Dear Legislators,
We are pleased that 94% of Californians now have health coverage. We’d love to see that figure rise to 100%. Multi-payer universal coverage systems such as those that dominate continental Europe and towards which California is marching can work extremely well. But one big difference is that European systems do a better job of controlling costs and utilization. That’s one reason the US devotes so much more of its GDP to health spending without getting much better health in exchange, and also why some enterprises — including providers doing business with the state who make political donations — are so profitable.
As hopefully California marches on to universal coverage, lawmakers should import effective cost and utilization policies, improve consumer health more than provider profits, and impose limits on political donations from providers who do business with the state. Corporate and other providers collecting billions of dollars per year from the state should simply not be allowed to donate to the lawmakers who authorize those expenditures.
Govern For California supports lawmakers who serve the general interest.
