On 10 September I discussed that there were eight significant contributing factors that are escalating costs in U.S. health care, but are not addressed in HR-3200.  The first contributing factor is the aging Baby Boomers who have begun to place greater demands on the U.S. health care system. For those readers unfamiliar with the definition of a Baby Boomer, it is those citizens in the U.S. born in the 1940’s and 1950’s. They are your relatives, friends and neighbors in the ages of 45 to 65.  Graphically they represent a bulge in the population with both the previous and following generations being considerably smaller in population size. This is by no means a surprise since as nation our political leadership has been aware of this demographic condition since the 1950’s and 1960’s, but they did little except to kick the can down the road and let someone else deal with the problem.

As Baby Boomers age, they require greater levels of health care services when compared to their parents simply due to the sheer volume of numbers. Overall expenditures for health care as a part of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) will increase as this large generation of citizens ages. Further compounding impact of the aging Baby Boomers is the secondary demographic reality that Americans are living much longer than they did 100 or even 50 years ago, further expanding the numbers of older Americans requiring higher levels of health care.  In 2010 we will see 49% of America’s population at an age of 40 or older.  Although the aging of America’s population is not the single issue driving U.S. health care costs, it is a significant contributing fact.  Market theory states that as demand for a service or commodity increases, the price will increase if more of the commodity or service cannot be provided.  In the case of health care, the Baby Boomer bulge will act as a market driver for higher costs since the following generation is smaller with fewer people, resulting in a reduced pool of workers to provide health care services unless higher compensation in that field draws them to pursue it as a career, or other external factors are introduced.

Certainly the solutions to these realities are not found in rationing or denying health care services to our older citizens. Political discussions in Washington D.C. to nationalize 1/6^th of our economy by government seizure and control of the health care system are also unacceptable.  Compromise proposals by some that would simply result in a slower rate of nationalizing the health care system are an affront to my belief in the Constitution, State Sovereignty, and to the Freedom and Liberty of individual Americans. How do we address this demographic reality without destroying our Republic?

Solutions can be found in restoring the ability of States and individual citizens to set their own course in life and in being accountable for themselves.  Since the current problem is often described as an ever increasing percentage of the nations GDP being spent on health care, we must look at both the Numerator (GDP) and Denominator (Health Care Cost) in the equation.  Follow on papers in this series will address controlling health care costs (Denominator) without resorting to direct or indirect (slowed) nationalization of health care.  Some ideas we can execute today to address the GDP portion of the equation are:

• Remove the off sets on Social Security income for seniors who desire and are able to work – many able to do so would reenter the market part time or even full time if these offsets were not present
• Encourage and train seniors who desire and are able to work in the health care field to take part time or full time positions – this will increase the health care work pool and mitigate at some level a smaller next generation work pool
• Review and revise hospital, clinic, outpatient, and pharmaceutical delivery to optimize services in a manner that recognizes the aging of America – engage seniors in this effort to identify and streamline services with associated cost control

Bill Parson