I am a candidate in the May 15 Nebraska Republican Primary for the U.S. Senate because the incumbent, Deb Fischer, is ignoring our enormous and out-of-control national debt. Of course, there are many other important issues addressed by Congress and my last two posts, here, and here, discuss the need for more gun control to reduce the number of mass shootings in the U.S.
Now it’s back to (fiscal) basics.
The Kaiser Foundation has discovered that by far the top issue of concern for voters this year is the high cost of healthcare. Here are some of the many reasons why this should be a very top priority for deliberation in Congress:
- The cost of healthcare is the fundamental driver of our debt problem.
- Three major corporations: Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway, and JPMorgan Chase are banding together to lower healthcare costs for their own employees. All companies have similar concerns.
- A major reason for the high cost of American healthcare is the employer mandate of the ACA which requires companies with 50 or more employees to provide health insurance for all employees.
- Huge savings for employees, employers and government could be had by modifying the employer mandate to give employees the option to migrate to personal healthcare insurance, see here and here.
Conclusion. “The federal government’s most urgent domestic challenge is the exploding debt and deficit.” Getting healthcare costs under control is the key to solving our debt problem and reducing a major expense for millions of American families.
It Does Not Add Up 
It seems, correct me otherwise, that our nation’s political, social and economic sectors are increasingly preoccupied by our nation’s AUTONOMY within the world-wide, market-place arenas for its . Resources . and to the exclusion of the world-wide, market-place arena for its . Knowledge . and . Human Dignity. All of sudden, we suddenly realize that our ability to protect knowledge and its use is open to anyone, world-wide, for any purpose unrelated to it owner, origins or purpose. In association with the daily world-wide information overload, we lack the social, political and economic networks to collaborate for solving the complex problems underlying our nation’s true AUTONOMY for…… 2050.
By 2050, there will be another 2 Billion human inhabitants world-wide, and our nation’s citizens with predominantly white, anglo saxon heritage will have become a MINORITY. In the meantime, increasing health spending by 2030 will have run our nation into international bankruptcy. Assuming that the portion of our national economy allocated to health spending has a “sweat spot” of about 11-13%, it would be wise to consider its current level of 18% as a common-pool resource (CPR). The Design Principles for Managing a Common Pool Resource have been defined and vetted. They were initially defined by Nobel Prize (2009) honoree, Elinor Ostrom. This does not require a new institution for the payer process. It does require a comprehensive risk-management policy among all the responsible payers: government (at all levels), health insurance (at all levels), Healthcare providers (at all levels), and citizens (at all levels of disposable income). Simultaneously, a local commitment must be supported to enhance the Common Good within each citizen’s community. Our pockets of entrenched poverty and their social mobility deficits must be mitigated through locally instigated investments in Social Capital (see below).
The Cooperative Extension Service offered county by county for agriculture (enacted by Congress in “” 1914 “”) would be a good model. Please be reminded that our nation’s agriculture industry is the most efficient and effective among the world-wide nations, AND our nation’s healthcare industry is the least efficient and, for certain citizen-groups, the least effective among the world-wide nations.
SOCIAL CAPITAL may be defined as
.the attributes of Trust, Cooperation and Reciprocity,
.as expressed during a community’s Social Discourse,
.that it’s citizens apply more commonly for resolving the Social Dilemmas
.they encounter while participating in their community’s Civil Life
.WHEN generational Caring Relationships are prevalent
.within and between the Human Ecologic networks of the community’s citizens,
.especially the neighborhood network of each citizen’s FAMILY.
I don’t disagree with you but how do we get from here to there?
You say you are going to reduce the cost of healthcare, but also states that you will seek more gun control to stop mass shootings.
Health care is in shambles Obama care needs to be thrown out, and bring in free market. I don’t need government to tell me I have to have health care and pay for everybody else’s care. That’s why we need free market.
Now onto gun control. If you think more gun control is going to prevent mass shootings think again. Guns are not the problem people are. So don’t infringe on my right to bear arms in any way, and come up with common sense legislation to fix the issue. More gun control is not common sense.
I support universal health care (for all) but I agree with you that we need to provide this with a free market system, including subsidies for people with low income. My specific proposals are to move in this direction.
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