Why the health care mess to begin with?

From the CATO INSTITUTE blog (CATO is a Libertarian think-tank):

The health care system is a mess, largely because of perverse government incentives through its big health care programs, Medicare and Medicaid, and its tax break for employer-provided insurance. As a result, we now have a third party payment-dominated system which simultaneously encourages excessive spending and pushes insurers and providers to decide how to “ration” (i.e., limit) care.

What people need is a medical system that allows them to make the basic rationing decisions: what kind of insurance to buy, what kind of coverage to choose, what kind of trade-offs to make between spending on medicine and spending on other goods and services.

Read the whole thing

Democrats Block Children's Insurance

"...the Senate on the one hand and President Bush on the other appear to have crafted a generous extension of the program that may now fall prey to the House Democratic desire to provoke a presidential veto — and the children be damned!"

Read it here