>>Valley Patriot>> |
The idea of imposing retroactive taxes sounds like something King George would have come up with. In 1776, we had an appropriate response to his eccentricities. Retroactive taxes are abhorrent and shameful. I wouldn’t blame any business for quitting this state in response. The anti-business climate here is getting stronger by the minute. Massachusetts firms lose business to Canada and other nearby states because the costs of operating in this state are out of sight. When are legislators going to learn Economics 101? And this nurse “pork barrel” thing passed by the House – mandating nurse staffing levels in hospitals – Legislators don’t seem to care what special interests they pander to at the public’s expense. Aren’t health costs high enough yet? Cities and towns around the state are screaming that health care costs are disproportionately absorbing funds sorely needed for education and municipal services. A recent study released by eHealthInsurance.com places Massachusetts as second highest in medical insurance costs in the country, next to New York. Both small and large businesses have to curtail giving raises to their employees as health costs escalate at four or five times the rate of inflation. With continued state interference and more mandated coverage, we should be hitting first place soon. Then won’t we be proud! The teachers unions say, “It’s for the children,” the nurses’ unions say, “It’s for the patients.” Those who know anything about politics and economics say, baloney! Special interests are who it’s for! They are the prime beneficiaries. The attitude on Beacon Hill seems to be, “Hospitals just don’t give a hoot about their patients.” Well, if that’s the case, what makes legislators think adding more nurses will cure that problem? How about focusing on measures to make hospitals more competitive, instead of trying to micromanage their operations? When will our representatives and senators learn that you can’t legislate productivity or efficiency? Just mandating more bodies won’t do anything other than create a larger demand for nurses. And, of course, that’s just dandy for the unions. The more demand, the higher the cost, and you can bet that less capable and less qualified nurses will be among those caring for patients, just the opposite of the intended result. My son-in-law’s mother, desperately ill in the hospital, was given a medication that her chart specifically said not be given to her. “Oops, sorry!” they said. This is not evidence of understaffing; this is evidence of incompetence. If incompetence prevails with the nurse staffing you have now, just wait and see what you get when you scrape the bottom of the barrel by staffing at inflated, mandated levels. Look what happened in California schools when they mandated smaller class sizes 12 years ago. (“For the children,” of course.) They generated a statewide shortage of teachers, which they still haven’t recovered from. They sent thousands of unqualified teachers into the classrooms across the state. That disaster is fully documented and acknowledged. The answer is not to legislate so-called “improvements” in a field that legislators are totally unqualified to deal with. The answer is to create a climate that will encourage hospitals to be more competitive cost-wise and performance-wise. Unfortunately, legislators’ abysmal knowledge of economics – frightening to contemplate – will hinder any progress toward sound measures to effectively deliver the goals they preach. In spite of legislative boondogglery, efforts to pay hospitals and physicians for medical services, based on their performance, are slowly moving forward, as the concept of linking reimbursement to quality and efficiency gains recognition. The kind of hospital services we seek can be achieved by going this route, rather than trying to legislate the way hospitals run their operations. That is, if the unions don’t interfere. As with teachers unions, on-the-job performance measurement of their members is something they resist. Dartmouth Medical School, for one, aims to provide a model that hospitals can use to offer patient satisfaction, even if the results show sub-par performance or negative trends. Any consumer will be able to use their website’s comparative data on national averages and outcomes at the top 10 percent of hospitals to ask how their own providers stack up on performance ranging from cancer treatment to pregnancy and pediatric care. There is a national reluctance on the part of hospitals to publicly report any statistics that might make them look bad or increase their liability risk. But efforts to facilitate (not force) by providing incentives, will do far more to improve medical services, than harebrained schemes to mandate nurse staffing requirements, not to mention the horrendous cost that will be inflicted upon a now over-bloated medical payment system. It is amazing that the basic principles of free choice, entrepreneurship and economic competition that have made this country great - and a standout from the pack - seem to be lost on current day legislators. Ralph Wilbur is the owner of Graphic Litho in Lawrence and is Director and Vice President of Valley Patriot, Inc. You can email him at sales@graphiclitho.com *Send your questions
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If House Bill 4163, “An Act to
Update and Improve Certain Tax Provisions,” passes
with its retroactive capital gains tax increases and
containing the expansion of the deeds excise tax, then
Massachusetts should permanently be renamed
Taxachusetts.