Giving Moderation a Bad Name

Liberal Democrats have an answer to the problem of rising health costs. They want government gradually to take over the health insurance market, and then use its monopsony power to force prices down.

Conservative Republicans have answers too. We want to intensify competition by putting individuals not employers in charge of health decision-making and allowing health policies to be sold across state lines.

The so-called moderate Baucus plan announced yesterday offers no such answers. It imposes an individual mandate, extends federal subsidies, and imposes a tax on employers to generate some expansion of coverage. But as to cost control, it proposes virtually nothing.

Baucus takes pride in his plan's deficit neutrality: It raises revenues in tandem with its higher costs. While minimizing costs to the Treasury is a valid concern, there ought to be at least equal attention to the costs to the economy - to employers and to workers. This issue, of so vital concern to both liberals and conservatives, was entirely dropped by the Baucus moderates.