Lawson for Congress

It’s time to return control of healthcare to patients and providers, and empower patients to drive improvements in healthcare quality and price. My plan for healthcare builds on health savings accounts (HSAs), more affordable health insurance, and improved pricing transparency. All of these factors are important in giving patients greater leverage, and improving the cost and quality of care delivered on a day-to-day basis.

I believe that the government can play a role in making healthcare accessible and affordable for all, but I do not support a government-controlled healthcare system. We should strive for a healthcare system that provides universal access, and is controlled by patients and individual providers.

Today’s healthcare is distorted by what I call “corporate care” – it's controlled by special interests, particularly insurers, large provider bureaucracies, and the federal government. The current system artificially inflates usage and prices, and takes control away from the patient working with his or her preferred provider.

Economically sustainable healthcare requires reducing costs and usage while improving quality. The "inconvenient truth" is that we simply cannot afford a system that promises unlimited care for a small co-pay. If we adopt routine healthcare as a managed household expense, similar to your car or home, costs and usage will drop. Patients can then choose affordable insurance policies that meet their needs, including hospital stays, expensive outpatient treatments, and preventive care.

From an insurance perspective, we could afford a universal tax credit of roughly $5,000 per family to purchase health insurance simply by ending our current government subsidy to employer-purchased healthcare. Excess premiums could be paid from tax-exempt HSAs. Ideally, long term care and holistic therapies will also be tax deductible.

In the long run, employers could contribute to employee health savings account (rather than administering a separate plan). In this model, healthcare would be less distorted by insurers and no longer tied to conditions of employment. In addition, tax benefits that are currently enjoyed only by employees with healthcare coverage would be available to everyone.

Another advantage is that when people control their own insurance, they wouldn’t have to worry about pre-existing conditions when they change employers. Finally, I will pursue legislation that will open up a national market for healthcare insurance, instead of the current system that limits consumers to only insurers operating in their state.

Putting the patient in charge of routine healthcare expenditures will encourage convenience centers which offer drop-in services, often on a 24/7 basis for simple ailments that can be easily treated by a nurse practitioner or physician assistant without an appointment. These services would dramatically lower the cost for many common ailments and be easily paid for out of a funded HSA.

In the long term, I’d like to see Medicare operate under a similar model using HSAs and government funding for insurance. Oh yes – and I’d expect members of Congress and others in Washington to enjoy the same healthcare market that I provides for all of our citizens.

As your congressman, I will seek an active and visible role on Congressional task forces and committees dealing with healthcare so that I can aggressively promote these ideas and turn them into  law.