Medicare offers the health care model that makes sense

From the perspective of someone running a small business, health insurance is a disaster. My small company pays almost $1,300 per month for a policy for my wife and me, and I don't dare go to the doctor.

The insurance company always seems to find a reason why what I need is not covered. The result is a large and unexpected bill. So I have health insurance, but no health care.

Minnesota has only three companies that provide the vast majority of health insurance. There is no real marketplace, and therefore I have no place to go for an alternative.

If you look at the other industrialized countries you will see that they cover everyone, spend half what we do per person, or less, and have better health outcomes.

Since I started studying the issue 15 years ago, I have been amazed at the lengths to which politicians will go to avoid solving the problem. Current Republican proposals to increase reliance on health savings accounts and to provide tax credits, for example, do nothing to extend coverage to everybody.

The health insurance companies, the drug companies and the medical products industry contribute millions of dollars to political campaigns. This is money that should be going to provide health care. When one side can attempt to sway the debate with money instead of sound reasoning, democracy is not working right.

Why has the health care problem not been solved? Two main reasons: The enormous amount of money involved, and the misinformation being spread by those who benefit from the status quo. There is substantial, credible information available about how to solve the health insurance mess in America. But by and large it doesn't get into the mainstream, so the public doesn't know about it.

Medicare has a 2 percent overhead, compared with the health insurance companies' 24 percent. As a fiscally conservative business person, I prefer to go with the low overhead method.

It is clear to me that the practical approach would be to simply extend Medicare to all. It is already there; it already works; it is far more efficient than the current health insurance companies. Yes, we'd all have to pay a little more into the Medicare fund, but right now my company pays $1,300 per month and I get nothing.

Another advantage to a Medicare-type approach is that the payments into the plan are based on your income. The amount my company pays for health insurance may have no relationship to my ability to pay.

I have noticed a distinction between the two camps in the health care debate. Those recommending a complete overhaul quote multiple studies, the experience of other nations and countless cases of the personal tragedies caused by our current system. The status quo advocates, on the other hand, are great defenders of the free market. They argue that it is best, but offer little evidence.

Large Minnesota corporations self-insure. They create their own funds and pay for their members' health care out of their own pool, and save a great deal of overhead costs. All an insurance company does is take in money from a large pool of people and then make payments to those who file claims. The insurance companies provide no health care.

Minnesota is large enough. We can create one pool of all Minnesotans, collect the money to fund the pool through the existing tax system and then hire a capable, qualified staff to administer and dispense the funds. A bill in the Legislature would do just that.

This is the fiscally conservative way to solve the health insurance problem. We can do this. We must do this. If we do not, the cost of health insurance will devour the state and national economy.

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John R. Kolstad, aka Papa John Kolstad, Minneapolis, is president of Mill City Music and a board member of the Metro Independent Business Alliance, though these comments represent his own views. He is also a candidate for mayor of Minneapolis.

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