John Stossel is co-anchor of ABC News' "20/20"

Arrogance

It's crazy for a group of mere mortals to try to design 15 percent of the U.S. economy. It's even crazier to do it by August.

Yet that is what some members of Congress presume to do. They intend, as the New York Times puts it, "to reinvent the nation's health care system" (http://tinyurl.com/mrjmon).

Let that sink in. A handful of people who probably never even ran a small business actually think they can reinvent the health care system.

Politicians and bureaucrats clearly have no idea how complicated markets are. Every day people make countless tradeoffs, in all areas of life, based on subjective value judgments and personal information as they delicately balance their interests, needs and wants. Who is in a better position than they to tailor those choices to best serve their purposes? Yet the politicians believe they can plan the medical market the way you plan a birthday party.

Leave aside how much power the state would have to exercise over us to run the medical system. Suffice it say that if government attempts to control our total medical spending, sooner or later, it will have to control us.

Also leave aside the inevitable huge cost of any such program. The administration estimates $1.5 trillion over 10 years with no increase in the deficit. But no one should take that seriously. When it comes to projecting future costs, these guys may as well be reading chicken entrails. In 1965, hospitalization coverage under Medicare was projected to cost $9 billion by 1990. The actual price tag was $66 billion (http://tinyurl.com/ltmezh).

The sober Congressional Budget Office debunked the reformers' cost projections (http://tinyurl.com/mf9p9p). Trust us, Obama says. "At the end of the day, we'll have significant cost controls," presidential adviser David Axelrod said (http://tinyurl.com/lrcyj9). Give me a break.

Now focus on the spectacle of that handful of men and women daring to think they can design the medical marketplace. They would empower an even smaller group to determine — for millions of diverse Americans — which medical treatments are worthy and at what price.

How do these arrogant, presumptuous politicians believe they can know enough to plan for the rest of us? Who do they think they are? Under cover of helping uninsured people get medical care, they live out their megalomaniacal social-engineering fantasies — putting our physical and economic health at risk in the process.

Will the American people say "Enough!"?

I fear not, based on the comments on my blog.
When I argued last week (http://tinyurl.com/mytx9s) that medical insurance makes people indifferent to costs, I got comments like: "I guess the 47 million people who don't have health care should just die, right, John?" "You will always be a shill for corporate America."

Like the politicians, most people are oblivious to F.A. Hayek's insight that the critical information needed to run an economy — or even 15 percent of one — doesn't exist in any one place where it is accessible to central planners (http://tinyurl.com/4jx93m). Instead, it is scattered piecemeal among millions of people. All those people put together are far wiser and better informed than Congress could ever be. Only markets — private property, free exchange and the price system — can put this knowledge at the disposal of entrepreneurs and consumers, ensuring the system will serve the people and not just the political class.

This is no less true for medical care than for food, clothing and shelter. It is profit-seeking entrepreneurship that gave us birth control pills, robot limbs, Lasik surgery and so many other good things that make our lives longer and more pain free.

To the extent the politicians ignore this, they are the enemy of our well-being. The belief that they can take care of us is rank superstition.

Who will save us from these despots? What Adam Smith said about the economic planner applies here, too: The politician who tries to design the medical marketplace would "assume an authority which could safely be trusted, not only to no single person, but to no council or senate whatever, and which would nowhere be so dangerous as in the hands of a man who had folly and presumption enough to fancy himself fit to exercise it."

John Stossel is co-anchor of ABC News' "20/20" and the author of "Myth, Lies, and Downright Stupidity." He has a new blog at http://blogs.abcnews.com/johnstossel. To find out more about John Stossel and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2009 BY JFS PRODUCTIONS, INC.

Is this the same John Stossel that wants to legalize child porn, assisted suicide, prostitution and repeal the ban on DDT??

I'm an occasional Stossel fan, and if you actually LISTEN to his reasoning on these issues, he makes sense. :) Nice article, OP.

