Mary Katherine Stout
Thursday, June 26, 2008Making Life Better for EveryoneBy Mary Katherine StoutCategories: TexasInvariably, every time the staff of the Texas Public Policy Foundation write about limited government and free market principles for health care reform the responses roll in charging that we clearly don’t care about sick people, poor people, and children. They suggest that conservatives are greedy people more interested in protecting our own wealth than trying to help the less fortunate. If all else fails, they simply resort to calling names and impugning our character. These responses misunderstand our position, or perhaps reflect just how poorly the free market limited government position has been articulated for health care. In fact, we are very concerned about how all Texans can experience the most freedom in making health care decisions, by making individual choices in a marketplace that delivers great quality and lower cost health care—including the poor, the sick, and children of all ages. Yet we know from experience that if the Left succeeds in turning health care over to the government, it is not the healthy or the wealthy who will suffer the most. Indeed, people with resources will always be able to find the best care available: they will buy their way to the best care at private facilities, with extra payments to providers, or by traveling to the best specialists in the world. Instead, the poor and the sick will suffer from being trapped in a non-competitive health care system that lacks the pressures for innovation, efficiency, improving quality, and decreasing cost. How do we know this will happen? Consider public education. Those with resources flee the worst schools and districts, moving to new neighborhoods or taking their children to private schools, while those who remain in the failing public schools do not have the resources to escape. Instead, they are stuck in failing schools and the political game for additional resources will always fail to deliver the quality product that the forces of competition could deliver. Free market people know that competition makes life better for everyone—it brings us more choices, better products and services, and lower costs. The competitive forces that work in everything from cellular phones, computers, and cars can work in public education and in health care too.
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Thursday, December 6, 2007Free the Nurse PractitionerBy Mary Katherine StoutIn comparison to other states, Texas nurse practitioners are among the most highly regulated in the country. Given the need for lower cost alternatives in heatlh care, it is essential that policymakers look for opportunities to ease regulations on nurse practitioners in order to offer more choices and affordable options for patients. For more on the subject, see Comparing State Regulation of Nurse Practitioners (PDF), recently published by the Texas Public Policy Foundation.
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Thursday, May 24, 2007Nurses for Single PayerBy Mary Katherine StoutOn Monday the California Nurses Association announced that they were joining the AFL-CIO, which brings the total number of registered nurses in the AFL-CIO to 325,000. The story from the Washington Post reports that the CNA's executive director cites their decision to join the AFL-CIO as a result of the "unprecedented momentum for comprehensive health care reform." The article further explains that the CNA "opposed any reforms that would leave private insurers as the system's gatekeepers." I always like things like that last little gem. I'm not unsympathetic to people's frustrations about insurance companies as gatekeepers, but the alternative that these guys propose is infinitely worse. A lobbyist for an association here in Austin likes to characterize their position on Medicaid reform/health care reform as being that the "state needs to get the right care, to the right people, at the right time." I can see why this is the preferred method for reform. The government is so good at getting people what they need, when they need it. Just ask all the people (great stories here and here) who have been waiting for their passports.
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Monday, April 23, 2007A Picture is Worth...By Mary Katherine StoutStop hugging trees and start hugging kids. Now that Earth Day has come and gone, it's time again for Cover the Uninsured Week of 2007 (good thing it has its very own week or else the uninsured might be forgotten with their mere 484 mentions so far this year in the headlines or lead paragraphs of the nation's major newspapers). This year, organizers say that they will be "demonstrating broad support for the reauthorization of SCHP and the need to cover America's uninsured children." In case you don't have your decoder ring with you, "reauthorizing" CHIP really means expanding CHIP, which is simply part of the larger effort in bringing more people into government-paid (and rationed) health care--we're talking everyone from more kids at higher incomes to adults this time around. States cheer the CHIP expans...er... reauthorization effort because it comes with that free federal money. Whatever the policy debate in your state, take notice of the Left's tactics. A quick glance at the Cover the Uninsured website and those of their fellow footsoldiers at advocacy organizations like the Children's Defense Fund shows just how good they are at peddling sob stories to manipulate policy debates. Even so, I was still appalled to get this e-mail (PDF) a week or so ago asking for stories about children who died due to lack of health coverage. They even request pictures of the kids! That's what we compete against this week... or for that matter, every day. Unfortunately, we too easily cede the argument about insurance, agree that everyone needs it, and focus on how we get everyone covered. The Left's solution, of course, is a big government program. The Right is all too willing to go along just to get something done. A good solid debate on the policy would be nice, but the uninsured have become the Left's marketing campaign for big government, and a vehicle for advancing the agenda using emotion.
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