ON LEGACY SYSTEMS, ELECTRICAL TRANSMISSION, AND MEDICAL CARE

SENATOR WARREN’S $4 TRILLION DOLLAR MEDICAL PLAN

LIKE OFFERING A PATIENT WHO NEEDS AN ACE INHIBITOR A. HEART TRANSPLANT 

Years ago traveling abroad I was often struck with the uncluttered beauty of landscapes in  France and Germany and countrysides of the UK.  What was so different from my USA home land, I wondered?   I realized these European countries had no ugly utility poles strung like looping fishing lines across the land.  Their graceful trees were not savaged by line crews to make a space like a lost tooth for a power line. Their country roadways were clear-edged, graceful concrete curves  winding though forest, field and meadow.  It was those overhead power lines on cross pieces that looked too much like sacrificial crosses that affected my sensibilities.  Why didn't’ we—in the most advanced and powerful nation in the world—just replace those ugly, impractical, always-needing-replacement, obstructive-of-view, and dangerous, overhead power lines and bury our wires underground like the smart and tech-savvy French?  

Just a little research and thought explained why.  We are blocked by what modern techies might call a “legacy system”of  electrical transmission.   Most of our electrical grid is well over 70 or 80 years old.  Here in the USA we were the first to develop of electrical power.  Way back in 1882 Edison Co. powered up the first city—the little town of Appleton,  Wisconsin.  Our nation pioneered the technology of stringing wire on upright poles from as early as  the 1850s when we began hanging  bare wire on pine wood telegraph poles across the nation (completed in 1861).   It was the most practical system then and easy.  Our  pine forests stretched almost from sea to sea and could provide almost unlimited wood transmission poles  

That was how we started moving electrical power around.  To bury our power lines now (and make our countryside look prettier) would mean destroying the massive infrastructure—(some call it “sunken capital”) invested  in all those poles and wires. It would also cost us a great deal to cart them away. It would cost more to replace them  with a new and more expensive system needing further capital investment.  To calculate our costs we would have to add the lost capital (sunken capital) to the expense of pulling down the old wires and poles, then add the new capital invstment to estimate the actual outlay.. There would be losses all around.  All those companies which in our early history had  adapted to the existing wire on wood electrical system, such as those  providing raw logs, transport services, insulation for wires, machinery for installation and maintenance , the tree-surgeons who clear cluttering branches, etc., etc. all would be forced out of business.  It would be a tremendous loss that would have to be added to the cost of replacement.  Sadly, the insult to my visual sensibilities could not be so easily altered.   Dumping and replacing any old system —legacy systems—is often difficult, impractical and very costly (especially when they continue to work well). 

Plans for a single payer free health care system to replace what we have poses a very similar problem. Ours medical infrastructure is also a legacy system.  Our medical care has been crafted, modeled and modified and adapted to by practitioners and service providers over the long decades from the 1950s  into a massive part (@20%) of our economy and replacing it with something new will be very costly.  Like our ugly utility poles —dumping and replacing older infrastructure is impractical and very expensive.  

Senator Warren (D MA) has a plan—one of many— to replace our effective, innovative, high tech, diverse, creative and top-of-the-line (though costly)  medical system  with something that will serve more people—but at government expense.  Our world class system covers more than 150 million citizens through mostly medical insurance paid for by employers.  There are an additional 25 million out there who work for themselves, are unemployed or simply do not want health care insurance.  

The costs of the would be astronomical—some estimate from between $3 to $5 trillion dollars annually or a bit more than we now spend for the entire governments annual operation (military, medical welfare, debt service, veterans benefits ,etc.etc.).  Thus to add an additional 25 million folks to the system Ms Warren would have us raise taxes on just about everyone and threaten our whole economic system.  

 Under Warren’s plan, the federal government would take over what has been privately funded health care businesses that represent almost a fifth (20%) of the US $20 trillion annual economy . Those businesses would be closed and their employees would have to seek other work.  The only purchaser of health care services would be the federal government.  All private health insurance would be eliminated.  There are about 150 million people in the USA who are served by private health insurance plans.  These folks would lose their plans, lose their ties to their own physicians and be forced to seek out the “free” government services.  The approximately 25 million who, at present, are not served (or who prefer to have no insurance plan) will of course be included.  It is unclear if the 22 million illegal aliens in the nation will be served by this plan.but that is likely.  

In regard to the former private insurance plans—most are provided by businesses and corporations and these will be eliminated.  However, those “perks” were all included in the calculations for salary when individuals were hired.   Many of these plans were formulated  with difficulty and with salary give-aways during tough union negotiations  But these would be gone under Warren.  

Under Warren all physicians would be paid by the government at current Medicare rates. But if you recall, no one actually pays those rates, all physicians have “co-pays” which partially make up the difference for Medicare patients.  Medicare rates are estimated to be —on average—about one-half of what private insurers pay.   Those figures hold for general practitioners, but for specialists—those to whom a patient must gravitate for life-threatening or very serious situations—the differential is much more.  But there would be no difference offered.  Specialists would have to accept these same fees that the government is offering. and these higher paid specialists will be forced to take massive income cuts—retire—or become a private practice or boutique practitioner.  But after a Warren like change in plans there may be a lot of competition out there.    

Under Warren hospitals would be paid about what they are paid now. But they would no longer be run by their boards of directors but would answer only to the Feds from which they are paid. 

So to make our system “free for all” and add another 25 million to the rolls Warren would raise taxes on everyone, confiscate funds from those who invest and create wealth, rack up enormous debt, sacrifice the entire economy of the nation, endanger our military preparedness, ravage a world-class medical system that now represents about 1/5 of our economy and create a UK style system of second rate care.  In medical terms this might be tantamount to subjecting  a patient that needs a 33 cent ACE inhibitor to a heart transplant.  

No, Senator Warren—think again.