden cross in their cold small hearts.
And to some degree consumerism in health care is appropriate and warranted, and therefore part of the answer to the health care reform question.

Continue reading health care consumerism update

Bob Laszewski has found the solution to the Bush health care program’s reliance on the non-functioning individual health insurance market. The plan needs a model that addresses the problems of medical underwriting, denial of coverage, age band underwriting, risk selection, access and availability, and it’s called “Part D”!

OK, so I’ve been a little obsessed with the First Health-Concentra deal. Several clients will be directly affected by the merger, and their priorities are mine. But I’ve been ignoring the larger world, including a report published in Health Affairs (subscription required) that has far-reaching implications.
Two researchers at CMS analyzed data on the concentration of health care expenditures, (what percentage of patients spend what portion of total medical expenses) and noted a surprising trend.

Continue reading Health care dollars – Who spends how much

In yet another sign of the impending attainment of critical mass on health care reform, the SEIU and WalMart have found common ground.
Who woulda thunk it?

Continue reading Reform makes for strange bedfellows

I’ve been trying to find a summary of the Edwards plan unblemished by opinion/criticism/odds-making, and so far all I’ve found is the same article written several different ways, and no synopsis.
No wonder we’re having a tough time engaging in a substantitive debate.

Continue reading The Edwards Plan

Matt Holt has published a hilarious dialogue with a press relations guy from the National Federation of Independent Businesspeople.
If you are one of those who believe people always act in their self-interest, this will disabuse you of that notion.

My recent comments on Michael Cannon’s entries for the Cavalcade of Risk struck a nerve or two, evidently without the benefit of anaesthesia.

Continue reading Libertarians and Americans