How many uninsured?

July 23rd, 2008 | by Brian Schwartz |

It’s become a mantra that there are “47 million uninsured” Americans, a figure people use to back compulsory “universal” health insurance of some kind.   Google found about fifty pages with the phrase on the Denver Post website alone.  Democrat Jared Polis has mentioned 45 million, while Democrat Will Shafroth 50 million. Sure, 47 million sounds significant, until you look at the details behind the numbers.

The Investor’s Business Daily reports:

The median household income, according to the data released this week, is $48,200. You might be surprised to discover that 38% of all the uninsured — that’s almost 18 million people — have incomes higher than $50,000 a year. An astounding 20% of all uninsured have incomes over $75,000. These are people who can afford coverage.

Is it really a good idea to tax working people to subsidize those who refuse to pay for a necessity they could easily buy? The answer, of course, is no.

The Census Bureau reports that “Spells without health insurance, measured on a monthly basis, tend to be short in duration — about three-quarters (74.7 percent) were over within 1 year.”  The same study reports that 44% of spells without insurance lasted less than four months.

Further, HealthCareBS pulls some choice observations from the Jeff Goldsmith at the Health Affairs blog:

Almost the entire increase in people without health insurance from 2005 to 2006 took place in families with incomes above $50,000.Two-thirds of the 2005-2006 increase was actually in families with incomes above $75,000!

The number of uninsured people in families whose incomes were below $25,000 actually declined by about 4%.

Now consider this question by economist Arnold Kling:

Question: How many American families have proper health insurance?

a) over 90 percent.
b) between 80 and 90 percent.
c) between 10 and 80 percent.
d) less than 10 percent.

Given that about 15 percent of American families do not have health insurance, the correct answer would appear to be (b). However, in my opinion, the correct answer is (d).

To understand his position, read his article here.

Lacking insurance is nothing to trivialize.  But the number of insured is not the problem itself, but the symptom of the main problem, government meddling in insurance and health care markets.

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  • There are lots of ways that health care costs can be borne without insurance, though, as well. The biggest unspoken assumption in the health care policy debate, and one that I am more tired of than the others, is that access to health care and insurance are synonymous. They aren't, and unless that assumption is pointed out and busted away from the debate, whatever answer we are given will not work.
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