I think such a plan (401k-type) would be a better idea, but it still smacks of government trying to dictate ways we should care for our own needs (that's not a "harsh criticism", since I realise that given where we are today, we are hardly going to have an appropriately limited government tomorrow).
I would like to see encouragement of true "health care insurance", meaning catastrophic care insurance with large (thousands of dollars) deductables, coupled with a 401-k type plan to provide the tax deductions for the money spent up to the deductable (again, assuming we have to have tax deductions at all).
Health "insurance" that is simply a pass-through for the costs of normal medical expenses distorts the markets.
However, I am also a fan of plans where you pay the doctors directly and they provide fixed-fee servise (like the Kaiser plan -- although my employee offers one and I don't use it, even though it costs 1/3rd of what I pay, and everybody in it loves it).
Agreed. There's no doubt that would eliminate the demand for many physician visits I would term unnecessary. I do think that in order to institute something like that there would need to be more transparency of physician/hospital ability. Some basic metrics around types of procedures performed, percent completed successfully, etc would be required in order to help individuals make choices for themselves.
I know the counter to that is it will result in high risk patients being refused, but I don't see any way around pulicly posting the data.