crb
09-06-2008, 11:15 AM
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121201589150427551.html?mod=opinion_main_review_ and_outlooks
Michigan doesn't have near this problem, AFAIK anyways, my healthcare coverage is pretty barebones.
This is exactly where lobbyists are bad, and also this is exactly how Democrats enable lobbyists. Lobbyists feed off regulation and mandates, and Democrats favor more regulation and mandates.
Not to say Lobbyists don't/can't also influence Republicans, but by and large Republicans are against (yes, there are exceptions, on both sides) regulation and mandates, big government, etc. However, it is the Democrats who right now are running that anti-lobbyist war and yet it is liberal policies that allow them to be so influential.
Chiropractor association lobbies to make chiropcractic coverage mandatory on all health insurance? Why? Money of course. So regulations and mandates are added, then health insurance goes up. Someone who might not want or need a chiropractor ends up HAVING to pay for insurance coverage for it because of a mandate. Add in all the other quasi-medicine fields, elective bullshit, etc, and you have huge mandates making coverage more expensive.
Most people would be happy just buying actual medical insurance, but instead they're forced to buy health insurance that covers numerous unnecessary things that they don't want. They're forced to buy the cadillac.
This, exact same type of lobbying, is why environmentalists are so dangerous. A lobby got us the wasteful and harmful corn ethanol mandate. California is/did going to/has ban incandescent bulbs in favor of mercury polluting CFLs (cfl bulb manufacturers paid for that). Solar companies lobby big time for government incentives for them, which in the end helps keep the lower quality manufacturers in business instead of letting the cream rise to the top.
None of these things are necessarily bad, but excessive government mandates fuck up what would otherwise be normal market forces and create increased costs for consumers, as well as retarding quality advancement.
Whenever the government creates a regulation or a mandate they need to be very careful and think of all the possible consequences, and too often they do not.
One thing you have to realize is that even universal healthcare is wanted by many of these groups. For instance some new age medicine person then merely must lobby a few democratic congressmen to get full federal coverage for their bullshit procedure, thus increasing the cost for everyone and lining the pockets of the quack.
With a single payer system there is no competition, no comparison.
If you have two insurance providers with no mandates restricting them, one might say "Okay, we will cover weekly chiropractor visits, but our coverage is $50 more per month." The other would say "We will not cover chiropractor visits, our coverage is $50 less per month." People can then pick what they want.
with a big bureaucratic mandate system like what we partially have and what the Democrats want to give us more of you don't get that. In a single payer system it'd be a monopoly and so no competition on those matters, in a mandated and heavily regulated system the insurance providers are restricted from competing on coverage packages. Either system results unnecessarily high costs.
Of course, no one wants to see someone get misled into buying coverage that doesn't cover all that they want, but would they? Look at car insurance, car insurance providers advertise the coverage they provide. If you don't cover something important, your competitor will run an ad saying so, educating the public. And the government can run public education campaigns too, there is nothing wrong with that. But a universal mandate is no replacement for simple public education.
Michigan doesn't have near this problem, AFAIK anyways, my healthcare coverage is pretty barebones.
This is exactly where lobbyists are bad, and also this is exactly how Democrats enable lobbyists. Lobbyists feed off regulation and mandates, and Democrats favor more regulation and mandates.
Not to say Lobbyists don't/can't also influence Republicans, but by and large Republicans are against (yes, there are exceptions, on both sides) regulation and mandates, big government, etc. However, it is the Democrats who right now are running that anti-lobbyist war and yet it is liberal policies that allow them to be so influential.
Chiropractor association lobbies to make chiropcractic coverage mandatory on all health insurance? Why? Money of course. So regulations and mandates are added, then health insurance goes up. Someone who might not want or need a chiropractor ends up HAVING to pay for insurance coverage for it because of a mandate. Add in all the other quasi-medicine fields, elective bullshit, etc, and you have huge mandates making coverage more expensive.
Most people would be happy just buying actual medical insurance, but instead they're forced to buy health insurance that covers numerous unnecessary things that they don't want. They're forced to buy the cadillac.
This, exact same type of lobbying, is why environmentalists are so dangerous. A lobby got us the wasteful and harmful corn ethanol mandate. California is/did going to/has ban incandescent bulbs in favor of mercury polluting CFLs (cfl bulb manufacturers paid for that). Solar companies lobby big time for government incentives for them, which in the end helps keep the lower quality manufacturers in business instead of letting the cream rise to the top.
None of these things are necessarily bad, but excessive government mandates fuck up what would otherwise be normal market forces and create increased costs for consumers, as well as retarding quality advancement.
Whenever the government creates a regulation or a mandate they need to be very careful and think of all the possible consequences, and too often they do not.
One thing you have to realize is that even universal healthcare is wanted by many of these groups. For instance some new age medicine person then merely must lobby a few democratic congressmen to get full federal coverage for their bullshit procedure, thus increasing the cost for everyone and lining the pockets of the quack.
With a single payer system there is no competition, no comparison.
If you have two insurance providers with no mandates restricting them, one might say "Okay, we will cover weekly chiropractor visits, but our coverage is $50 more per month." The other would say "We will not cover chiropractor visits, our coverage is $50 less per month." People can then pick what they want.
with a big bureaucratic mandate system like what we partially have and what the Democrats want to give us more of you don't get that. In a single payer system it'd be a monopoly and so no competition on those matters, in a mandated and heavily regulated system the insurance providers are restricted from competing on coverage packages. Either system results unnecessarily high costs.
Of course, no one wants to see someone get misled into buying coverage that doesn't cover all that they want, but would they? Look at car insurance, car insurance providers advertise the coverage they provide. If you don't cover something important, your competitor will run an ad saying so, educating the public. And the government can run public education campaigns too, there is nothing wrong with that. But a universal mandate is no replacement for simple public education.