Opinion: The entire U.S. health care system must be torn down and rebuilt
Americans are far too accepting of political control of health-related decisions when governments have no demonstrated ability to make better decisions than consumers.
In “We’ve Got You Covered,” Liran Einav and Amy Finkelstein describe America’s existing patchwork of health care payment arrangements as a “teardown.” I agree. I support downsizing the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), eliminating many programs, rolling back regulations, and creating a new system modeled on Social Security that will be simpler, less administratively burdensome, more affordable, and more effective at improving Americans’ health.
At the highest level, existing arrangements should be repealed because the health care system costs too much and delivers too little. STAT readers surely know that the U.S. spends twice as much per capita on health care as other developed countries but gets worse results. Spending more doesn’t buy better outcomes for many reasons, some of which are discussed below, but the inescapable conclusion is that the system is grossly inefficient.
