Comments on: I Spy the Senate Bill

By: Why Does The US Spend So Much On Healthcare? - Better Health

Why Does The US Spend So Much On Healthcare? - Better Health — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 20:45:38 +0000

[...] isn’t one answer, just like there’s no unitary health care “system” in the United States. I’ve written a lot about before, so today I just [...]

By: Evan Falchuk

Evan Falchuk — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 15:38:09 +0000

Thanks, Charles!

By: Charles Schamenek

Charles Schamenek — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 08:12:35 +0000

Glad to be here. I referenced your blog post on the word "system" in one of my existing pages on "health care reform" - specifically on this page: http://www.schamenek.com/charlie/opinions/healt...
Hope we have a Happy New Year.

By: Charles Schamenek

Charles Schamenek — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 01:12:35 +0000

By: Evan Falchuk

Evan Falchuk — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 19:00:23 +0000

Hi Charlie, welcome! Thanks, and yep, you found me!

Evan

By: Charles Schamenek

Charles Schamenek — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 16:39:34 +0000

Amazing! I finally found someone who agrees with my observation that calling medical care in the United States a “health care system” is a mistaken use of the word “system” !

By: Six Simple Steps To A Long And Healthy Life -Or- A New Way To Protest Bad Healthcare Legislation - Better Health

Sun, 27 Dec 2009 19:01:24 +0000

[...] if you’re feeling angry about all the legislative shenanigans surrounding healthcare reform, I offer this suggestion – channel that anger into getting yourself [...]

By: MKirschMD

MKirschMD — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 12:05:28 +0000

An apt analogy of health care to 'I Spy'. Can you spot real tort reform in the legislation? Reminds me of 'Where's Waldo?'

www.MDWhistleblower.blogspot.,com

By: Evan Falchuk

Evan Falchuk — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 21:12:41 +0000

You're surely correct about the doctors and patients!

As for the map analogy, it's not really meant to be an analogy. I meant to emphasize that insurance is regulated entirely at the state level.

If you're an insurer you sell in your state, and no others. If you want to sell in another state, you have to set up a separate insurer in that other state and comply with its rules, regulations and mandates, which are very likely very different from those in your home state. It makes for a rigid and uncompetitive marketplace.

In this sense, the machinery of insurance regulation is a fairly simple entity. It's divvied up among 50 state regulators.

The implication of the Senate bill is that these state regulators will become, for all practical purposes, dinosaurs. They will hang on for a while, but soon enough we will have one, single, super-regulator.

What's more, that super-regulator seems to want to regulate health insurance in pretty much the same exact way the states have been doing it for many decades.

I don't think that's progress, unfortunately.

By: Evan Falchuk

Evan Falchuk — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 21:02:10 +0000

Awesome. You're the best, Val.