On Not Learning From Experience
I’ll no doubt be writing a lot about the Republican plan to dismantle Medicare in the days ahead. But a quick thought now before I go off to listen to Bob Hall explain the high-unemployment, zero-rate trap (pdf).
Here’s the thought: when it comes to controlling health care costs, there are a lot of role models out there — because everyone does better than the United States. There are government-provider systems like Britain’s NHS (or the Veterans Administration); there are single-payer systems; there are regulated competition systems.
But what the GOP plans to offer is a plan that broadly resembles Medicare Advantage — a plan that not only failed to reduce costs, but actually ended up substantially increasing costs.
Of course, it’s not really about saving money. And that’s the point.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com
I’ll no doubt be writing a lot about the Republican plan to dismantle Medicare in the days ahead. But a quick thought now before I go off to listen to Bob Hall explain the high-unemployment, zero-rate trap (pdf).
Here’s the thought: when it comes to controlling health care costs, there are a lot of role models out there — because everyone does better than the United States. There are government-provider systems like Britain’s NHS (or the Veterans Administration); there are single-payer systems; there are regulated competition systems.
But what the GOP plans to offer is a plan that broadly resembles Medicare Advantage — a plan that not only failed to reduce costs, but actually ended up substantially increasing costs.
Of course, it’s not really about saving money. And that’s the point.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com
