President of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, James P. Hoffa, correctly identifies many of the symptoms of the ongoing national health care debacle but is completely wrong about the underlying disease.
Our nation is facing an urgent crisis. Companies, workers and all levels of our government have an equal stake in this fight. Our nation's health care system is broken. America must act now.General Motors Corp. is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy, and Delphi Corp. is already there, largely because of the amount of money they spend on health care for their employees.
GM spends more on health care for its workers than on steel for its cars. GM estimates that it spends $1,500 in health care costs for every car it produces. It paid out about $5.8 billion for health care in 2005. That competitive disadvantage largely explains why the Big Three automakers have eliminated or announced plans to eliminate nearly 140,000 jobs since 2000. ...
Despite these increases -- and maybe even because of them -- there are now more than 46 million Americans without insurance. That's over 15 percent of the population. In 2000, it was 39 million, and it was 31 million in 1987, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
America is spending more and more on health care to cover fewer and fewer people poorly.
Health care costs are destroying our nation's economic edge. The cards are stacked against American companies as they try to compete with low-cost, low-wage foreign producers.
All of this is true, but Mr. Hoffa's proposed solution would certainly make the situation worse.
The only real solution to this crisis is national health care. Meeting such a basic need should not force government budgets, companies and workers into the red. As the crisis grows, more and more Americans, workers and corporate leaders alike, are calling for government action.
Government action is needed, but what the government needs to do is reform the legal malpractice system to protect health care providers from the lawsuits that consume billions of dollars per year in direct costs (e.g., ridiculous payouts) and indirect costs (e.g., unneeded tests).
Teri Robert has collected an array of facts that will astound you and hopefully convince you that we don't need more regulation of health care, we need more regulation of lawsuits.
- Lawsuit costs passed on to consumers add up to nearly $721 per year for every person in America today. - Because of litigation fears, 79% of doctors said they had ordered more tests than they would based only on professional judgment of what is medically needed. - It takes at least a year to resolve most lawsuits, and delays of three to five years are not uncommon. Unfortunately, injured people with legitimate claims can wait years before their cases go to trial. - An estimated $50 billion per year is spent on unnecessary test procedures designed only to guard doctors and hospitals against malpractice claims. - Almost half of the money spent by physician insurers goes towards defending cases that ultimately are closed without compensation paid to the claimant.
And so forth. Rather than turning over one-fifth of our economy to the federal government as Mr. Hoffa proposes -- which never makes anything cheaper, better, or more efficient -- let's limit these lawsuits in a way to leads to better health care rather than just richer lawyers.
The second step, more controversially, is to slash the government regulation of physicians and medication. Rather than require all practicing physicians to be certified by a government-approved authority, the government should simply require that physicians disclose their credentials and leave the certifications to private organizations (as is done in most professional fields). This would open the door for thousands of lower-cost, lower-skill physicians who would be more than able to treat common maladies like colds and broken bones. You don't need an MD to set a broken arm, so why should you have to pay for one? Because currently the government says so. Medication is similar. Consumers need the government to ensure that drug companies disclose all the potential side-effects of their products, but we don't need the FDA to tell us what we can and can't put in our bodies if we're willing to take known risks.
You are suggesting that WE THE PEOPLE should be allowed to be resposible for ourselves? We should be able to make decisions for ourselves, with little or no safety net for those of us who choose unwisely?
That smacks of libritarianism. Continue down that path of thought, and see where it leads. Libritarianism lacks compassion fiscally, and lacks morals socially. It values the group over the individual fiscally, and values the individual over the group socially.
I'm not saying I disagree with you, I'm just pointing out where I see the ship sailing. There be icebergs ahead.
Lawsuits and the continued use of the law maliciously has led to many of the nations problems - Manufacturing, Health, etc. I was just discussing this with my dad when I saw a little trinket that my son got for Easter - a simple little plastic ball. It was stamped "China". This stuff isn't hard to make but I am sure fear of liability lawsuits means domestic companies are taking huge risks compared to foreign manufacturers and may be one of the factors for declining manufacturing. Just see if a lawyer will sue a foreign company...they won't because it is almost futile but US companies are easy targets. The anti-gun crowd is using the legal tactic to push as many gun manufacturers out of business as possible just by making them jump through legal hurdles all day long. Manufacturers got some respite thanks to some recent judicial rulings but the lawsuits keep coming and they have to spend enormous amounts of money to keep fighting. Doctors and Hospitals are also under attack and you see the results, lawyers paid a lot, hospitals raise prices to cover, and some even close down. Unless judges and legislature tackle this problem, we are in for increasing reliance on foreign manufacturers and more expensive health care, just to name two affected areas.
I think far more people would go into health care if the education plan was distributed over the course of a career. The up-front costs in time and money are so burdensome for students, I can understand why they would rather go into web programming or would just sit at home and play video games. At least they're not going in debt at a rate of $30k per year while working crazy hours for 8 years straight (followed by bearing the risk of lawsuits and the virtual mandate to work crazy hours for the rest of their lives).
Just imagine if the certification system were organized into a tree, such that you could pick-off one leaf by taking night classes, and immediately start making money with that simple skill. Then, when you had enough money, you could take a few more classes, and eventually have a whole branch of certifications, allowing you to move up incrementally in ability and compensation.
Ok, I better stop dreaming now and get back to reality.
Another big part of the problem is in the tax system, which allows employers to deduct health insurance premiums pre-tax. There is no reason to connect employment with health insurance. Everyone's health insurance premiums should be deductible, so that individuals can handle health insurance on their own.
Then we need widespread acceptance of the new Health Savings Accounts. These allow you to buy a high-deductible policy (about $5k for a married couple) and then to put up to $5k per year into a segregated account. If you use the money in that account for medical expenses, then you never pay tax on it.
Let people pay for their minor medicines and doctors' visits with their own cash, and the market will straighten health care out in a hurry.
Ben: I agree with you 100% on this one.