CO Gov Wades Into Universal Health Care

Newly elected CO Guv Bill Ritter laid out some of his agenda, and it includes keeping his promise to "provide health insurance to 760,000 Coloradans who don't have coverage by the end of this decade" and restore funding to Planned Parenthood.

Ritter says it cost's $7000 "providing" individuals with health insurance, and his democratic opponents say the plan will cost $1.8 billion a year (which at $2,300 a person seems light).

This is more, "Wow that's really expensive and getting more so. Let's throw money at it, that will surely bring the cost's down." thinking. Furthermore, by shifting the insurance burden onto the state, its getting further from the ones who should bear the burden, the individual. Also, not only does $1.8 billion seems light now, that figure will only grow as businesses take advantage of the program and drop coverage (if the state's providing insureance, it loses it's main hook as a "perk") increasing the state insured rolls. At a minimum, having businesses provide the insurance means someone is watching the bottom line. If this thing gets into the government's hands prices will only go up faster (see college tuition). Also (and tied to the point above), if businesses feel they can shift the cost to the State, they will (it's good for the bottom line - short term to medium term), and that will be the next big lobbyist push.

While trying to look after everyone is a noble cause, the state's not the right mechanism. The original idea of group insurance was to guard against catastrophe. Today insurance covers just about everything. When gobs of money are involved, people will line up for their take. Giving that gob access to the state treasury won't do anything but have even more people line up for their cut, drive cost's up, and lead to an actual catastrophe.

I wonder if we could get some kind of insurance on that?

The second thing I want to address is Ritter's plan to refund Planned Parenthood. Long time readers of the blog (Hi Mom) know that I'm opposed to the government giving money to charities, so it should shock no one that I'm against this, regardless of any feelings about PP. However, I do want to point out the flaw in Ritter's solace (he's pro-life) that PP says they will "have to ensure that money for abortion services are kept separate." It shows a fundamental flaw in the understanding of business. When Planned Parenthood creates their budget they look at a whole number. When Ritter insists on sequestering money for the "Planned" part, it really only means that PP will shift non-restricted money originally allocated to the "Planned" part to "abortion services." Regardless of the wording, giving money to Planned Parenthood gives money to the entire organization, the parts you like and the parts you don't like. If Ritter wants to promote the smart planning (contraceptives, abstinence, education, etc) aspect of Planned Parenthood he should fund a group that focuses on just that part.