Healthcare

Healthcare is taking center stage once again as the political arena heats up. This will not be a political treatise. Instead, we will focus on the long-term problems in the U.S. healthcare system and potential solution to be found in the tax code.Medicare for all is something that appeals to me. When the politics are stripped there is a lot to like in the idea of expanding Medicare to everyone. Currently about half the people get some form of Medicare benefit. The old, very young and poor qualify for the Medicare program. Unfortunately, the Medicare system is set up backwards. The people who pay for it are not the people receiving benefits and the people receiving benefits don’t pay for it (with the exception of people age 65 and older).Even the elderly who pay a Medicare premium for some parts of the program are still subsidized by those earning a wage or salary, the very people who don’t qualify for benefits. The inefficiency of the U.S medical system has created the most expensive healthcare system in the world by far with sub-par results. For most illnesses it is better to travel for treatment if you want better odds at living. 

Eight years ago Barack Obama was hitting full stride in his first term as President. The economy was in tatters. The banking industry was only beginning to come to terms with the level of bad loans they had on their books. The largest insurance company (AIG) required a bailout to survive; the largest domestic automakers needed a bailout to preserve jobs; nearly every bank required assistance and every money center bank actually took assistance to weather the storm. This easily could have been another Great Depression.

So what did President Obama do in this desperate environment? Why, tackle health care reform, of course.

Every President has a short window of opportunity to build a coalition at the beginning of their Presidency to pass a key piece—or if lucky, several pieces—of legislation. These are the tough issues, things like major infrastructure investments and tax reform.