Something McCain is Doing Right: His Health Care Plan

I am desperate. I am looking for any reason to cast a vote for John McCain this November, and coming up with maddeningly little. However, his health care plan does look like it has some merit:

McCain would move us away from a system of employer-based health insurance. He plans to provide all Americans with a $2,500 refundable tax credit for individuals and a $5,000 credit for families, regardless of how people obtain their insurance.

Most notably, McCain would allow people to purchase health insurance across state lines, a practice now prohibited, says Tanner. Health insurance is largely regulated at the state level, and the different regulations and mandates in each mean prices vary widely from state to state:

• For example, New Jersey imposes more than 40 mandated benefits; as a result, the cost of a standard health insurance policy for a healthy 25-year-old man in New Jersey costs an astonishing $5,580.
• However, a similar policy in Kentucky, which has far fewer mandates, would cost him only $960 per year.

McCain would also allow people to purchase insurance through nontraditional groups, such as churches and professional organizations.

Finally, McCain wants to change not only who pays for health care, but how they pay for it. McCain challenges the concept of traditional “fee for service” medicine and he rightly calls for greater transparency of health care costs and prices, says Tanner.

First off, I have to wonder why they just couldn’t lower our taxes rather than offer tax credits. But really, this is a far better plan than Barack’s socialist takeover of the nation’s health care system.