Will Work For Health Insurance; Already Do
Credit: Mort Gerberg, Huffington Post 2/25/2008
This was me, self-employed and uninsured, until a kind employer hired me to work a second full-time job and now I now work two full-time jobs: one for health insurance, as well as the co-payments, the other for income.
Ralph Nader would argue that under his single payer system, I could get whatever treatment I needed as it was prescribed at a lower price, under a so-called “free health care” program.
It’s unlikely to be the medication that works the best, and because it’s a controlled substance, it might not be covered at all under a single-payer system, essentially excluding me from his whiz-bang slick system, but hey, it’s free.
Nader speaks as though he has authority, but he doesn’t base his ideas in reality. The reality is that a single payer system is not the answer. The answer is something in the middle, such as the plans that Clinton and Obama have proposed, but I’d suggest modifications to the following in their plans:
- Insurance company review and reforms
- Incentives for qualified students to attend and pay for medical school
- Aggressive review and reform of pharmaceutical pricing, including schemes like these, which only serve to drive up costs either by driving patients to newer, more expensive medications or inflate the price of medications where patents expire in the near future.
- Incentives for doctors and supporting health professionals to choose primary care over specialties
In a single payer system, these reforms, particularly those giving incentives to doctors, are unlikely. I’m not seduced by the idea of “free health care”. There isn’t any such thing — just look at the VA for a shining example of what happens when we leave health care in the hands of the federal government.
It’s a good thing I really love my “health care job”.
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