Forward Thinking Outside The Box #1 - Why the "Free Market" Will Not Solve the Problem of Escalating Health Care Costs...

Go to any news website or any cable news channel and there will undoubtedly be a story covering a town hall meeting featuring a very vocal opponent of a government run public option. The most frequent argument against the public option is that the government should step aside and let the "free market" reign unchecked, thereby creating the competition needed to solve the problem of escalating costs. What these opponents fail to recognize is that there is currently no true free market for private health insurance.

With the private health insurance market dominated by a small group of large insurance companies, it resembles more of an oligopoly than a free market. This elite group of health insurance giants need not and do not compete with one another. The status quo results in fewer choices in coverage, higher costs for the patient/consumer, and a scheme where the insured may be dropped at the discretion of insurance companies, often at times when coverage is needed the most.

Only through a public option, thereby creating a true competitor to the private health insurance oligopoly, will insurance companies be forced to compete by lowering prices and improving coverage. I doubt most opponents of the public option realize that it will take a page out of the Keynesian economics playbook to create the benefits of competition supposedly brought about with an unfettered free market.