Healthcare, Chess and Unintended Consquences (Guest Voice)

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Healthcare, Chess and Unintended Consquences

by Average Joe

In the flap over an Op Ed article penned by the CEO of Whole Foods, John Mackey rehashes a right wing idea I blogged about after the CPAC convention in March. This idea has been widely touted as one of the conservative alternatives to any Democratic plan to overhaul healthcare. I first heard of this plan several years ago when I was a consulting engineer represented by the American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC). The plan, in a nutshell, would allow groups to organize across state lines in healthcare insurance pools. The newest twist on the idea is health insurance co-ops which would do the same thing. Conservatives may want to rethink this concept.

If, as in chess, conservatives think a few moves in advance, they might find some decidedly unconservative ramifications to the idea.

One of the ramifications of this idea will be the dismantling of the state power to regulate insurance companies. Beyond the constitutional questions the plan raises, there will be a serious regulatory void left by state insurance officials.

With a Congress, Senate and White House in Democratic hands, conservatives should ask themselves who will write the new national regulations to take place of the states.

The result of this plan will most certainly be to replace the states with a giant big brother bureaucracy in Washington. This kind of shifting of regulation violates a basic conservative principle. In general, conservatives feel state and local government works better than any Washington based government.

One alternative to Washington regulating the insurance industry might be allowing insurers to pick the state where they would like to be based and regulated. The result would be a mass exodus from high regulation states to low ones. This exodus would be similar to the previous exodus of the credit card companies. Again, another conservative principle of free unfettered markets will be violated by this seemingly innocuous deregulation. This conservative solution will pick winning and losing states in the health insurance industry. By voting for this kind of solution, conservative lawmakers might be shipping thousands of jobs to other states.

Many conservative solutions in Washington go around the mountain suggest a “free market like” alternative only to please conservatives. This alternative to a public healthcare option may be another around the mountain solution. This is one of those solutions which may sound good to conservatives on the surface. If you will pardon the pun, the cure (a private system) might be worse than the disease (a public system).

Conservatives might also be guaranteeing a liberal checkmate in a few moves by supporting a co-op or private plan which crosses state lines.

Average Joe is works as a civil engineer and lives with his wife and daughter in north Alabama. He writes for the American Silent Majority. www.americansilentmajority.com is a moderate political blog with an aversion to the left and right wing.