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| Source:The Real News- talking about a proposed government-run health insurance plan in Maryland. |
"Gerald Friedman Pt 3 of "What a Single Payer Health Insurance Plan Looks Like"
If there is anything that I like and respect about Gerald Friedman's health care plan for Maryland, is that he's honest about it. He's not one of these partisan leftists whose saying that we need free health care now and that government should give it to us, without having any idea how to pay for it. Friedman acknowledges publicly, that of course government-run health insurance wouldn't be free. It would have to paid for, probably through payroll taxes.
I think I've been clear that I'm not in favor of a government-run health insurance plan, at least as the only option to pay for health care in this country. If states want to do that, they can do that, if they can get a plan passed and into law and find a way to pay for it themselves.
I'm not in favor of government only health insurance plans for multiple reasons:
all the examples of government-run only health insurance plans, comes from countries that are very small and simply don't have the diversity and economy that we do. America is not the only even large country in the world with private health care systems. Just look at Germany, look at France, look at Japan, just a few examples.
Not every person, let alone every country is the same. The larger the country, the more the people, the more options and choice that individuals have to have, in order to have the most efficient health care system. You put everyone on the same plan in a large country, now government is the only option not just for insurance, but now health care, because only the national government would get to decide what health care people can have, because only they get to decide what would be paid for.
The other part of the Friedman plan that has a big hole in it, is one way that it would be paid for. It would not just eliminate a major personal responsibility component out of the existing health care system in Maryland (a state where I grew up and still live) by charging people for their health care based on their income, instead of the health care that they receive. Which means we would be incentivizing low-income people to live unhealthy, because they would always be taken care of by taxpayers with means. They wouldn't have to cover the costs of their own poor decisions.
The Friedman plan would also be de-incentivizing people to earn a good living in a state where the cost of living is already pretty high, because of the high quality of life in Maryland and all the wealthy and well-educated people in this state, because you would be telling them even if they're very healthy, that they would now have to pay more for their health care, simply because they have means.
So, no, I couldn't support this plan. But more importantly it will never pass in a state like Maryland, even with a Democratic Governor in Martin O'Malley, with a Assembly that has a House and Senate, that both have larger than 2/3 majorities, because most Maryland Democrats even, aren't left-wing Democrats and they would know the problems with the Friedman plan as well.
