DrRich submits that this assertion is vastly overblown. As we move ever closer to actually getting healthcare reform, one of the most remarkable things we have seen about this whole process is the decided absence of vociferous opposition by the health insurance industry.
For those of us old enough to remember it, the most prominent feature of the battle over healthcare reform in 1993-94 was the all-out (and ultimately successful) effort by the insurance industry to stop it. You couldn't go anywhere without seeing the TV and radio ads, billboards and mailers, all blasting us with painful details of the sufferings that would befall us all if the Hillarycare travesty was passed.
But in stark contrast to the Clintons' efforts at reform - and in stark contrast to the claims being advanced by current Democratic leadership - we hear next to nothing today from the insurance industry. And when we do hear something from them, it tends to be polite and mild mannered, almost contrite.
The fact is - as DrRich sees it, at least - the health insurance industry is not against healthcare reform at all. Indeed, they need it. Indeed, if healthcare reform should fall apart at this late date (by some twist of cruel fate, since nothing else can stop it given that the Democrats firmly control both houses of Congress and the Presidency), the insurance companies will be in deep trouble.
The traditional methods by which health insurance companies make their profits (i.e., acquiring non-profit community assets for a tiny fraction of their actual value, and engaging in mergers and acquisitions with one another) are no longer feasible, so these companies are now in the unenviable position of having to figure out how to make a profit by actually taking care of sick people. This is something they have never done, and never will do.
The health insurance companies have had 15 years of unfettered opportunity to figure out how to control the cost of healthcare, and they have failed utterly. They have enthusiastically employed every underhanded strategy of covert rationing they could imagine - cherrypicking patients, withholding needed services, retrospectively canceling policies of people who develop expensive illnesses, and doing everything short of dispatching teams of Ninjas into the night to slaughter some of their more costly subscribers in their sleep. They have shown no scruples, scoffed at the lamentations of those they have injured, and taken actions which would have caused your more standard villain to collapse into a blubbering mass of self-loathing. One can only admire their persistence. Yet, despite this monumental effort, their costs have skyrocketed, their profit margins have shrunken dangerously, and their ability to squeeze higher and higher insurance premiums out of their subscribers is rapidly running out the string. Their only remaining growth business is to administer government programs like Medicare Advantage, and even that may be going away soon.
DrRich does not know exactly what kind of "deal" the insurance industry has reached with the healthcare reformers, but is certain there is a deal. The insurance industry needs one of two things: either an arrangement where they can participate as transaction processors and administrators (which is something they actually know how to do) for a government-controlled healthcare system, or a graceful exit strategy. DrRich suspects they will get the former.
But the notion that the insurance companies are trying to stifle healthcare reform, a notion broadcast by political leaders every now and again (merely for effect, since, if the whole thing falls apart they're going to have to find someone to blame), is patently absurd. The insurance companies need healthcare reform even more than uninsured Americans do.
In fact, DrRich believes that the dire need of the insurance industry for reform is the one thing that virtually guarantees we'll get it.
(For a somewhat less jaded view of health insurance, see the offerings of About.com's Guide to Health Insurance.)
