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States Look to Heritage on Health Care

April 3, 2009 | By Nathaniel Ward

While Washington ponders government-based health care reforms, The Heritage Foundation is working hard to help states enact consumer- and patient-based health care reforms.

These efforts are paying off. Last month, Utah Governor Jon Huntsman signed a health care reform bill based in large part on Heritage's consumer-centered health insurance model.

Heritage health care experts have been on the forefront in assisting Utah legislators create a health care system that serves patients, not bureaucrats or special interests. Our experts educated legislators and stakeholders and gave advice on key details on the plan.

Heritage's recommended reforms allow employees to assume a more active role in selecting their health insurance. Under this new law, Utah workers will be able to choose the health plan that best suits them instead of the "one-size-fits-all" plan offered by their employers. But because they're offered by employers, these individual plans could still be purchased with pre-tax money. A new website will also give Utahns and their employers and providers access to more health care information.

Instead of pushing a top-down, Washington-centered reform model, Heritage is advancing health care reforms that preserve federalism. The principles of our reforms have been adopted in such varied locales as Massachusetts and now Utah, demonstrating the system's adaptability and strength. Even states like Vermont have "demonstrate[d] that a decentralized, consumer-driven system can expand access and improve quality within current resources," Heritage health policy expert Dennis Smith argues.

As the new plan develops, Heritage experts will continue to work with the Utah legislature's Health Reform Task Force to further refine and advance this important reform.

—Amanda Reinecker

Securing America's skies

Last Tuesday, the Transportation Security Administration announced the implementation of an important initiative, the Secure Flight program, which will screen flight passenger data and flag suspected persons before they board a commercial aircraft. This is an important victory for The Heritage Foundation: our experts have written in support of the program for several years.

The Department of Homeland Security "should be commended for implementing such a smart security measure," writes Heritage national security expert Jena Baker McNeill.

The implementation of Secure Flight marks a significant advance in national security by addressing the previous system's inadequacies. Unlike its predecessor, which limited screening to a passenger's form of payment and travel itinerary, Secure Flight includes gender and date of birth and checks a passenger's data against a federal database of known terrorists.

Under Secure Flight, TSA will screen passengers using only one watch list system. Individual airlines will no longer have this responsibility. This shift significantly reduces the burdens of airport security and further minimizes the chance of private traveler data leaking into the wrong hands.

McNeill notes that the "right kind of security policies…ensure that Americans can travel freely and safely with the knowledge that their privacy and civil liberties are being maintained."

—Amanda Reinecker

Other Heritage work of note

  • Just how high is the cost of the proposed cap-and-tax program to counter global warming? Heritage Foundation experts have put together a handy chart:

  • Heritage Foundation President Ed Feulner presented Heritage's highest honor, the Clare Boothe Luce Award, to Heritage Board of Trustees chairman David R. Brown at a March 30 ceremony in Oklahoma. The award recognizes those who exemplify conservative ideals. Recipients include Ronald Reagan, William F. Buckley, Jr., Milton Friedman, Margaret Thatcher and Rush Limbaugh.
  • Although Congress recently softened its stance on a potentially unconstitutional plan to tax the bonuses given to AIG executives, Heritage president Ed Feulner reminds us that "the more the federal government tries to run the economy, the more likely that debacles like the attempted AIG clawback will erupt." Feulner adds that lawmakers are right to be skeptical of Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner's plan to allow the federal government to purchase toxic assets.
  • Because of Congressional intransigence on a question of free enterprise, Mexico has levied tariffs that cost American businesses $2.4 billion annually, explains Heritage expert Israel Ortega.
  • As world leaders gather in Europe, North Korea is planning to go ballistic — literally — Heritage national security expert Peter Brookes explains in the New York Post. As early as tonight, Pyongyang plans to launch a missile capable of guiding a warhead as far as the western United States. Brookes calls on the Obama administration for an active response. The administration blames the "testy US ties with North Korea on bad Bush-era policies."

In other news

  • Recovery.gov, the website the Obama administration set up to track the progress of the "stimulus" plan, has cost taxpayers $84 million.
  • As a candidate, Barack Obama pledged that "no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes." What did the President do on April 1? He signed a law raising the federal tobacco tax nearly 62 cents, the largest increase in tobacco taxes to date.
  • "Today the largest countries in the world have agreed on a global plan for economic recovery and reform," said British Prime Minister Gordon Brown at the G-20 summit. The biggest-ticket item agreed to is a $1.1 trillion deal to boost funding for the International Monetary Fund and other global institutions.

Coming up at Heritage

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Nathaniel Ward is the Editor of MyHeritage.org—a website for members and supporters of The Heritage Foundation. Amanda Reinecker contributed to this report.