Health Care Reform and the Public Option

On September 21 at the SBC Executive Committee, Guidestone Financial Resources president O. S. Hawkins announced that he and leaders from a coalition of 32 denomination-backed health insurance programs are concerned about the impact of President Obama’s proposals for health care reform (Baptist Press, http://www.bpnews.net/bpnews.asp?id=31316). With all of the partisan political rhetoric, the President’s incessant public appearances, and lobbyist commercials about health care reform between the news stories about health care reform, how are we to process the abundance of information?

The controversy stems from the inclusion in the proposal of a public option health insurance. So far, many of the opinion articles that I have read that support the president’s proposal have argued that health care costs are out of control and something must be done. I think many if not most people would agree that this is true. The problem is that a public option does not address health care costs; it addresses health insurance costs.

A public option might provide insurance at a lower premium, but in reality, it will be subject to the same market pressures that private insurance companies face. A public option will charge a lower premium and pay the same high prices that other insurance companies have to pay for treatments and prescriptions. Hawkins rightly stated, “You can’t compete with somebody else who doesn’t have to not just make a profit, but doesn’t even have to break even [and] can print money and support it with your tax dollars.” As with any government interference in the free market, a public option has an unfair advantage and inevitably inflates costs as markets try to compensate for their disadvantage.

A public option will have to establish a structure similar to private companies in order to determine what will or will not be covered. Currently, doctors determine how many patients they will see and which insurance companies they will accept. The proposal has no authority to force doctors to see patients that carry public insurance. In other words, the public option offers no real change to the system and only superficial cost saving to people who will use it.

These factors fuel the scare about “socialized medicine.” Because of these competitive disadvantages, the public option could end up being the only option, as private insurance companies choose to move out of the health care industry and focus on more profitable and competitive markets such as life, home, and auto insurance.

The real solutions to health care reform will only be found when legislators begin to focus on the market forces that drive health care costs. Tort (law that defines what constitutes legal injury and establishes liability) reform directly addresses the cost of doing business for doctors—costs that are directly passed on to patients (and subsequently their insurance carriers.) Legislation that provides incentives to good doctors to accept more patients and more private insurances may possibly force bad doctors out of business. The assumption is that bad doctors stay in business out of the leftover patients and insurance coverage that good doctors refuse to accept.

I am not an expert in economics or the medical industry. I admit that my solutions may not be solutions at all. I do believe that if we are going to argue in support of an idea, our arguments should actually support the idea. If we are going to propose a solution to a problem, the solution should address the problem.