In a recent post, after wondering why some Democrats were opposing a very popular government supported “public option” as part of health care reform, I speculated that they may be in he pocket of the insurance industry.
Paul Krugman wondered the same thing and proposed an explanation:
I may have a new hypothesis about the political economy of the health care fight. One thing that’s obvious, if you look at the balking Democrats I chided in today’s column, is that almost all of them come from states with small population. These are also, by and large, states in which one or at most two private insurers dominate the market.
So here’s a suggestion: while the opponents of a private plan say that they’re trying to defend market competition, what they’re actually doing is defending lucrative local monopolies.
Sounds about right to me.
Tags: corruption, health care monopolies
