That's the dirty little secret. That and the fact that doctors and nurses will have to have their salaries capped for the simple reason you have more people chasing the same amount of medical services. Who's going to want to go into medicine only to become a civil servant?
There’s things we can do to make medical costs “fair” where all consumers are paying the SAME price for the SAME services from the same doctor (different doctors in different may still charge different rates).
But “professional discounts”, pre-negotiated discounts, federal discounts, etc. mean that someone else is picking up the difference (getting gouged).
Tort reform would also help (and one of the billion dollar trial lawyers killed himself driving recklessly this year, while John Edwards has put a fork in his career as a trial lawyer with his public scandals).
Interstate insurance may get rates down but as it is, the specifics of each state’s laws (something not under federal reach) means that some insurance companies won’t WANT to provide coverage in some states. Which doesn’t mean that opening up the market won’t make prices drop, it just doesn’t ensure it.
And requiring everyone to get insurance won’t make rates drop. That was Not-my-Mahhh Richard’s excuse in Texas when driver’s insurance became a requirement.
When are we going to require that all people along the coast carry flood and storm damage insurance? And people in California required to carry fire and earthquake insurance? We won’t need another “FEMA bailout” for a disaster area ever again.
We have cops making $86000 while in jail and suspended teachers making $100,000.
Civil Servants my left little toe.