Putting Healthcare Back into Consumer’s Hands

The Right pushes the idea that under a government controlled plan, bureaucrats control an individual’s health (“death panels”) in that they make decisions as to which doctor one can see, tests one can have and medications one can take whereas under an insurance plan purchased on the free market, you make these decisions. First let me say that people working for insurance companies in the private sector are as much bureaucrats as those working in government except that the organizations they serve are motivated by profits instead of public good. In reality however, insurance company staff also decides what doctors one can see, what tests one can have and what medications one can take. So the illusion that in a private healthcare insurance plan you can decide these things is just that, an illusion. Now of coarse one can pay out of their own pocket and in either case make these decisions themselves. What putting healthcare “back in the consumer’s hands” is really meant to do is put the responsibility for making cost/benefit decisions regarding their health into the hands of consumers, some of these decisions resulting in life or death. To make any cost/benefit analysis one does not only need to understand the implications of cost, which most consumers do, but also the other element in the decision, which they don’t. What the Right is asking an average person is to decide whether the results on their health of a procedure are worth their cost? To make this analysis properly one needs to also understand medicine and for most things a casual google search is totally inadequate. Even general practitioners, doctors themselves, rely on specialists. If a cost/benefit analyses are done improperly, the action taken will not only result in less benefit but also higher cost. The more affluent among us of coarse will avail themselves of the best health plan and not face the necessity of making this analysis while the middle and lower class will. And even if they do, cost will have a very low priority. (Hopefully the very poor will still be covered by some government subsidized plan and avoid making the analysis.) As a result, the “one percent” will not only be able to buy more stuff but be healthier while they do it. A healthy nation, like a well-educated nation, is necessary for a country to prosper and compete in this global economy. Better healthcare is not only good for the majority of those benefiting from it directly but is also good for the “one percent”. Healthy people can be more productive, increasing the bottom line of a company. Most of the increase in profit going to the wealthiest (Unfortunately the gain does not trickle down). Healthier people will have more income which they can spend to buy more widgets, also increasing the bottom line. Finally, if we are ever in a major war, a healthy army will outperform a sickly one. The answer is not to put decisions relative to healthcare in the hands of the consumer but to put in place a system that will ensure that the entire population is healthy and strong and able to contribute to our society.