Healthcare Reform #1

I know the subject of healthcare is boring to many people but it is an issue which I think many of us realize must be addressed and acted upon. We need to listen carefully to the plans the presidential candidates are promoting and how each plan will impact us as individuals, as families, as states and as a country.

Now there are right and wrong ways to reform our healthcare system and I have written about the many ways it can be reformed without resorting to “socialized medicine” which is NOT an option as far as I am concerned.

The best way to discuss the subject is to explore why and how we got to this untenable position with our healthcare system. This will also help me get it straight in my own head so please humor me.

Employers started offering health care benefits to their employees during WWII. During the war wages were frozen at a certain level and the only way one employer could persuade an employee to work for him instead of another employer was by giving paid health benefits.

Previous to that people paid their medical bills in cash to the doctor or in chickens depending where you lived. Some insurance was available as early as 1910. Blue Cross began to offer hospital insurance in the 1930s. Truman proposed a national health program and was called a communist.

Medicare and Medicaid were introduced by Johnson in the 1960s and covered the health of the very poor and the over 65 elderly. There were over 700 health insurance companies in the country at that time. Nixon once proposed a national health insurance program and was shot down.

Hillary tried to push a socialized medicine plan during the Clinton years and was really shot down. She has since realized that this country does not want and will not stand for a socialized medicine plan.

The dilemma we are facing now is that healthcare expenses / costs have sky rocketed and many employers are dropping medical coverage or requiring the employees to pay more and more of the monthly premium (in my company a family plan is now over $1,000/month).

Individual states have mandated what medical insurance policies must cover making those policies very expensive and unaffordable to many who then opt to remain uninsured. The uninsured use the services of hospital emergency rooms which are very expensive and since the uninsured usually cannot pay, the insured get charged a surcharge when they seek medical services.

The uninsured are usually identified as young males with jobs. They do not want to spend their beer money on insurance when they are convinced they will not get sick or injured – hence the large ER bills.

Also, look at the tax implications. Employers get a tax break for offering health insurance. Individuals that are covered by an employer’s health plans also get a tax break because the health insurance amount is not counted as part of the individual’s compensation so it is a tax free benefit.

Individuals who have to buy their own health insurance do not get a tax break; they can deduct their medical expenses up to a percentage of their salary though.

Individuals that are covered by their employer see it as a free gift to misuse as often as they want – after all they don’t have to pay for it – right?

These are some thoughts about our current non-system. Next we will see what can be done to actually create a workable system.