Achieving Health-Care Competition
The other day I happened to have lunch near one of my lunchtime friends, which also meant being in close proximity to her arch-conservative husband. Naturally, as arch-conservatives are wont to do, he immediately wanted to talk about constitutional rights and what's wrong with liberal government. It's almost as predictable as those "Would you like to talk about Jesus?" moments.*
I let him carry on with his polemics about "obamacare" and how it would be the ruin of the country,‡ grunting occasionally as one is likely to do with the conservatively boorish. In a summary statement — or, rather, a statement that I chose to treat as a summary statement, he made some mention of insurance companies.
"Well," I said, "I am no friend of insurance companies."
Then a breakthrough happened:
"Well," he said, "neither am I…."
Perhaps he was going to say more, but I thought I would trap him on that thought, pretend that we had reached common ground, and I shifted the conservation to his wife and her thoughts on the weather.
Later rumination led me to think that if we might count on a general hatred of health-care insurance companies, brought on by a universal realization of their profit-driven tactics to deny care, reject claims, and drop customers at the least provocation, there might be some hope. Perhaps reality is actually seeping through to so many of the brainwashed conservative supporters who are so frequently the victims of these tragedies but who continue, so markedly against their own self-interest, to be cynically manipulated by the republican party.
What seems to be notice by all: the insurance industry is not working for the benefit of the American people, regardless of what they might tell us about "peace of mind". (How long has it been since that's been claimed as a benefit of health insurance?)
And so, I suggest that we offer a choice of how to effect the reform that nearly everyone seems to agree is needed:
- through competition, or
- through regulation.
Now, since many of these people will react to "regulation" as anathema and to be avoided at all costs, perhaps we can all agree to go with "competition".
And the best, easiest, most beneficial way to achieve competition?
A true public option, of course.
———–
* I actually had someone sit down next to me and ask that very question many years ago. I answered: "no". Remarkably, this seemed to leave the Jesus guy speechless; he got up and went away.
‡ It must be up to health-care reform to bring the sky falling down because marriage equality for gay people hasn't done it. Tsk.
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on Monday, 7 September 2009 at 19.19
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conservatively boorish
It's diversity, man.
Perhaps reality is actually seeping through to so many of the brainwashed conservative supporters who are so frequently the victims of these tragedies but who continue, so markedly against their own self-interest, to be cynically manipulated by the republican party.
Mmmm. I remember well my brainwashing. The klieg lights…the sleep deprivation…the rote repetition. Good times.
If conservatives are holding back the enlightened liberals, why don't they form their own public option amongst themselves? And let the zombified conservatives wander aimlessly in the wilderness.
I'd say a few market forces could help the situation. Many elective cosmetic surgery procedures have come way down in price, e.g. lasik eye procedures. We could use a little more price discovery.
on Tuesday, 8 September 2009 at 01.57
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Nice try, Jeff. But alas, when it gets down to who or what will do the competing
— OMG! You mean government??!! — anathema won't begin to describe
the reaction you'll get. Unfortunately.
Re: the question. I had a similar one posed by a stranger once. It was more
along the lines of, "Do you ever feel a need to thank Jesus?" As I recall, I
said something like, "That's between me and his father." and went on about
my business.
on Wednesday, 9 September 2009 at 10.45
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That's admirably civil, SW. I guess these days I feel an ever-stronger calling to be an outspoken atheist, surrounded as I am by poor, down-trodden, persecuted Christians who love me but don't quite want me to have equality in civil rights–or think I should be put to death.
on Wednesday, 9 September 2009 at 10.52
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Really, Fred, if you're remembering your brainwashing with such clarity, you probably need a refresher!
To be honest, though, I always thought you were more likely one of the inexplicable few who chose a conservative path–or was born to it–rather than manipulated into it. Too much Ayn Rand at a critical age?
Forming our own enlightened public option. Now there's an idea it would be fun to try. Difficult to get enough people into the pool, though, an insurance works better with a lot of room to spread the risk / fluctuations in payout. It reminds me of a coworker who loved his Lotto despite anything I could say about the odds. He had a "system" that he knew would win, sooner or later I guess, but he was always short on cash. "Book my bets," he'd suggest if I said he was certain to loose. I would have if I could run a big enough operation, but booking one bet would wipe me out if it won. On the other hand if I had, say, a million people betting…but I'd have to be government-run or something like that to get those numbers.