The Medicare II bill (my name for it) that Congress is about to pass is an unmitigated disaster.
The bill contains provisions for the largest expansion of socialized health care in this nation’s history. It essentially nationalizes prescription drugs for the elderly, which is tantamount to nationalizing all of the life-saving prescription drug industry. As The Wall Street Journal reports, the bill will increase the amount government spends on health care from $13 trillion dollars to $20 trillion dollars over the next 75 years.
What do you think this will do to taxation? It would essentially render the nation socialist, with taxes at or near 100 percent on all income. The only other alternative would be for the government to ration health care outright, kind of like what you see happens with water after a hurricane or other natural disaster.
This bill is even worse than anything the liberal Democrats would ever pass. At least if the liberal Democrats and a liberal Democratic President passed this bill, the blame for the results would be on them. But no such thing is the case here.
The Republicans have packaged in to the bill Health Savings Accounts, which allow people to purchase their own health insurance via a combination of high deductible insurance plans and tax-free medical savings accounts, like IRAs for retirement. I always supported this idea and wanted Congress to pass it. It’s a good transitional step to a market-based economy–if and only if it takes place in the context of eliminating Medicare for future generations. Health Savings Accounts were never intended to occur in the context of massively expanding Medicare and nationalizing prescription drugs.
Prescription drugs work wonders, as we all know. Nationalizing them means that in the future we can expect drug companies to operate like, say, the public school system. Is this what we want?
The worst news of all is that as medical care deteriorates still further in the coming decade or so, it won’t be socialism or government who gets the blame. It will be Republicans and the free market. It’s the worst of all possible worlds, not just for Republicans, but for those of us who want and need competent medical care.
