Creating a Market by Abolishing It?
Leader Hoyer just suggested that Democrats want to create an open and transparent health care marketplace. Perhaps he should review Section 202(c) of H.R. 3962 (page 100 of the House-passed legislation), which notes that beginning in 2013 (when the exchange comes online in the House version) “individual health insurance…may only be offered” through the national, government-run exchange. How does prohibiting the purchase of private individual insurance—and forcing people into a government-run exchange—constitute the creation of an open marketplace, except in the most Orwellian vision of health care?