Sunday’s Oregonian had a front page interview with former Governor John Kitzhaber (audio included in link) regarding his vision for a new approach to health care in the state of Oregon and the nation. As a member of the small business community in Oregon, I was intrigued by what I read because Kitzhaber is proposing something that would radically change the way health insurance is administered in this state. From what I can gather, small businesses might finally get a break in this plan.

Kitz believes, and he’s right, that we’re at a breaking point in our health care system. State budgets are crippled by it, business are bogged down by it and millions of people don’t have access to it. Most states are forced to spend more on Medicaid than public education. Kitz says it’s time to put the band-aids away and get out of the band-aid box altogether.

Parts of Kitz’s plan are pretty straight forward:

[It] calls for giving Oregon control of all the public dollars spent on health care in the state. That includes federal Medicare and Medicaid money, state funding for the Oregon Health Plan, and taxes the state currently forgoes because employers are allowed to deduct what they spend on employee health insurance.

And don’t think that all of that money is just chump change. It’s a whopping 6.4 billion dollars. So how would that be reapplied in Kitz’s plan?

With those waivers, Oregon could set up a system that provides at least a basic range of coverage for all residents, such as prenatal care, treatment for high blood pressure, and care for other common but often costly ailments. The new plan wouldn’t limit those who choose to buy their own insurance.

If you know any small business owners out there, you’re quite aware that one of their number one complaints is the cost of providing health care coverage to their employees. Some small businesses have been forced to drop health care coverage altogether in order to keep going. In most cases employers have chosen to let employees decide whether or not they want to continue their coverage by paying for the increased costs themselves.

Although I don’t have any employees, since I contract much of my work out, I pal around with other business owners who do and all of my contractors have employees. After reading Kitzhaber’s interview I called some business owners I know and asked them what they thought of the plan. Of course, they’d like to understand better how it will work, but the overwhelming response was positive. One employer said, “Sign me up!” This particular employer shares the cost of health care with his employees who choose to have coverage: He pays half, which amounts to just over $200, and the employee pays the other $200 each month.

Every business owner I’ve spoken with would be more than happy to trade the tax write-off on health insurance costs for the decreased expense of it. It sounds pretty business friendly to those of us in business:

Businesses might relocate to Oregon because of a universal health care policy (see Toyota’s recent decision to locate a new plant in Canada rather than the US.)

Existing businesses would be able to be more competitive because the current burden of health insurance policies would be lifted.

Oregon businesses that are competing nationally for highly skilled workers would have an advantage because basic health insurance needs would already be covered by the state, which would free up business income for higher levels of benefit packages to those “nugget prospects” from places like MIT, Harvard, or Stanford.

There will no doubt be intense opposition to Kitz’s plan, but think of it this way: Instead of having the federal government tell the state of Oregon what it can and can’t do with its health care funds, let Oregon decide what it can do with those funds in respect to how the state deals with health care. Local control… one would expect conservatives would be cheering for such a change in policy, especially for those who own businesses in the state.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 9th, 2006 at 5:12 pm and is filed under Elections, Health Care. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.