Scott Armstrong’s article “Health-care Reform, Washington Style” (June 26) describes Medicare Advantage, an interesting program that bridges private non-profit goals and government objectives to aid seniors. Public-private partnerships like Medicare Advantage are few and far between.
We should heed Armstrong’s advice. Redirecting money from Medicare Advantage into the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) is a bad investment. All of SCHIP’s taxpayer funding should have increased the number of children with health insurance. Instead, the percentage of children with health insurance in Washington has actually decreased almost 2 percent since SCHIP was enacted in 1997.
Dane G. Wendell ([email protected]) is a legislative specialist for The Heartland Institute. He is author of Heartland’s forthcoming “State Welfare Report Card,” which describes welfare reform successes and failures in the 50 states.
