In a recent news release on Capitol Hill, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D, Nevada) has opined his strong support for the public option as it makes its way back into discussions surrounding the Senate bill. His use of rhetoric is undoubtedly skillful, but there remains large skepticism about the truth behind his claims - namely, whether the public option can, in fact, force competition and accountability by the private health insurance industry. It seems fundamentally the opposite. Shouldn't government "take-overs" of any private market actually serve to undermine competition? After all, the government functions for the word of politicians, not to fill any profit margins. Shouldn't the fact that Amtrak and UPS - both government entities of a generally private sector of the economy - were, for the most part, utter failures lend credence to anyone who opposes the public option?
This isn't to say that there aren't actually valid justifications for a single-payer health care system. Yet, most of these advantages lay uncovered, and with the major non partisan governmental body (namely, the Congressional Budget Office) showing unwavering skepticism to Obama's agenda, the bar has been raised for the liberals in Congress. Mr. Hoff, of the Heritage Foundation, expresses the point with utter clarity:
Advocates of the government insurance plan assure us that it would compete with private insurers on a level playing field. In reality, the "competition" would be rigged, with the government plan enjoying a number of advantages.As a result, the government plan would likely capture a large percentage of the insurance market, marginalizing and undermining private insurance. For example, the Lewin Group estimates that the America's Affordable Health Choices Act,[2] the health reform bill currently under consideration in the House of Representatives, would reduce the number of Americans with private insurance by 83.4 million and that the new public plan would cover 103.4 million people.[3] Coupled with the federal regulatory system that the legislation would impose on the remaining private plans, this would clearly by itself constitute a government takeover of health care.Even worse, the federal takeover would accelerate. The private plans' relatively small market share would likely render them increasingly uneconomical and lead to a death spiral in which private insurance would serve an ever-decreasing share of the market.
Mr. Hoff continues:
It is unclear whether the government plan would be subject to a number of requirements that the private plans would be required to meet. It would appear to give the HHS Secretary and the Health Choices Commissioner the discretion to decide these ambiguities in favor of the government plan and to find that various requirements do not apply to the government plan because of its overriding mission to offer a low-cost plan. However, even without including these potential advantages,the government plan would clearly be free of a number of requirements and expenses that private plans face.
Doesn't it strike you as odd? How can a bureaucratic organization claim to be on an even playing field with other private insurance corporations when it has the power to regulate and define vital concepts that implicate the entire industry? What democrats fail to see is that any game where the players are the referees is doomed to an inevitable fate of corruption.
