Women’s Voices Illinois Blog

Five Ways to Improve Healthcare for Women

June 30th, 2008

Last year, the Independent Women’s Forum, a non-partisan think tank based in Washington, D.C., issued a call to action to elected officials to “help alleviate the unease in the current healthcare system and prevent a further increase in the number of Americans without health insurance.” Though some time has passed since the report was issued, both unease with health care costs and the number of uninsured (over 47 million Americans) have continued to increase. With health care being a top concern for many voters in the upcoming election, these proposed solutions remain relevant and deserve serious consideration.

The Independent Women’s Forum calls for the following 5 reforms:

• Reform the tax treatment of health insurance: Today’s tax code provides unlimited tax breaks for those who obtain coverage from the workplace but does not extend any comparable tax benefit to those who purchase coverage on their own. The way to solve this problem is through a refundable tax credit to individuals who purchase coverage on their own.

• Expand coverage options: Individuals should have the freedom to decide the state and regulatory structure under which they purchase their health coverage.

• Improve consumer-directed models: Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) and other affordable alternative health insurance products should be available.

• Allow for greater employee-employer flexibility: Employers would have the option of moving from a defined-benefit system, where the employer sponsors a health plan, to a defined-contribution system, where the employer chooses to contribute to a worker’s own health plan.

• Reform healthcare entitlement programs: There is no doubt that current entitlement programs threaten to bankrupt our country. Policymakers can start by beginning to transform these entitlements, in this case, Medicare and Medicaid, from defined-benefit to defined-contribution programs along the lines found in the employer based pension system.

You can view the entire report here .

My questions for all of you are: Do you agree with these reforms? Will they address the problems of healthcare cost and coverage? What other reforms would you suggest?

Posted by April Green

Entry Filed under: Health Care Reform