Health Care Reform

Dear Mr. President and members of Congress and the Senate,

Yahoo Finance is perhaps the last place I would have thought to find an insightful article about what is wrong with the health care system, but I did.

I'm super excited about the prospect of health care reform (I'm a huge fan, really), and I tend to fall into the liberal camp in the discussion about it (i.e. I would very much like it if everyone in the country had health insurance even if it means me having to pay a little bit more in taxes). However, I foresee a problem with everyone being insured. Many on the other side (conservatives) have expressed a fear that if we move to a more socialized system we will end up with long waits for medical care that we can now get relatively quickly. While I still would find that preferable to the concept that only people who can afford insurance get the care they need, it is legitimate concern. More over, it's already becoming a problem even under the current system.

The only way to solve that problem is more doctors. So, my proposal to fix the health care system is first to make medical school free and make undergrad free for those who pledge to go on to medical school. For it to work quickly you'd have to also forgive all the existing student loans for doctors as well. While I like to believe that the people who are interested in medicine as a profession are more interested in helping people than making money, I know that isn't true of everyone, so you would probably have to make decreasing the cost of health care (i.e. taking a pay cut) a condition of forgiving the loans. Once the cost of health care is cheaper then the cost to taxpayers to insure the currently uninsured would also be cheaper and it would be a lot easier for both sides of the isle to come to terms.

It would probably also be a good idea to pass legislation requiring all health insurance companies to be non-profit, or at least putting a cap on how much they can profit. You could count on the competition (from the public option which will, as noted be much easier to pass given how much cheaper it will be) to regulate that for you. I mean if it were a choice between a super expensive private insurance plan and a much cheaper (or free) public option, all other things being equal, a lot of people would pick the cheaper option. Still, I think it would be safer to legislate.

First step though, make it free to become a doctor. I know there are those who think it would open some sort of flood gate and we'd end up with a bunch of sub par doctors, but I really don't think that would be a problem. I mean the competition to get into medical school would increase exponentially which can only mean we'd probably end up with even better doctors, and more of them. It's win, win (win, win, win), really.

I'm not just saying this because I want to go to medical school for free, although I do....I mean, of course, I do. I want to go to medical school and my bachelors was in English so I have two additional years of undergrad to take before I can go to medical school and it will actually take me four years because I have to work full time while I'm taking them just so I can end up only $150,000 in debt instead of over $200,000 in debt. Not to mention which I'm stuck with private loans because, as a home owner I no longer qualify for fedearlly susidized student loans. So, yeah, it's sort of personal for me, but I really think it will also help with the current crisis in the health care system.

I really am a big fan of the work you guys are doing. These are just a few (hopefully) helpful suggestions.

Love,
The Fan