Wednesday, June 15, 2011

(Un)Healthy Exchanges

Mike Cannon, Director of Health Policy Studies at the Cato Institute (and FoIB), has a thought-provoking proposal:

"A key battleground is whether states will implement the law by creating government bureaucracies that Obamacare euphemistically calls health insurance "exchanges" ... Creating any sort of exchange is unnecessary, wasteful and counterproductive."

But it's in the law we had to "pass to learn what's in it."

Mike proposes a simple, elegant alternative:

"States are under no obligation to create these bureaucracies, however, and many have wisely refused."

Worst-case scenario? HHS "makes them" do so.

Keep in mind, though, that the Exchanges are still several years away, and "(i)f the Supreme Court overturns Obamacare, any money [states spent] creating an exchange would be wasted."

I would add several additional factors:

First, there's a distinct possibility that, come 2014 (when the Exchanges are scheduled to come online) we'll be calling her former HHS Secretary Shecantbeserious.

Second, we've seen how well the ObamaPools© have worked; any takers on whether or not the Exchanges will fare any better?
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