Summary compiled by the Market Institute of a Galen Institute event held February 27, 2104
The Galen Institute hosted an event which saw three different panels comprised of politicians, policy experts, and journalists, debate the Affordable Care Act. The event centered around whether the panelists believed Obamacare would get “fixed” or replaced by a credible free-market plan.
The first panel, moderated by former CBO Director Douglas Holtz-Eakin, included leading members in Congress and their views on what true market-based health reform should look like. The following ideas were discussed:
- The panel agrees that they have to build upon a viable alternative to Obamacare
- Spur competition to lower costs
- Buying health insurance across state lines
- Equalized tax treatment
- Health-savings accounts
- Obamacare is fundamentally unfixable
- The bill has essentially destroyed the physician-patient relationship
- The law has been the biggest decelerator of innovation
- The White House is trying to figure out how it will pay of the healthcare law for the next year and a half
The second panel, a group of policy analysts and researchers from various market-oriented think tanks, discussed policy solutions including:
- In a true free market, consumers would have a level of choice
- A promising trend in the health insurance market is newer products that are offered side by side with traditional insurance
- By 2019 will be losing money on Medicare over Obamacare cuts
- Medicare Advantage and Health Savings Account legislation were consumer oriented reforms that were growing in use before the ACA was passed
The third panel, Journalist Ezra Klein and Avik Roy, opinion editor of Forbes and Manhattan Institute senior fellow, gave their views of how the healthcare debate would affect the 2014 and 2016 elections:
- The most important parts of the ACA have yet to be really implemented
- The bill did not disrupt enough of the market, specifically employer sponsored coverage
- CBO’s spending estimates are often wrong
- There is not enough validation in the Republican Party for a new reform plan to go forward
- A full repeal of Obamacare is unlikely, but with a Republican President and Republican-controlled House and Senate could see a “repeal and replace”
Event Website: http://www.galen.org/events/health-solutions-conference/
