Monopoly

I heard an audio clip late last week of Pelosi calling the insurance companies a monopoly—unfortunately, I haven’t been able to find any references to it anywhere, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.

In any case, to remedy the insurance companies’ monopoly on medical care, she wants to eliminate all of them and consolidate everything into a single-payer government system.

If a single-payer government system isn’t a monopoly then nothing is. Rather than replace the insurance companies with a single-payer government healthcare system, we should lower barriers to entry for new insurance companies, remove regulations that force insurance companies to provide plans that include coverage for esoteric procedures, allow insurance companies to compete across state lines, allow small businesses to buy insurance at group rates, etc.; any of these would be more effective in making healthcare more accessible and more affordable than Obamacare.