{"id":36567,"date":"2019-12-02T12:40:31","date_gmt":"2019-12-02T19:40:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.summitdaily.com\/?p=375387"},"modified":"2019-12-02T12:40:31","modified_gmt":"2019-12-02T19:40:31","slug":"opinion-morgan-liddick-the-truth-about-government-health-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/local-news\/opinion-morgan-liddick-the-truth-about-government-health-care\/","title":{"rendered":"Opinion | Morgan Liddick: The truth about government health care"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and other Democrats think the government should give everyone health care. Here\u2019s some of what that means.<\/p>\n

Slow and archaic service: As a former federal employee, I receive part of my health care from a system used by government workers. Every year, I check prices for the private firms offering policies within the system \u2014 prices that rise each year. Government health care ain\u2019t free, no matter what one hears. This year, I had to change policies. It was an adventure.<\/p>\n

When I recently sold a house and bought another, everything was handled online. Listing contract, sale documents, application for a mortgage, purchase contract \u2014 it was all done through secure online document transfers using services like Docusign, widespread in the private sector. So what far more impressive and speedy service would be available from the federal government, with its practically unlimited budget?<\/p>\n

As if.<\/p>\n

First stop was a comparative website, allowing the shopper to compare among available plans. It was convenient, fast and informative. When the decision was made, there was a large, friendly \u201cenroll now\u201d button. I pushed it and the fun began.<\/p>\n

The button did not spawn an online application for the plan in question, but pages of information about who exactly could chose what, who was excluded and how one could tell. Should have been the first step instead of the last, you say? Ah, but that\u2019s not how things work when the government\u2019s involved. Never make anything a one-step process when 15 will suffice.<\/p>\n

The phone call followed. No online form, you say? Of course not. That stuff can\u2019t be just spread around; anyone could have access to it. Instead, one has to call, justify one\u2019s self and request a form. At least it was an 1-800 number, for those among us still using long-distance services that charge by the minute. Except that the number given was for the Political Review Office, whose employees had no idea why I was calling them. It was an uncomfortable call for all parties.<\/p>\n

Eventually, I found a working number, maneuvered through robot operators, spoke to a person and procured a PDF form sent as an email attachment. I filled out what I could online, printed the form, filled out the rest, signed it, scanned it and sent it back. Could I attach a receipt form to record who received it and when? No. Were there alternatives? Of course. I could have mailed the form. Or faxed it. And eventually, I\u2019ll have to call again to verify the PDF was received. Your tax dollars at work, sort of.<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s the current example of government provided health care. No, not Medicare. Medicare is just the cheap alternative to my present private insurance. It doesn\u2019t cover everything private insurance does, pays on average 40% to 50% less per procedure<\/a> and has fewer five-star facilities in its portfolio. No, the real example is Veterans Affairs, where the doctors are government employees, the hospitals are government-owned and managed, and the patients are, for the most part, captives of the system. So, how does the VA rate?<\/p>\n

That depends on what is measured. VA hospitals outperform their peers on preventing post-operative blood clots but do far worse than average on bedsores. Their staffs are seen by those who use them as uncommunicative and uncaring; their wait times for emergency care average twice as long as their private counterparts<\/a>, and they have a nasty habit of postponing critical admissions until the problems resolve themselves. A former co-worker of mine had a serious case of mesothelioma, a 100-mile commute to the nearest VA hospital and a revolving door of oncological specialists that continued to rotate until he died \u2014 without receiving treatment. His was not the only case of its type.<\/p>\n

So remember when you hear candidates promising free health care or carrying on about \u201cMedicare for All,\u201d not only do their promises mean \u201cI promise to take trillions from those who made it to fund a system in which the government decides who gets what health care and how,\u201d their plans imply other realities. Since price controls will be inevitable to control costs, highly remunerated specialists will flee to private \u201cconcierge care\u201d plans or, if that is outlawed, to safe havens for medical tourism because people with money will continue to buy the best, no matter the effect on the rest.<\/p>\n

And forms will continue to be faxed or mailed. Because bureaucrats, who vote and donate to politicians, need jobs.<\/p>\n

Morgan Liddick\u2019s column \u201cOn Your Right\u201d publishes Tuesdays in the Summit Daily News. Liddick spent 27 years working for the U.S. Foreign Service, primarily living abroad. He also spent 12 years teaching U.S. history and Western civilization at community colleges in Colorado and Texas. He lived in Summit County as recently as 2015. Contact him at <\/em>mcliddick@hotmail.com<\/a><\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

via:: Summit Daily<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and other Democrats think the government should give everyone health care. Here\u2019s some of what that means. Slow and archaic service: As a former federal employee, I receive part of my health care from a system used by government workers. Every year, I check prices for the private firms offering policies […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[97],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-36567","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-25 14:44:51","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KIFT - The LIFT FM","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36567","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36567"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36567\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36567"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36567"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36567"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}