Health-care reform key to US economy, Times op-ed
The US health-care system is hobbling the US economy, writes Jacob Hacker, a professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley in a Sept. 9 op-ed in the Seattle Times.
When people feel they cannot leave dead-end jobs because they risk losing health insurance, when they fail to invest in education or skills for fear of falling through America’s increasingly tattered safety net, they are giving up opportunities that would be good for them and their families—and for the American economy,” Hacker writes.
Hacker favors reform proposals put forth by Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, who would “provide generous subsidies and regulate insurers to prevent exorbitant rates” to increase coverage and contain costs.
Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s plan, Hacker writes, “would undermine state regulation by allowing insurers to operate across state lines, so they could set up shop in states with fewest consumer protections.”
McCain’s plan, Hacker argues, “is certain to cover many fewer people than Obama’s.”
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