John Stossel telling us about arrogance, that's cute.

Wow. Still no facts by libs and dems debating conclusions from a well respected journalist....Let's see, it can't be so, so lets attack his character.....how typical along with saying the facts are FEAR Tactics.



Is this FEAR

"Also leave aside the inevitable huge cost of any such program. The administration estimates $1.5 trillion over 10 years with no increase in the deficit. But no one should take that seriously. When it comes to projecting future costs, these guys may as well be reading chicken entrails. In 1965, hospitalization coverage under Medicare was projected to cost $9 billion by 1990. The actual price tag was $66 billion (http://tinyurl.com/ltmezh)."

Or the truth

Who's attacking his character, and what makes him an expert on health care and the economy over other journalists that are respected and do not agree with him?

bring back DDT!!

death to the insects!!

hmmmmm, sounds reasonable

now I have something to look up

I doubt seriously that Stossel wants to legalize child porn... but he may believe in some freedoms under which if were protected it could be construed to be legal.

You can't argue the FACTS in his article can you....

"Also leave aside the inevitable huge cost of any such program. The administration estimates $1.5 trillion over 10 years with no increase in the deficit. But no one should take that seriously. When it comes to projecting future costs, these guys may as well be reading chicken entrails. In 1965, hospitalization coverage under Medicare was projected to cost $9 billion by 1990. The actual price tag was $66 billion (http://tinyurl.com/ltmezh)."

It'll happen to health care too.....millions in deficit turned into billions in deficits turned into trillions in deficit turned into quadrillions .............That's the street we are on!!!

see how easy it is to turn it from a discussion of the points in the article to a discussion of the author's moral character?


clever

I did some rough numbers.

US population about 300,000,000:

Would have to place an ADDITIONAL tax of $3000 per person to pay for medical plan alone. Bearing in mind that only a percentage of the number of people in that number are taxpayers...

I could not find data on how many of that 300 million were tax payers but the actual increase in tax based on number of ACTUAL tax payers would be outrageous.

There is no way to pay for this plan WITHOUT increasing taxes across the board...

DO THE MATH.

I am not attacking John Stossel's moral character. The point I was trying to make is that John is a Libertarian and believes that government should not be involved in anything. You have to understand where the author is coming from and he is from the fringe.

I believe this country is moving in a different direction than what John Stossel thinks should happen.

Change is needed, the current system is broke.

Change is coming.

Also leave aside the inevitable huge cost of any such program. The administration estimates $1.5 trillion over 10 years with no increase in the deficit. But no one should take that seriously. When it comes to projecting future costs, these guys may as well be reading chicken entrails. In 1965, hospitalization coverage under Medicare was projected to cost $9 billion by 1990. The actual price tag was $66 billion (http://tinyurl.com/ltmezh).

Say hello to the quadrillion......deficit=millions/billions/trillions/quadrillions

So what is it going to cost ME if we do NOT reform health care?

Now, I am stating this from my own personal experience, I'm not going to copy/paste some article as many of the posts are.

In the past 6 years, my medical premium has doubled. That's a 100% increase from what it was just 6 short years ago.

If this trend continues, in 2015 (6 years), it will have cost me an extra $21,000 out of MY POCKET!!

This is part of the problem that the President keeps stating over and over but nobody is listening. He also uses a more conservative estimate that premiums will double in 10 years. Based on my experience and in the plan I am currently with and the demographics of the group, we are trending much higher. Our preiums are projected to double in the next 6 years again.

I would also qualify to say that I am talking medical premiums only. No including co-pays but Includes Rx.

Aloha

Place I worked at ran into the same problem... Their answer was to get a better insurance company... It's called competition. Had to do that twice before they found a company that was ethical.

No one is arguing that reform isn't necessary. The argument is whether or not the government can efficiently run a health care program alongside private industry on a level playing field and run one that will be paid for by not adding to the deficit and one that will not cause exodus from private plans leading to a single payee government plan where cost greatly exceed what is taken in. And one that doesn't erode choices.

