Obama proposal limits rights of Americans to use their own money to save their own lives

It is basic economics that price controls force rationing. Under the President’s proposal, states and the federal government would be empowered to review and reject premiums charged by any health insurance plan, even the supposedly “grandfathered” plans that Americans now have. Yet the Administration has the temerity, even now, to state, “For Americans with insurance coverage who like what they have, they can keep it. Nothing in this act or anywhere in the bill forces anyone to change insurance they have, period.” It is as though a government, concerned about the high cost of restaurant food, imposed a price limit of $5 per meal, and then asserted that for those who like their restaurant food, nothing will force them to change their eating habits. The reality, of course, is that restaurants would be unable to afford to offer meals at prices below the cost of their ingredients. Consequently, about all restaurant-goers would be able to get would be fast food. Similarly, when every premium increase is subject to veto by government officials, it means that instead of Americans making their own choices balancing the cost against the benefit in evaluating competing insurance plans, that decision will be taken out of their hands by bureaucrats whose principal duty is to hold health care spending down. Denial of lifesaving diagnostic tests and treatment would surely follow. This is rationing, pure and simple.

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