Sunday, August 30, 2009

A Simple Health Care Plan

HR 3200 is everything and the kitchen sink. Thus I thought I would present a simple Health Care Plan in just seven slides. It does not include any Governmental Panels, Agencies or the like. Yes, it does include a Government Insurance Management Board, to set the minimum coverages and make certain the Insurers are following the rules, you can't trust anyone, especially Insurance Companies.

Well here goes:

Step 1, Principles: The plan has the following core principles. It is a plan that covers everyone and has no exclusions and is purchased by every person and is thus portable. It is a national plan and has no state control. It is akin to life insurance but it has aspects of auto and house insurance. I know my left wing adversaries will yell foul as only they can but this can work.



















Step 2, It has a Minimum Plan and it Allows Anyone to Buy Up: The plan has a minimum Core Package. The Core Plan has both catastrophic coverage and has a primary care element. We want to keep the costs low so this Core Plan follows a CCE, Comparative Clinical Effectiveness, set of guidelines. You sign up for this Core Package and you then have to go generic and follow CCE. This is the lowest cost option. You also have an out of pocket and a deductible. Thus there is some modicum of financial incentive. Of course if you cannot pay then it gets subsidized. Then if you want more you can buy up.



















Step 3, How do we Get the Costs Down? Well we follow the steps we proposed a week ago and the costs are reduced for the 2008 numbers as follows.



















The percent numbers are shown below so that they are scalable.



















This is a 30% cost reduction. The view below assist in seeing it by target area.



















Step 4, Applying the Target Cost Reductions we see we can reduce the cost per person from what it is today of some $7,200 per year to just over $5,100 which is a 30% cost reduction. This we show below by cost area.



















We have applied our plan to the costs as they were in 2008 and we have achieved the cost reductions by areas as shown.

Step 5, the Revenue from the subscribers is as shown below and it matches penny for penny what the costs are.



















Thus we have a simple straightforward plan which has no overt costs other than what the Government decides its wants to reimburse people for. The plan costs total out of pocket what it costs for auto insurance per car in New Jersey. Since every person has a car the costs per person out of pocket is that amount. The other amounts for the insurance payments are additional and would have to come from their own resources and that may mean from their employer. I have avoided the tax issue but frankly the money should be taxable based solely on a fairness principle, but we avoid the discussion here.

So why cannot our wonderful Congress come up with something this simple?