A Modern American Economy Does Not Have Universal Health Care

If you didn't read Froma Harrop's column from Wednesday's Sanford Herald, here are links for it.  Below the links is my letter to the editors of both The Sanford Herald and The Providence Journal, which the Herald borrowed the column from.   

A Modern Economy has Universal Health Care

http://www.creators.com/liberal/froma-harrop/a-modern-economy-has-universal-health-care.html

In response to Froma Harrop’s column entitled A Modern Economy Has Universal Health Care:  Perhaps a modern European economy has universal health care, but most Americans do not want to follow the European model for health care.  A modern American economy should have a free-market health care system that allows each person to buy their own health insurance from whatever company they chose, anywhere in the country, much like how we purchase car insurance.

For those who are unemployed or underemployed, instead of forcing people into exchanges, state governments should give those people a check and let them purchase their own insurance.  Let people make these decisions for themselves. 

Ms. Harrop’s final paragraph says, ‘Only government can force order into the jungle of profitable waste and crazy cross-subsidies.’  This is not true.  A free-market system with competition between providers would quickly drive down costs and drive up quality. 

She also says, ‘America can’t be modern without a system of universal coverage that promotes wise use of health care resources.’  It’s the ‘wise use of health care resources’ that bothers me.  I don’t want the government making the choices for me concerning ‘wise use of health care resources’.  I want to make those choices for myself.  I do agree with the last sentence of her column, though. She says, ‘Let’s stop fooling around and get on with it.’  So, let’s stop fooling around and get on with the return to a free-market model of health care in America.