FixHealthCarePolicy

The President’s Health Proposal: Bringing Back Price Controls

In preparation for the Health Care Summit, President Obama unveiled his first official health care proposal. It is intended to reconcile the differences between the highly unpopular House and Senate bills. Curiously, President Obama’s latest iteration of the liberal health policy agenda includes more federal power: the power to control “private” health plan premiums.

Price Controls. According to the President’s proposal, a new “Health Insurance Rate Authority” would oversee rate review for private insurers, so that “if a rate increase is unreasonable and unjustified, health insurers must lower premiums, provide rebates, or take other actions to make premiums affordable.” On the face of it, this means price controls on health insurance.

The President knows the unhappy history of price controls, and the genuine misery- shortages, mainly- that such a policy guarantees. Think of the long, hot gasoline lines of the 1970s, courtesy of the Carter Administration. (more…)

Tags: health care spending, Health Care Summit, health premiums, President's proposal, price controls

32 State-Based Think Tanks Push for Patient-Centered Reform

The Pelican Institute is the latest state-based think tank to join a coalition calling for patient-reformed health care options instead of the proposals being considered in Congress. “Although many of these ideas aren’t new, this is the first time public policy leaders from across the country have come together to propose a unified alternative plan to what has been termed ‘ObamaCare,’” the institute said in a press release.

The premise of patient-centered health reform is simple: It empowers people to make their own health care decisions.
For example, patient-centered reform would allow individuals to take the tax deduction employers currently get. This means you-not your employer-will own your health insurance policy.

Another element of the reform is permitting individuals and businesses to buy health insurance policies across state lines.

Perhaps the biggest reform suggested by the think tank leaders deals with the basic way that Medicaid currently works. Where beneficiaries are now stuck in a bureaucratic system with few options, a patient- centered health reform for Medicaid would allow them to use their medical aid in a way they choose through a simple voucher system. Medicaid enrollees could then take their vouchers to the doctor of their choice, therefore improving access and quality, and allowing them to see-for the first time-just how much their health care costs.

Tags: health premiums, Medicaid, patient-centered reform