The Declaration of Insurance Independence
1st July 2012
Healthcare’s hyperinflation has ignited the DIY Health Reformers to declare what amounts to a Declaration of Insurance Independence. While the reformers recognize insurance plays a vital role for managing high risk events (house fire, car accident, cancer), the fee-for-service model underlying insurance in day-to-day healthcare has created what translates into a 40% “insurance bureaucrat tax” that they want freedom from.
I’ve long said that the two major areas of human endeavor that haven’t been properly automated yet are health care and education. We appear to be on the verge of that happening; Khan Academy is certainly a step in the right direction. This article is about another encouraging step.
Unfortunately, ham-handed attempts to dip the current system in bureaucracy and freeze it in place, like Obamacare, may stifle this initiative in the cradle. But maybe not — entrepreneurs are more nimble than politicians, almost by definition, and they might be able to work around it. I hope.