Quote: Originally Posted by
Navy1960 
Quote: Originally Posted by
toomuchtime_
Quote: Originally Posted by
Navy1960
toomuchtime, I think if issues such as Illegal Immigration healthcare costs are not addressed, and drug costs, along with several other factors. The result of all of this will be exactly what you have said, higher costs, lower quality care, and higher taxes. That is why I have said that its best that the individual states decide for themselves what is best for them. As whats best for Ca. is not whats best for Az.
Of course, there is nothing to prevent states from making changes in their health care systems now, but if federal money is involved, it should, imo, be aimed at achieving specific health outcomes. That means the states would not be able to decide what they would try to achieve with federal money but would have some discretion about how they would achieve it. This is, in fact, how the Medicaid and SCHIP programs work.
I was thinking more along the lines of a hybrid of tax credit that is used to pay state premiums for healthcare This money would in turn find it's way back to the Fed in the form if taxes paid by the states and the providers. more or less like a closed loop. The more people enter the bigger the pool/ However its my opinion the states should be the source for all this , the Fed. should only provide incentives for those states to do so.
Again, even if we agree the states might be better at designing health care/health insurance changes to serve their individual needs than the federal government would be, I still can't see the justification for federal dollars being spent unless it is to achieve specific health outcomes.
So if the federal goal were to make quality health care available to more people, and one state wanted to do this by openning public health clinics in underserved areas and another wanted to do this by subsidizing health insurance for a certain economic class, as long as both plans met certain performance criteria, I'd have no problem with federal assistance to the states to carry out these plans, but if a third state wanted to use the money to lower insurance costs to some people who already had insurance, I'd say, no, because that was not the purpose the money was appropriated for.