Health Care Prediction

After being inspired by a comment made by Charles Krauthammer, I have a prediction on what will happen with Obama's health care reform. Krauthammer believes that ultimately what will pass this year will be some kind of health insurance reform legislation. If that ends up being true, my impression is that this will not involve any funds from the fed and will basically include any or all of the following: require insurance companies to cover people who in the past could not get insurance, require insurance companies to ignore pre-existing conditions, regulate how much insurance companies can charge for premiums, and regulate how much an insurance company can profit and/or earn. It would be a heavy handed way for the federal government to control the insurance industry, and ultimately health care, without the federal government having to outlay any funds . . for now.

If this scenario ends up coming true, health care will end up in the same position that the housing market found itself. In the housing industry, banks and mortgage companies were forced by the government to create mortgage vehicles and approve loans for people who otherwise could not afford to purchase a home. Traditional norms and standards that made sense for approving loans were abandoned. People on both sides of the aisle were excited to see home ownership numbers growing, but those numbers were built on unstable ground. As conditions changed and house values decreased, people who could not afford to pay their mortgage. So the government intervened, bailing out banks and taking greater control over how those banks operated.

Project out about five years from now. Health insurance companies, forced to take on clients who are wiping them out financially, forced to not be able to raise premiums without federal approval . . these companies will go under . . one by one. There to take over will be the federal government with its own insurance system . . and Obama's health care reform will finally take place. That is unless we can change the tide. It's time for a different kind of hope and change.