Many of President Trump’s MAGA and America First base — especially some of his most public supporters — hoped he would be pulling back on American interventionism in other countries. But as president, Trump has become a globalist, an interventionist — some might say a war monger.
And now he plans to become a nation-builder as well.
The 1950s was a simpler time in medicine. Mostly absent was the bureaucracy and overhead required nowadays when billing multiple insurance companies and government programs. Doctors mostly had one price, with perhaps a small discount for BlueCross. Most Americans paid their physician visits directly. This was about the time when Americans were beginning to acquire health coverage through work. Congress intentionally created an incentive for employers to offer coverage when it exempted employee health insurance from taxes. Health insurance was relatively cheap in 1955 because technology was primitive compared to now, and medical inflation was not yet a thing.
When the Affordable Care Act was debated in Congress, and even earlier as progressives geared up for the fight, public health advocates often repeated the phrase, “health coverage will not be affordable until everyone has coverage.” The idea was that forcing everyone to have similar coverage, while charging similar rates, would somehow make coverage affordable. Or at least it would make coverage affordable for those with pre-existing conditions, if not for those who were healthier. I recently ran across someone who is blaming the high cost of Obamacare on the repeal of the individual mandate. Absent was any discussion about poorly crafted plan design, a multiplicity of mandated benefits and costly regulations.