Government Drives Up Health Care Cost

From the Albuquerque Journal Online.com - by J. Deane Waldman - In the Journal of Nov. 28, economist Robert Samuelson claims that health care costs are “out of control.” Quite the opposite: They are totally in control – by the government. That is a problem. Health care refers to goods and services delivered by hospitals and providers to be consumed by patients. Costs to providers and institutions are driven more by government regulation and bureaucracy than by labor costs or MRI machines. Meanwhile, payments to providers and institutions – what Samuelson calls “costs” – are controlled by government. Note that when the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”) cut “Medicare costs” by 21 percent, they cut Medicare payments to providers. Therefore, they cut services to patients. As Robert Moffit of the Heritage Foundation testified before Congress, “you cannot get more of something by paying less for it.” Meanwhile, the spending on – the costs of – the federal health care bureaucracy went up by six whole new agencies, hundreds (thousands?) of bureaucrats added to the payrolls, and multithousands of new rules and regulations. So the government controls and increases spending to/on itself, while it controls and decreases spending on patients. Want proof? Of all the money spent on “health care,” 40 percent – that is over $1 trillion in 2010 – disappears. It goes to health care but provides no care. Read - requires subscription

Government Drives Up Health Care Cost