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Popping the balloon

Written by Jack Lundberg on 05-30-2008 17:55

Mr. Lazsewski, 
 
I want to commend you for the straightforward reporting on the Massachusetts health plan debacle and its cost to taxpayers now literally out of control.  
 
While Presidential candidates from both parties prattle on about their healthcare reform plans no one, it seems, has had the presence of mind to calculate the actual cost of enacting the same or reveal its economic impact. Without substantive cost containment measures--and therein lies the rub--promising health insurance for all amounts to little more than political pandering that, if enacted, would become a bottomless pit of ever-increasing governmental expenditures.  
 
Government-paid healthcare accounts for roughly 50% of all healthcare expenditures which when added to privately-secured coverage, collectively accounts for some 17% of GDP or, about $2 trillion annually . Cover the 47 million or so un- and under-insured via a $5,000 government subsidy, for example, and the figure more than doubles! 
 
When genuine and effective efforts are made to rein-in and control healthcare costs only then should universal coverage be considered, otherwise, it's simply a taxpayer boondoggle.