George W. Bush found the solution to America's healthcare crisis seven years ago. Nobody listened

Politico Magazine ^ | 02/19/2014 | EDWARD LAZEAR

[SeekAndFind]

The Congressional Budget Office’s warning that the Affordable Care Act will cause employment to fall by the equivalent of 2.5 million full-time workers is just the latest of Obamacare’s negative surprises. Unfortunately, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s statement that “we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it” is proving to be depressingly accurate.

The law’s defenders legitimately argue that it is not sufficient merely to criticize the Affordable Care Act; responsible action requires proposing an alternative. Fortunately, Republicans have a good one, and it’s been hiding in plain sight for the past seven years. The plan was first described in President George W. Bush’s 2007 State of the Union Address, but it remains timely. This plan would remedy most of the major problems that exist in America’s health care system and cause less destruction with fewer adverse consequences than Obamacare.

There are two main problems associated with health care in the United States today. First, it is expensive. Health economists, among them Daniel Kessler at Stanford, have shown convincingly that the United States spends a larger share of its gross domestic product on health care than other countries (for example, about one-and-a-half times what Switzerland spends per capita) because of inappropriate incentives to use care efficiently.

Patients who have insurance or rely on state funds to cover their expenses bear little of the cost of any treatment received, which causes them to use health resources as if they were almost free. This means that health care is overused and the scarce resources do not always go to those who need them most. Part of this is a result of a Tax Code that subsidizes expensive plans, which have low co-payments and overly extensive coverage.

The second problem is the large number of uninsured Americans who do not have reasonable access to health care and who obtain the health care that they do receive in inefficient ways, such as using emergency rooms for minor ailments.

So what would the ideal alternative to Obamacare look like? It should provide cost-effective care and the quality treatment that Americans deserve. Effective reform should discourage over-insurance that results from the subsidy of so-called Cadillac plans that pay for basic, inexpensive and predictable procedures and have patient co-payments that are too low. Reform should encourage consumers to use America’s scarce health resources efficiently by inducing them to get tests and treatments that are justified instead of those that are selected because they are almost free to the decision-makers. Finally, reform should make health insurance available to the vast majority of Americans, some of whom cannot afford insurance without help.

The Bush 2007 plan achieves these goals. The basic structure is to offer all Americans a standard tax deduction, in 2007 set at $15,000 for families and $7,500 for individuals. The deduction would apply to payroll tax — both employee and employer contribution — as well as to income tax. Importantly, the size of the deduction would be independent of the amount spent on the plan. Any taxpayer who has a plan that includes catastrophic coverage gets the full deduction, irrespective of the plan’s cost. That is important because it creates the incentives to choose efficiently. A family that wanted to spend less on the plan than the value of the deduction would pocket the difference. A family that wanted to spend more on a plan than the value of the of the deduction would bear the additional cost out of pocket.

As a consequence, consumers would reap the full benefit of keeping the cost of their plan low, which prompts them to shop and choose effectively. If the extra coverage offered by a $10,000 plan over an $8,000 one is not worth at least $2,000 to the consumer, he will not purchase it. Under the current system, part of the cost is borne by others because the tax system does not treat employer-provided health insurance as income. As a consequence, a dollar spent by the employer or worker costs less than a dollar to that worker. The Bush plan would eliminate that distortion, replacing the non-taxed status of employer-provided health insurance with the standard deduction.

By eliminating the link to employers, health insurance becomes more like auto insurance, where the consumer has appropriate incentives to shop around. Other features of the Bush proposal include allowing the purchase of plans across state lines to enhance competition and reform of medical liability to reduce the amount of defensive medicine.

-- Edward Lazear, who served as chairman of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers from 2006-09, is a professor at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business and a Hoover Institution fellow.

[SeekAndFind]

RE: So what’s better? A tax deduction plan like this or a tax credit plan like the one Coburn is sponsoring?

I personally prefer a tax credit.

If I were ever faced with a hypothetical choice between a $1000 tax deduction and a $1000 tax credit, I would want the credit.

Unlike a tax deduction, a $1000 tax credit reduces your tax dollar-for-dollar ($1000). On the other hand, a tax deduction reduces your taxable income by $1000.

The resulting amount of tax you save depends on your marginal tax bracket (in everyday language: your tax bracket). If you are in the 25% tax bracket, a $1000 tax deduction reduces your taxes by $25.

But either one would be preferable to the monstrosity we have now.

[GeronL]

if it doesn’t have half the people getting a subsidy the left will oppose it

[SunkenCiv]

He also wanted to straighten out the Social Security system, and the Demwits fought against it tooth and nail. Thanks SeekAndFind.

[AllAmericanGirl44]

bkmk

[superfries]

great explanantion

[1010RD]

Poor GWBush, if only we’d listened to him. Like he didn’t cause or encourage the problems we have today?

What health care needs is a full dose of free market. Everything that ails health care in America is government sponsored. It isn’t insurance that people need, but access.

At the local, county, state and federal level rules and regulations limit choices. It is illegal to situate one hospital across the street from another. Why can’t pharmacists prescribe? Why can’t non-doctors own clinics?

It’s government and their crony capitalists that created the problem. Get government out of health care and watch it thrive while prices drop and access improves.

Do that for everything and watch America boom. To do that you’ll need an excess lobbying tax on lobbying incomes over $100K. Something like 90% for the next dollar ought to do it.