Did You Know This Shocking Way That We're Behind Much Of The World?

[Selatius]

35. I'm sorry, but as far as competition in health insurance goes, there is simply no competition.

As far as "...they are the agents we have set up..." I never was aware that they were set up and operated in the sense that we actually set them up, like paying for the establishment of a sewage and water treatment system. They are no more our agents than Microsoft is an agent for us to get better operating systems. The market for health insurance companies has been exempt from anti-trust laws since about the 1930s. This is an aspect of law that is the result of an aborted attempt at health insurance reform under FDR. The deal was that states regulate the market for health insurance in exchange for the government backing off the issue altogether, but states have largely reneged on that deal and in their entirety in some cases. The result is this:

http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/news/news/competition-health-insurers.page

If you want cheap health insurance rates, you might want to break up the cartel. That'll both bring down premiums and grant wider coverage to people who have trouble as it is affording insurance, the same ones who use the ER as a health care answer driving up costs. I don't know anyone serious in the legal and medical field who honestly thinks letting states regulate the health insurance market as they currently do, is an adequate solution to the problem. It hasn't been. We wouldn't be having this discussion if it were so.