The White House Council of Economic Advisors today issued a new report entitled The Economic Case for Health Care Reform that covers some of the same ground as did the Center for American Progress report we have previously discussed on this site. Like our previous article and the CAP report, this new economic report argues that health care reform is vital for the future of the American economy. Release of this report comes on the same day that the President is visiting leaders on Capitol Hill to discuss the urgency of getting the job done this summer.
Christina Romer, Chair of the Council of Economic Advisors, led the press conference announcing the report this morning, and also penned an op-ed for Yahoo! News discussing it. In that op-ed she warns that, “the process of achieving comprehensive health care reform will not be easy. Controlling cost growth cannot just be a lofty goal, it must become a hard reality. To do this, we will need reforms that emphasize quality over quantity, patient involvement, and reward prevention and wellness.”
"Years of diagnosis on the ills of the U.S. health system have produced no cure. Health care expenditures in this country are currently 18 percent of GDP and, without change, will keep rising, until they account for nearly one-third of our total output by 2040. Even with this exorbitant bill, about 46 million Americans lack health insurance coverage today, and this number is predicted to rise to 72 million over the next three decades."
She goes on to discuss the impact that cost reductions produced by health care reform will have on families, writing, "For a typical family of four, income would be higher than it otherwise would have been by approximately $2,600 in 2020 (in 2009 dollars) and by nearly $10,000 in 2030." But she notes that the effects are even further reaching than that, explaining how health reform can impact GDP, the deficit, unemployment, standard of living, and the labor market.
The bottom line for both reports is that doing health care reform right is incredibly important. Doing more of the same or merely patching up the existing system will just throw good money after bad and prolong the current economic crisis. If, on the other hand, we can put in place true reforms that will slow cost growth significantly, expand coverage, and reduce waste on untested treatments and big corporate money grubbers, then the benefits to American families, firms, and government budgets would be enormous. To put it simply, good health care reform is good economic policy.
