Let me take another bite at this apple. Look at this statement from a Republican.
Georgia Republican Rep. Tom Price, a medical doctor, called “simply false.” the notion that there are only two choices – between government-provided insurance and private insurance. Instead, there is a “patient-centered way” of providing health insurance, “to put patients in charge.” Price also said Sunday that creating a public health insurance option will “crowd out” individuals from the private insurance market and into the government insurance option.
Now, I think most of my readers probably share with me a certain level of aversion to comments like that. I simply do not believe that selling private health insurance is a legitimate business. In my value system, Rep. Price’s argument makes about as much sense as opposing drug legalization because it will put the crack dealers out of business. I don’t care if people drop private insurance in favor of public insurance. In fact, that’s precisely what I want them to do. So, Price isn’t remotely persuasive to me when he complains that a public option will be too popular and ‘crowd out’ corporate profits. But, he’s persuasive to a lot of Americans who have a strong belief that making a buck in health insurance is everyone’s God-given Constitutional right. We speak totally different languages from each other. The problem we have is not that their worldview outnumbers ours, but that we have a bunch of senators who care more about the jobs created in their states by the insurance industry (and the political consequences of messing with that) than they do about people getting affordable health care. It’s that simple.
Now, here’s a left-wing quote that is making the rounds:
Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-Texas) told CNN on Sunday it would be “very difficult” for her and other liberals to support legislation that does not include a public option.
“The only way we can be sure that very low-income people and persons who work for companies that don’t offer insurance have access to it, is through an option that would give the private insurance companies a little competition,” she said.
Johnson added that House liberals have already told Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) that she should insist on White House support for a public option.
Now, the problem with this quote is that it isn’t necessarily true. The alternative that is being floated to the public option is the non-profit co-operative. The plan has to be fleshed out, but it would be something like a non-profit private credit union. Private citizens would band together to create their own negotiating power. The potential problem with the co-ops is that, unlike with the public option, there wouldn’t be any big initial infusion of cash that would provide negotiating clout. Over a long period of time, co-ops could obtain the size of HMO’s and negotiate prices without having to make a profit. The concern is with getting up to size in a timely manner (or at all).
But, the co-ops could assure that low-income people have access to health care. If they didn’t because the price remained too high, then I suspect that the government would be forced to come back and fix the problem. Either they’d find a way to inject a sufficient cash infusion to get things up to scale or they’d scrap the system and go with the public option.
The co-ops seem to me to be a bad idea because even if they work they will work too slowly. But, if that is the only thing standing between the status quo and health care reform on rescissions and pre-existing conditions and portability and expanded coverage, then I’m confident that we can fix this later.
