The Democrats Are Coming!
6 CommentsBy Ed Silverman // January 3rd, 2008 // 4:56 pm
“I don’t believe you can sit at a table and negotiate with drug companies, insurance companies, oil companies and hope that they will voluntarily give their power away,” John Edwards told an Iowa crowd, The Chicago Tribune reports. “We will get their power out of their hands when we take their power away from them.”
“I’ve taken on the drug companies,” Hillary Clinton said the other day, according to The New York Times. “I’ve taken on the health insurance companies; I’ve taken on the oil companies, and I intend to keep doing it.”
Jack2
Personally, I will vote democrat because my opinions on the war and environment trump these other issues, but…
Is it the oil company’s fault that the global supply of oil is dwindling, and thus the diminishing existing reserves of oil increase in value? If you want to solve this problem tax gasoline*, a simple government solution.
Drug companies and insurance companies make easy targets to explain the increase in health care costs, because, for most people, they’re faceless corporations. It’s easier to blame the increase in healthcare spending on them than, say, your highly paid doctor, pharmacist (of which I’m one), or nurse. Plus, drug companies and insurance companies kinda sorta directly oppose one another, although Hilary never mentions that. Plus, government kinda sorta doesn’t want to stop the increase in healthcare growth, since it’s about the only component of the government (along with government) that’s growing.
Finally, I don’t think Americans would mind paying more for healthcare if they were getting more - but they’re not. I won’t completely exonerate the pharmaceutical industry from this problem, and I know others on this board will point out its flaws. Let me make one pro-pharma point though. The life expectancy of the western world has increased dramatically in the past 20, 50, and 100 years. After the rapid proliferation in sewage treatment, the pharm industry deserves the most credit for that increase. Americans can be rightfully angry in that they subsidized most of these advances in drug technology (in the form of higher prices) for the rest of the world (I’m looking at you, Europe and especially Canada).
*I hate to digress like this on a pharmaceutical industry blog but I feel very strongly in a gasoline tax - and a substantial one. Like 25 cents per year for the next four years with additional increases strongly considered after that. Why?
1. All other efforts to regulate consumer gas consumption could be solved in this simple stroke. You wouldn’t need to place mandatory mileage requirements on an already reeling automobile industry. You wouldn’t need to mandate wind/hydro/nuclear power - or make people choose to pay a little bit more for green electricity when they get the bill. Consumers would rationally decide to use less gasoline.
2. The current cost of gas represents the cost of drilling the gas, loading it on a tanker, refining it, and getting it to a gas station. It doesn’t consider the environmental damage society bears for every gallon consumed (increased CO2 emissions, increased risk of an oil spill). A tax would nicely account for these costs to society by placing the burden on the user (who burns the gas), instead of society who just happens to live in the same country as the user who buys the gas.
Again, I apologize for the digression.
Myrt
So instead we should give the power to who, exactly? Edwards or Clinton? Or their unelected bureaucrats?
There’s something very wrong when there’s no objection to the vast amounts of disposable income spent on entertainment but most expect health care to be a free good. What better place to spend your own money than on improved health, right after shelter and food.
The Democrats Are Coming! : Health Insurance Chicago
[...] Original post by Ed Silverman [...]
Outside the Box
So long as we continue to see stories about abuse of promotion, misuse of trial data, “bribing” of FDA experts and so on, the pharmaceutical industry will be a soft target.
So long as politicians continue to see the 11-12% of health costs represented by drugs as a bigger issue than the “administration” and profit made by the insurance industry (which combined represent more than the entire drug costs and add no value to the system - unlike pharma R&D), the pharma industry will be a soft target.
So long as insurance companies can increase drug co-pays without reference to the true cost of the drug - and implicitly lay the blame on rising drug prices, the pharma industry will be a soft target.
So long as the main message heard by consumers from the pharma industry is the endless stream of DTC pushing “expensive” drugs, the pharma industry will be a soft target.
This industry has gone from the top of the tree to the bottom in less than 10 years and almost every company in the top 20 has had at least one example of questionable activities during that period. To use a sporting metaphor, in recent possessions we have fumbled, been intercepted, missed field goals and are down by 5 touch-downs and it is late in the 4th. We need to stop complaining about bad calls and stop the turnovers or this industry is going to remain a very soft target.
DC
I find it interesting with both of them ‘taking on the pharma, oil and health insurance’, the one that is missing is tort reform…..Oh, wait..they are lawyers (especially Edwards).
Dan
Are there any people that are actually unhappy that there are more available treatment options today (than ever before in the history of the world) for most ailments that plaque mankind?
The pharmaceutical companies brought those forward. Should we stifle progress by incentivizing these companies to slow the RD so better treatments are not created by taking away their so-called, “power.”
Democrats pick on drug companies — because it’s popular and it gathers votes from people that are paying high prices for medicines they need. Most people need excess medicine due to illnessed they helped bring on, i.e. Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and so forth through poor life choices.
I wonder what Democrats take when they are sick? I am guessing some type of medicine that was created by a pharmaceutical company not the government? What do doctors study at Medical school to become doctors? Medicine. If I am ever diagnosed with a serious disease in the future, I pray that there is a company out there seriously putting some money into a cure today! We allow our tax money to go overseas to help third world countries build roads, why can’t we see the need to pay for necessary R&D today for the medicine we will need when we are older. As we live longer we will need more medicine, not less.
Humans have wanted more medicine going back to medieval times. There have always been shamans and witch doctors/healers looking for cures to common ailments. Today we have scientists that actually no what they are doing. Unfortunately they have families they must feed as well. We pay their salaries for the better lives they ultimately provide us. When Democrats agree to never ingest medicine again, they can begin talking negatively about drug companies.
Good Day…..