ESPN Columnist on Health Care Policy

If you’re not reading ESPN’s Tuesday Morning Quarterback column, you are really missing out. Gregg Easterbrook, a Brookings Institute scholar who just happens to be a huge fan of the NFL, writes the weekly entry. He regularly combines football insight and analysis with his views on matters of public policy. A couple of weeks ago, in the midst of making fun of teams for punting in the maroon zone and talking about why football coaches are overrated, he had a fantastic analysis of health care pricing. Here are a few quotes:

“Health care is only the single largest segment of the U.S. economy, so surely there is no risk in passing a 1,000-page health care bill no one understands!”

“My impression is that so much lobbying attention has focused on the handouts, giveaways and interest-group demands for a gigantic new civil-service bureaucracy that not enough attention has gone to a simple change that would remove much of the injustice from health insurance — standard rates with no denials for existing conditions.”

“The distinction between list prices and “adjusted” prices prevents health care services from functioning as a rational marketplace.”

“Gradually transitioning to a system in which most people carry catastrophic-cost medical insurance but pay the rest themselves could rationalize health care economics while restraining costs, because the wasteful paperwork aspect of the system would decline.”

“Stipulating that health care providers offer standard, published prices would lay the groundwork for an informed free market in health care delivery — and free markets control costs.”

To read the entirety of his thoughts on health care pricing, go here. Midway down the page, you’ll see a bold header entitled “Why Not Standard Pricing?” It is an excellent read and it makes a great case that some of the smallest, common sense changes could result in the biggest overall impact.