Real health care reform
June 19, 2009| By Amanda Reinecker
In an open letter to the President and members of Congress, Heritage Foundation President Ed Feulner offers a robust rebuttal to the administration's proposed big-government health care reforms.
Conservative concerns about his proposal are not simply "scare-tactics" as the President has suggested, Feulner writes. Instead they're a response to the sketchy details and dubious promises on which the health care plan is based.
Feulner reminds the President that the task at hand is to "fix the gaps in our health care system and lower costs for all Americans," which requires concrete reforms, not government micromanagement.
But while the Left remains confident their plan will pass — one proponent said "the planets have aligned as they never have before" — conservatives and moderates are increasingly alarmed about its cost.
Citing the ever-growing budget requirements for big-government health care, Heritage expert Ernest Istook says the price tag "might as well be a made-up number like 'gazillion.'"
A new Heritage Foundation graphic (PDF format) helps illustrate the difference between the conservative and progressive approaches.
A real health care reform would:
- Give families real choice and ownership of their health care by creating portable health care plans;
- Reform the tax system so that the same breaks apply to those who choose their plans through their employer and those who do not;
- Foster competition between insurers to be more transparent, efficient and fair; and
- Transfer power to the states so adjustments can be made according to each state's respective health care needs.
This, writes Feulner, is a workable model that will meet the common objective to grant all Americans access to fair and affordable health care. And it does so by empowering individuals and families in a truly competitive market.
"A reckless, expensive and one-sided rush toward 'reform' would not only be damaging to our public discourse," warns Feulner, "but it could fundamentally change our society in ways that have far-reaching consequences."
- Amanda Reinecker
