I have been listening to the arguments over the new
Republican health care bill, and it occurs to me that the issue really boils
down to the same issue that divides the country on most political issues: we
want lots of nice things but we don’t want to pay for them.
People want to subsidize insurance for the poor, but they
don’t want to pay for it with higher taxes
People want pre-existing conditions to be covered, but they
don’t want to pay the higher premiums insurance companies would have to charge
everyone just to stay in business.
People want whatever plan they have to cover the costs of
the best (and most expensive) medical care available, but they don’t want to
pay the higher premiums that would entail.
There is no free lunch. If the government subsidizes lots of
people’s insurance, the money has to come from somewhere. That was the core
problem with ObamaCare, and ObamaCare solved it, not by raising taxes, but by borrowing yet more money and
growing the national debt – one reason the national debt almost doubled under the
Obama administration.
If we went to a single-payer (ie – Government) insurance
system, as many liberals would prefer, the money would still have to come from
somewhere. The logical place would be higher taxes, but no one wants that, and no politician seems prepared to point this out.
This, it seems to me, is at the root of many political
issues: we the American voters want more than we are willing to pay for. Many European countries, more socialist in nature, tax their people heavily to provide all the state-provided services. Americans just are not willing to be taxed that much.
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