Getting Health Care Reform Back on Track

There are many policy options Congress should consider, after repeal of PPACA, to begin moving the system in the right direction and put the country on the right path toward market-based health care change that gives people better choices and allows them to take account of the price and value of health care. For example, Congress should:

• Provide individual tax relief for all persons purchasing private health insurance, regardless of where they work;
• Eliminate barriers to individuals purchasing health care coverage that best suits their personal needs across state lines;
• Allow employers to convert their health care compensation from a defined benefit package to a defined contribution system;
• Promote new group purchasing arrangements based on individual membership organizations and various associations, including union, fraternal, ethnic, and religiously based groups;
• Improve consumer-directed health options (such as health savings accounts, health reimbursement arrangements, and flexible spending accounts) that encourage greater transparency and consumer control over health care decisions;
• Extend rational pre-existing condition protections in the non-group health insurance markets for those with continuous creditable coverage, thus rewarding responsible persons who buy and maintain coverage;
• Set up a fair competitive bidding process to determine government payment in traditional Medicare fee-for-service and Medicare Advantage programs;
• Review Medicare rules and regulations and eliminate those that unduly burden doctors and patients, such as the restriction preventing doctors and patients to contract privately for medical services outside of the traditional Medicare program;
• Encourage the states to set up mechanisms such as high-risk pools and risk transfer models that help lessen the problems of individuals who are difficult to insure;
• Expand states’ ability to develop consumer-based reforms that enable states to customize solutions for their citizens;
• Strengthen premium assistance in Medicaid to enable young families to obtain private health insurance coverage;
• Improve patient-centered health care models for those on Medicaid;
• Increase federal and state efforts to combat fraud and abuse in Medicaid, including tightening eligibility loopholes in Medicaid for long-term-care services;
• Encourage personal savings and the development of a robust private insurance market for long-term-care needs;
• Make the ban on taxpayer-funded abortion permanent and government-wide and extend a similar permanent policy to ensure protection of the right of conscience among medical providers and personnel; and
• Stop new tax increases and promote tax cuts that would expand private insurance coverage and grow the economy.