Let Amazon sell health insurance with free shipping.

With all the fuss about a government designed website that imploded, I almost forgot the goal of the affordable care act is to reduce health care costs. It is not surprising to me that health care legislation was passed that few congressional representatives actually read, and the legislation was then followed with a $100 million website that few government officials bothered to test. Of course why should they care, congress has their own health care plan.

However despite the fuss, I do not need to read a Gallup poll to conclude that health care costs are increasing not declining. After all who is paying for the web site fiasco? It is not the insurance companies who are the beneficiaries of a forced medical insurance plan, but the taxpayers. Moreover, it does not take many trips to the post office to recognize that the website is a ticket to wealthy retirement for all the website development contractors involved. It is a permanent contract, financed by the tax payer, just like the post office, for the benefit of someone else. I would suggest insurance companies pay for the website, but then they would charge us too. Either way the taxpayer foots the cost. Let Amazon sell the insurance and shipping would be free.

Meanwhile, citizens take steps to reduce health care costs. My friends at dinner last night told me they had just has a oral surgery procedure done in Mexico. The cost was a fraction of the cost for the same procedure in the USA.  My dentist charges me $150 for teeth cleaning. And another $50 so he can look at my teeth for two minutes at the end of the cleaning visit. It is $30 in Mexico including a shot of tequila and a beer.

Another friend of mine flew to India for a successful spinal procedure. Regulations and economics have driven manufacturing jobs off shore. Perhaps health care treatment will go the same way.

This is not a trivial notion.