HillaryCare's Worst Features

From Cato.org is a scholar that sums of Hillary Clinton's health care proposal's worst features:

• An individual mandate. Sen. Clinton would require every American to purchase health insurance or face penalties. There are many problems with such a mandate. It restricts individual choice and liberty. It will require a massive new bureaucracy to enforce. And it sets in motion a whole series of regulatory requirements that will ultimately lead to greater government control of our health care.

• An employer mandate. Sen. Clinton would impose a “play or pay “ mandate on American businesses, requiring them to provide workers with health insurance or pay an additional tax into a government insurance fund. Such a mandate simply increases the cost of hiring workers, meaning employers will inevitably hire fewer workers. Some may even be forced to layoff current employees and others will offset their costs by reducing wages or wage increases.

• Expanding government programs. Sen. Clinton would expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) to provide benefits for middle-class families. Yet studies show that many of those who would be covered by such an expansion already have private health insurance. Thus, Sen. Clinton would simply be moving people from private insurance to taxpayer-funded government care. She would also allow people under age 65 to “buy-in” to Medicare despite the fact that the program is already facing a financial crisis.

• Insurance regulation. Senator Clinton would require insurance companies to accept all applicants regardless of their health, and would impose “community rating” on health insurance premiums. As a result the young and healthy will be forced to pay more in order to subsidize the older and sicker. And those who practice healthy lifestyles will pay more to subsidize the irresponsible.

This is a scary program. If you don't like waiting at the DMV for renewing your driver's licence how would like to wait weeks in line for a dentist in pain just to get a cavity filled? Something to think about. Also, Hillary Clinton said she would leave it up to Congress to fill in the details of her plan. You know who is the ranking member of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee that would oversee her plan? None other than Senator Ted Kennedy. That's who. Something else to think about. In summary her plan (or any Universal Health Care plan for that matter) would lead to long lines, overworked good doctors and nurses, poor doctors still getting paid, and shortages of medical equipment and medical staff.