Health Care Crucible: Public or Private?

Fits over health care reform at congressional Town Halls around the country have dominated the cable news for the past week, so the Pres weighs in with a NY Times Op-Ed. Perhaps it’s his measured style, or intended to counter the “loud voices,” but it comes off too lukewarm. Once the hysterical opposition talk about “death panels” and, gasp, “socialism” (“We gotta stop this madness before we turn into Russia,” one woman stammered in frustration. It’s still the Cold War! Later the same lady admitted on some cable news show that she didn’t hear a word of what Arlen Spector said in response to her question) blows over it’s going to come down to costs. How is this thing going to be paid for? Universal coverage means increased costs. Meaning: higher premiums. Making it illegal to deny people coverage because of their medical history is going to increase costs. Meaning: higher premiums. It is extremely hard to believe that cutting wastes and inefficiencies (networking records, bundling payments for doctor care, etc), as good as these ideas might be, will cover these increases in costs. Taxing the rich might get us universal health care but it won't stop inflation in health care premiums and costs. Or let me put that more directly: based upon what evidence could we possibly believe that health insurance companies given this scenario will NOT continue to raise premiums? Backroom handshakes w/ Big Pharma? Over the last decade or so health care premiums paid by people, families, has grown three times faster than wages. The measures to keep the insurance companies accountable that Obamacare is now talking about, at the height of the debate, involve coverage issues but not, seriously, costs. Sure, I think everybody should have access to basic health care. But Obama is still pulling punches w/ the corporations, and has apparently given up on the importance of the public option, or in his words, "keeping the insurance companies honest." Come on, the profit gouging will continue without a not-for-profit public option to keep the private insurance companies, yep, honest on costs. The NY Times prints some University of Chicago economist (also something in the Washington Post)explaining why any public option (under a "fair" set of regulations)would not impact health care costs significantly. His case is not convincing. How is it all those European countries and Canada get way more "care" for the buck than we do after all? Tell me it has nothing to do w/ the fact that as public services they don't have to pay CEO and managerial supersalaries or hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising and lobbying the government? So, apparently, we're going to get universal health care and more inflationary health care preminums and costs. This is the great democratic compromise on the table at the moment. And when costs do blowup it will be blamed on Obamacare, of course. Wall Street is going to be O’s undoing, I'm just saying.

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