Sorry, Liberals, RomneyCare Is Still Not Working
The Massachusetts health care overhaul continues to come up short.
The evidence shows neither that the declining costs will last nor that they are the result of the program.
Theres more. Massachusetts has implemented something called global budgeting, a form of managed care under which providers are given a fixed sum per patient per year instead of being paid on a more traditional fee-for-service basis. Since providers keep any money left over in the patients budget, the hope is that they would offer more cost-effective care.
There are two points worth making about all this.
One: Massachusetts increasingly complex web of price controls and rationing might curb costsuntil patients and providers find ways to beat them, that is. But that has nothing to do with the inherent logic of universal coverage. Indeed, if such measures had been imposed before RomneyCare burdened the state with more demand, the Bay State might have reduced health care costs even more.
Two: Desperate to temper runaway costs, universal coverage enthusiasts are embracing the very things that they abhor about the market. Isnt the whole point of universal coverage to make quality care available to everyone regardless of ability to pay? Yet here they are, mandating tiered plans that let rich people buy quality and access while the poor languish in substandard facilities.
Sorry, Liberals, RomneyCare Is Still Not Working - Reason.com
The Massachusetts health care overhaul continues to come up short.
The evidence shows neither that the declining costs will last nor that they are the result of the program.
Theres more. Massachusetts has implemented something called global budgeting, a form of managed care under which providers are given a fixed sum per patient per year instead of being paid on a more traditional fee-for-service basis. Since providers keep any money left over in the patients budget, the hope is that they would offer more cost-effective care.
There are two points worth making about all this.
One: Massachusetts increasingly complex web of price controls and rationing might curb costsuntil patients and providers find ways to beat them, that is. But that has nothing to do with the inherent logic of universal coverage. Indeed, if such measures had been imposed before RomneyCare burdened the state with more demand, the Bay State might have reduced health care costs even more.
Two: Desperate to temper runaway costs, universal coverage enthusiasts are embracing the very things that they abhor about the market. Isnt the whole point of universal coverage to make quality care available to everyone regardless of ability to pay? Yet here they are, mandating tiered plans that let rich people buy quality and access while the poor languish in substandard facilities.
Sorry, Liberals, RomneyCare Is Still Not Working - Reason.com
