Saturday, August 8, 2009

Health Care Reform: Passing the burden from businesses to government

Health Care is the biggest issue being talked about right now, and it seems like the citizens aren't for the reform that is being planned. That may change as time goes on, but right now the people of the nation seem to be wary of more spending because of how large the deficit has grown to.

What really bugs me about the issue is the fact that it shows exactly where my views with Obama differ. Both of us see that the insurance companies are the problem, but our methods to fix it are completely different.

I see insurance companies as a hindrence to the free market. With insurance companies paying the cost doctors and patiants are in the dark about the actual cost of what they are recieving. The insurance companies make the decisions instead of the patient.

Right now Obama is trying to fix it by taking away the insurance companies and adding the government. What bothers me about this is that it takes the patients choice to choose away even further, and now the government is who you go to for Health Care.

If it continuos to be an option that is fine, but if it is an option that is underwritten by the government every year than it won't be good because it would drive private insurers out of the sector. The more people to be under the government model the more it would have to be subsidized, which would just keep costing the government more and more money.

Obama is saying that that fixing health care is how we fix our economy. Right now it is hurting businesses because they have to pay for employees insurance. So, instead of strangling businesses we are going to strangle the government? That just seems bad.

Why not make it the individuals who have to save money for procedures and doctors visits? I'm sure hospitals would compete for yearly plans and stuff for normal services. It would save money because people could shop around for the best price, people could rate doctors online, and everything could be dealt with in the free market.

Right now the free market doesn't exist in health care, because the patients and the doctors don't know the prices of anything anymore it would seem. The government is trying to compound the problem, not fix it.