Imagine if your car insurance covered oil changes and gasoline. You wouldn't care how much gas you used, and you wouldn't care what it cost. Mechanics would sell you $100 oil changes. Prices would skyrocket.
That is exactly what has happened here with health care. It is even more pronounced on those who have no copay. I see it all of the time with people carrying those little gold Medicaid cards. They don't care what it costs, so they go to the emergency room for everything, to the point where ambulances must wait in line to drop off patients, because ER beds are full. 30 to 45 minute waits are not uncommon, and I have seen more than a few patients die on an ambulance stretcher while waiting. In fact, the chief deterrent to this is that long wait for service, not the cost.
Things will only get worse, and more expensive, if we establish any sort of government sponsored health plan. This will mean that expenses will spiral out of control. When that happens, the government will have to find a way to pay for it. There are only a few options:
1 Increase revenue (iin other words, raise taxes)
2 Control costs (through rationing or price controls)
3 More deficit spending
Any of those three would be a disaster for our health system AND the economy. More on that in future posts...
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