Thinking About The Healthcare System’s Problems

President Trump’s administration has developed an alternative to Obamacare.

The press is suddenly saying the public considers the healthcare system its biggest problem. The healthcare system has been a huge problem all along. Obamacare was supposed to fix the problem. Obamacare has only enrolled twelve (12) million people in an individual healthcare market in 2019. Eighty-five percent of those enrolled are receiving government subsidies. Many of the enrollees have unaffordable deductibles and cannot afford to use the healthcare insurance.

Obamacare is methodically destroying the infrastructure of the healthcare system. Consumers of healthcare are becoming commodities. The healthcare system is complex. Obamacare has increased its complexity. It has increased costs to Medicare and Medicaid and made the entire healthcare system unsustainable.

Unfortunately, Democrats have ignored Obamacare’s effect on our national deficit while not increasing the efficiency of delivering healthcare. There has been some press quoting Democrats who have said that Republicans are starting to believe that our budget deficit is not significant.

It was recently discovered that insurance companies have overcharged the government’s Medicare Part D more than ten billion dollars.

What are consumers thinking as their savings are worth less and drugs cost more each year? Do they believe that the government’s bureaucracy is efficient? Is it any wonder that Congress’ approval rating is close to single digits?

When people feel they have less freedom to choose their doctor, hospital or insurance company and are being compelled by their government to settle for what is available, does anyone think they want more of the same?

Now, the narrative heard all over the land is “Medicare for All.” Medicare for all will not solve the healthcare system’s problems. It did not solve the VA Healthcare systems problem. The VA system is being privatized.

I do not believe that the way to solve our healthcare problem is to enlarge an unsustainable program. It is illogical. It will make the healthcare system worse and more unsustainable.

The first thing to do to solve any problem is to understand the problem. Everyone wants the best medical care for the entire population. Everyone says the healthcare system is so complex that it is impossible to fix.

The best way to cut through the healthcare system complexity and find a solution is to a clearly define the goal. The goal should be quality medical care available for all at an affordable cost. This means that all of the waste must be eliminated from the healthcare system. This is the goal of the Trump administration’s three-point approach.

Next, is to search for an approach devoid of politics and ideology that will have the highest impact. In my view, this means developing a system that provides consumers with the most control and responsibility for their medical care decisions.

The highest impact can be provided by the development of a system using technology to put the healthcare system in the hands of consumers. It must provide consumers with the greatest control over their choices and generate incentives to be responsible for their medical care and healthcare dollars.

There will be outliers who will be a potential burden to the system. However, if a system is developed with financial incentives to consumers, those outliers will realize they are hurting themselves. I do not believe consumers are stupid. They have simply been uneducated, unaware and unmotivated to control their health and healthcare dollars because a system to motivate them to be healthy and responsible for themselves is unavailable.

Steve Jobs said it all when he told his engineers that the consumers are not too stupid to use the machines, we are too stupid to make machines that easy to use. The same holds true for our healthcare system.  The goal in the healthcare system would be to reorient our thinking.

Obamacare is beyond improving because it put more power in the hands of the government which translates to more control over consumers’ freedom. An “improvement” such as an attempt to provide “Medicare for All” will lead to disaster.