MWCN Executive Roundtable - Governor Huntsman’s Healthcare Initiative
I attended an Executive Roundtable yesterday afternoon at the State Capital Building. The Mountain West Capital Network (MWCN) organized this event for MWCN members and Utah 100 Winners with ties to healthcare, consulting, biotech, biomed, and a few high-tech representatives.
Dr. Norman Thurston (an advisor on Healthcare to the Governor and the Legislature) led a dynamic discussion on the Governor’s healthcare initiative. Back in September, in one of my Inc 500 Conference summary posts, I stated: “The health care system in America (and our culture that is driving massive increases in cost) is screwed six ways from Sunday.”
After yesterday’s discussion, I stand by that claim 110%. Some interested tidbits from the presentation by Dr. Thurston:
- Since 2000, health insurance rates have doubled
- In 2006, rates increases at twice the rate of earnings and double the rate of inflation
- In 1960, consumers paid for 69% of health expenditures
- In 2005, consumers paid for 26% of expenditures (it’s shifted to insurance companies)
Basically, those 4 points are INSANE. We have a sense of entitlement in this country in that we think someone else is responsible for my health care costs, and ultimately, that makes all of us very irresponsible of our own health. There is no transparency or visibility for consumers. There are no incentive programs in the system to reward consumers for better personal health management. Healthcare professionals are not incentivized and compensated for quality. They actual make more money by giving you more quantity of healthcare.
In the question that I asked during the discussion yesterday, I said that I thought the Healthcare system in America is the most complex man-made system in the universe.
It sounds like some folks here in UT are going to try and get some laws passed to try to change these trends. And they’re not going to wait for the Federal Government to try to make changes. I’ve uploaded the PPT slides they used to present the case for and the plan to address Utah Health System Reform in Utah. They’re hoping to pass all these reforms in 2008. I think this will be hard, but I am glad someone is doing something. The way it’s going now, everyone form entrepreneurs and small businesses to consumers of healthcare to large corporations are heading quickly down a very disastrous road.
Posted by Jeremy at 3:44 PM
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Jeremy,
Thanks for joining us for this event. Like you, I think this is a vitally important issue. I’m pleased to live in a forward thinking state that will enable us to find ways to dramatically improve health care.
Devin Thorpe
President, MWCN
Looking to government to fix our health care problems is wrong. They are part of the problem, not the solution. If government got out and let the free market do its thing we would be a whole lot better off. The government historically messes up everything it tries to control and regulate.
Utah is doing exactly what you propose. Look at the slides I linked to. They’re not trying to have the state fix it, they’re trying to make it more transparent, more visible, and far more market driven. If they can do what they are proposing, my opinion is that it will be awesome. I’ve done enough entrepreneurship and see enough to know that what they’re proposing might very well be pretty slick.
[…] glad to see that Governor Huntsman is starting to make an effort to help with small business health care. For those of us with families, it is a huge issue to taking the step into the life of […]
I just moved to another job and I got the COBRA letter asking me if I needed coverage during the transition. Looks like I’ll be out one month without health coverage, since the bill is over 900 dollars for one month for my family (ouch!). This is what I’ve heard the corporations who offer benefits pay for heath costs per month and per employee. If this is the case, we definately need to see some transparency so individuals and small businesses can motivate themselves to change, vote, be more civic minded etc, and not be walking mats and further.