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Redefining Government's Role In Health Care: Is A Dose Of Competition What The Doctor Should Order?, James F. Blumstein, Frank A. Sloan

Vanderbilt Law Review

Throughout the 1970s, the two major political parties espoused some form of national health insurance. Faced with a fiscal squeeze, however, the Carter Administration gave national health insurance a relatively low priority.The political movement for comprehensive national health insurance rests on an ideological commitment that the federal government should underwrite the cost of providing universal access to medical services. The objective is essentially redistributive in nature: equitable concerns for the disadvantaged loom as the major focus. The selective expansion of coverage to encompass those identified as needy and worthy, but only those so identified, is anathema to those who traditionally …