- Joined
- Jul 20, 2005
- Messages
- 20,688
- Reaction score
- 7,320
- Location
- Washington, DC
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Liberal
Basically, I see the government's role in health care to be two things:
1. Making sure everyone has access to insurance. This includes subsidies for the poor, and banning preexisting conditions (which of course requires an individual mandate, as proposed by the Heritage Foundation and Bob Dole, and as implemented by Barack Obama).
2. Providing solid choice architecture. I'm perfectly fine with private health insurance. The problem is expecting the average person to wade through all the legalese and fine print that health insurance policies typically entail, and decide which procedures they want covered. None of this crap where people think that their surgery is covered, but clause 47B of their insurance policy specifically rules out that procedure. The government should set standards for what services health insurance MUST cover, so that consumers can more competently compare various options. I think consumers can make better choices when they aren't flooded with unintelligible information, and when they only have to compare a few variables (e.g. monthly premium, out-of-pocket maximum, and annual deductible). And another aspect of choice architecture is, well, making sure the consumer actually HAS a choice: This means the government should end the subsidy for employer-covered health insurance, to encourage people to move toward individual insurance.
1. Making sure everyone has access to insurance. This includes subsidies for the poor, and banning preexisting conditions (which of course requires an individual mandate, as proposed by the Heritage Foundation and Bob Dole, and as implemented by Barack Obama).
2. Providing solid choice architecture. I'm perfectly fine with private health insurance. The problem is expecting the average person to wade through all the legalese and fine print that health insurance policies typically entail, and decide which procedures they want covered. None of this crap where people think that their surgery is covered, but clause 47B of their insurance policy specifically rules out that procedure. The government should set standards for what services health insurance MUST cover, so that consumers can more competently compare various options. I think consumers can make better choices when they aren't flooded with unintelligible information, and when they only have to compare a few variables (e.g. monthly premium, out-of-pocket maximum, and annual deductible). And another aspect of choice architecture is, well, making sure the consumer actually HAS a choice: This means the government should end the subsidy for employer-covered health insurance, to encourage people to move toward individual insurance.
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