I don't think government can. The articles I post point to specific instances of government blunder that shows me that when government gets involved taxpayers lose.

Congress has not tried to fix private insurance yet. I believe that Congress needs to get the lobbyist out of their back pockets and come up wilh a plan that legislates, regulates, and reforms private health care as it now exists. Some thing even need deregulating to encourage more competition.

Why not allow small busineses to join together to get the same rates that larger corporations get.

There is a multitude of ideas out there that will bring cost down.

There is a multitude of ideas that can be legislated to protect people.

Maybe the government should have played a little poker with this one - by holding the threat of a government plan to obtain concessions from private health insurance providers and drug companies.

We have the best plan. We also made the move several years ago from a fully insured plan to a self funded model. Even though it is thru the Blues, they only provide the network access and administration based on a pp/pm basis. It's the most economical and efficient model out on the market with direct access in a PPO arrangement. Our trend is running up due to utilization and an aging population.

So you don't think government can efficiently run a health care program?

I think that's exactly what the insurance companies are afraid of. Doctors too. Look at what happens under Medicare; the Government sets the rates of how much they are going to pay for example, an office visit. Regardless of what the doctor normaly charges patients, that is all he is going to get from Medicare.

Insurance companies do the same thing. They negotiate rates with a network of doctors and set what they are going to pay. an excample would be that a Specialist I am seeing charges $150 for an office visit normally. My BCBS plan negotiated a rate of $62 per visit so that's all he gets.

The Insurance carriers vary on the discounts they recieve from Physician networks, hospitals and Rx. Some get better discounts than others and it can add up to quite a bit. They even vary on the way the negotiate the contracts as some carriers for example with hospitals, base it on the type of occurance vs. number of days stay.

what has all the Insurance carriers scared is that a Public Option Plan that is being proposed, will be setting rates very low, similar to what they see with Medicare. They will have to compete.

The Rx Industry has already said they will be offering huge discounts to a Public Option plan. The jumped on the bandwagon early as they wanted to be involved in shaping the legislation.

You can bet there are many specialists in the industry drafting this legislation. It is not being written by a bunch of morons at the capitol as Mr. Stossel has suggested.

I would also add, just something to ponder: What if the Federal Government did away with Medicare and turned it all over to be completely run by Private Insurers? What would it cost per year?

You know Crick, the more I look at what you have posted, the more confused I get.

You talk about how "Congress needs to get the lobbyist out of their back pockets and come up wilh a plan that legislates, regulates, and reforms private health care as it now exists."

Doesn't John Stossel OPPOSE government regulation in a fashion or form? He's Libertarian after all. Free market?

Then you go on to say "Some think even need deregulating to encourage more competition." No this is sending mixed signals. Confusing. Sounds like somthing the Insuarnce carriers would want and anything to cause delays and "Kill the Bill".

You also state "There is a multitude of ideas that can be legislated to protect people." Not quite out of the Libertarian playbook either, is it?

"Also leave aside the inevitable huge cost of any such program. The administration estimates $1.5 trillion over 10 years with no increase in the deficit. But no one should take that seriously. When it comes to projecting future costs, these guys may as well be reading chicken entrails. In 1965, hospitalization coverage under Medicare was projected to cost $9 billion by 1990. The actual price tag was $66 billion (http://tinyurl.com/ltmezh)."

The above is exactly what happens time and time again with our government.
Check out Amtrak too. The Post Office struggles.

I totally disagree with you.

Here is what will happen. In order to compete, privater insurers first
will find a way to drop all their poor risk onto the government run program. The government will not run the program on a level playing field whereas private industry can make enough profit to raise capital. More and more people will choose the government option to save. Private insurers will eventually go bankrupt. Taxpayers will be stuck with another program that constantly drives the deficit up. That is what has the insurance carriers scared.