The Anti-Obama Care Solution To Our Escalating Health Care Costs

As we all know, Obama Care is a massive intrusion into our lives in what is likely a failed attempt to solve the problem of our high and escalating health care costs in this country. Rather than address the underlying root causes of high health care costs (e.g. Americans eat too much of the wrong kind of food, American do not exercise enough, Americans smoke too much, Americans on average are getting older which leads to a growing incidence of age-related diseases, etc.), Obama Care relies on a massive new government bureaucracy and taxation approach to solve what is basically a public health crisis:

• Just the physical size of the legislation, over 2,500 pages, lends itself to massive bureaucracy, inefficiency, and ineffectiveness.
• The legislation will introduce almost 2,000 new rules and regulations that will be imposed on every American and their freedom of choice.
• The legislation will impose burdensome new taxes on everything from real estate sales to prosthetic devices.
• The legislation will criminalize every American who does not obtain health care insurance for themselves, unless the Supreme Court says this government overreach is un-Constitutional, greatly reducing our freedom of choice in our democracy.
• The legislation introduces a 15 member panel of appointed people who are not accountable to the voters or recallable by the voters but who will decide what illnesses and treatments are allowable for payment and which are not under Obama Care's guidelines.
• The legislation will cause millions of Americans to lose their current health care insurance as companies find it less expensive and a better business decision to terminate their health care plans and pay a small Obama Care fine than to continue with their health care plans, causing massive stress and anxiety across the country.
• The legislation was written so poorly that it will have a massive impact on Americans' decisions relative to marriage, job, and retirement options.

Massive bureaucracy creation, overriding Americans' freedom of choice, complicated rules and regulations, unaccountable bureaucrats, new taxes, etc., a formula for failure if ever there was one. Think about how unlikely success is with this bureaucracy, given the Federal government failures in just about everything else it does with its existing, massive bureaucracy:

• The Medicare and Medicaid bureaucracies waste about $100 billion a year due to incompetence, waste, and criminal fraud and is headed for fiscal insolvency.
• The Social Security bureaucracy loses over $100 billion a year due to incompetence, waste, and criminal fraud and is headed for fiscal insolvency.
• The IRS bureaucracy fails to collect almost $400 billion a year due to it under the current tax code due to incompetence and criminal fraud.
• The Defense Department military industrial complex bureaucracy loses untold billions of dollars every year due to inefficiencies and criminal fraud.
• In previous posts, we have examined how untold billions of dollars are wasted every year by the Federal bureaucracies that operate Federal housing, unemployment, food stamp, and other functions within the Federal government.

The possibility that this new Federal government bureaucracy will succeed is next to impossible, given the Federal government's heritage of bureaucracy failures.

But maybe there is a better way to address our escalating health care costs. What if the nation took the opposite approach to Obama Care? Rather than massive new government bureaucracies and new taxes, new rules and new regulations, and new complications, what if we went to the extreme opposite and just simplified the process of delivering health care in this country?

Well, some enterprising Americans are going this simplification route and being successful and effective in doing so. Consider the details from an article that appeared in USA Today on April 22, 2012, "Some physicians offer service based on monthly retainers:"

• The article focuses on family doctor Steven Butdorf of Eugene, Ore. The doctor was tired of rushing patients through appointments, tired of insurers denying procedures, and tired of insurance paperwork and as a result, decided to change his mode of operation.
• The hassle of doing business as usual in the American health care industry had taken the fun out of being a doctor, according to Dr. Butdorf.
• On February 1, 2012, he opened up a new practice called  Exceptional Health Care, which charges patients a set monthly retainer fee in return for specific health care services and completely cuts insurance companies out of the doctor/patient relationship.
• His new approach to GP medicine is the first to be certified under a new Oregon law allowing retainer medical practices. The law took effect Jan. 1, 2012 and requires such practices to register with the state of Oregon, but exempts them from insurance regulations.
• At least 18 states have similar retainer laws already on the books but nowhere is the practice explicitly prohibited, according to the article.
• Retainer medical arrangements are designed for people with high-deductible or catastrophic insurance who need affordable primary care and for  patients with no insurance since they provide coverage at reasonable rates for a menu of non-recurring or non-catastrophic medical problems, e.g. cancer.
• According to the article, the primary benefits for the doctors in such practices is that it allows them to spend more time with patients and practicing medicine and less time dealing with insurance companies and the overwhelming paperwork and hassles that go with that relationship.
• By cutting out insurance companies, doctors can also substantially reduce their operating costs since they no longer need to have a staff dedicated to interfacing and coping with multiple insurance companies, companies whose focus is minimizing costs and not maximizing service to patients.
• The advantages for patients of retainer practices is that they can receive same-day appointments, spend more time with their doctors during the longer appointments in retainer practices, they can avoid emergency room visits, and they receive more comprehensive annual exams, all for much more reasonable prices than traditional medical practices.
• Dr. Butdorf charges patients between $39 and $79 per month, depending on their age, plus $20 for each office visit. He claims he spends an average of 30 minutes to each appointment, and 60 minutes for an annual physical, much longer than what most Americans are accustomed to in their dealing with their family doctors.
• Dr. Butdorf summed up the primary advantage as follows: "What I'm doing allows the patient to come to the doctor and pay the doctor without a third party there to set rules and regulations for how we conduct medicine."
• According to the article, the number of medical retainer practices has been increasing over the years as doctors and patients opt for this simpler, more effective approach.

A simple market transaction between a seller and a buyer without any massive third party bureaucracies intervening. The doctor gets to simplify his life and do what he does best, serve his patients. Patients get better service for routine medical needs, less hassle from insurance companies, and no government interference in their lives, all at a reasonable cost.

All of this is done without 2,000 new rules and regulations, the fear of becoming a criminal for not having health insurance, a panel of 15 who determine your future health options, etc. And best of all, no government interference in your freedom of choice.

But what about catastrophic diseases such as cancer or other chronic conditions that retainer policies do not cover? This situation is handled by going to an insurance policy that is dedicated just to such a case. Since the chance of a catastrophic illness, disease, or condition is much smaller than the need for a GP doctor, the costs of such policies are much lower than the cost of a traditional health insurance policy.

Consider an example. If you go to the website, http://www.catastrophic-health-insurance.org/costs-of-catastrophic-health.php#, they provide an example for a catastrophic health care insurance: "A catastrophic plan from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida for a nonsmoking 21-year-old female, with a $250 deductible and $2,500 out-of-pocket limit after exceeding the deductible, costs $29 per month."

If we assume that such a young lady will get a relatively lower rate from Dr. Butdorf, say $40 a month, than this young lady could cover almost all of her medical needs for about $840 dollars a year, far less than what most people pay today and far less than what costs and debt would be incurred under Obama Care.

Again, the beauty of such an approach is that it simplifies the entire process. The doctor/patient relationship is strengthened. It removes unnecesary administrative costs from the process, government and insurance company bureaucracy, that have nothing to do with medical care. It reduces the nation's costs without incurring hundreds of billions of dollars in national debt. It does not criminalize Americans if they choose a personal approach to medicine that is in conflict with what the Washington political class dictates, increasing our freedom of choice.

Does this solve all of our high health care costs issues? Probably not, but it certainly makes more sense, is more effective, is simpler to understand, and has a much better chance of succeeding than a 2,500 page piece of legislation, 2,000 new rules and regulations, a 15 member death panel, and something that was put together by a political class that has trouble agreeing on anything or operating any government function efficiently and effectively. Simpler is good, more complex is bad, costly, and doomed to failure.


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