The White House
Health Care Reform Today
October 5, 1993
- Opponents of reform are starting to sharpen their attacks. Over
the next few weeks, we expect the full-scale scare tactics of the
opposition to roll out. They will tell Americans about how much
more they'll pay and all the benefits they'll lose. They will call
our modest controls for slowing down runaway health spending too
draconian and warn it will lead to rationing. And they'll paint a
phony picture of a big, bureaucratic, heavy handed, government run
system. While we welcome debate over policy differences, scare
tactics are a different matter. When scare tactics are used, swing
the spotlight back on the accuser. Bet it'll be someone who profits
either from the status quo or benefits from playing the politics of
fear.
- The fear-mongers are attempting to paint their hysterics with
the patina of truth by couching them in terms of specific numbers
--as in the charge that cropped up over the weekend that the
President's plan would create a new federal bureaucracy of
50,000. Let's treat such stuff like what it is, folks: garbage.
- Here's the straight story on the "bureaucracy" issue: The
President's proposal seeks to eliminate bureaucracy, not create
more. The role of government in the new system is to set the
rules, guarantee security and quality, then get out the way and
let the private sector go to work. Existing systems that
function like health alliances are astoundingly unbureaucratic:
the California Public Employees Retirement System organizes and
oversees a free-choice, consumer-responsibility market for nearly
a million families among 44 health plans with fewer than 100
staffers; the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program runs a
consumer-choice market among hundreds of health plans for
millions of federal workers and retirees with fewer than 300
staffers. As Ira Magaziner says, "If the National Health Board
has 100 employees, it will have too many." You get bureaucracy
with micromanagement, and micromanagement -- by both the
government and private insurers -- is what the President's
proposal seeks to move away from.
- A total of 2 million more Americans were without insurance at
the end of 1992 than at the end of 1991, according to new data
released by the Census Bureau yesterday. That figure doesn't
include the millions of Americans who were without insurance for
a period of time when they were in between jobs or without a job.
If the President's Health Security plan passes Congress, all
Americans will have a comprehensive package of benefits that can
never be taken away.