{"id":526310,"date":"2010-04-13T12:11:46","date_gmt":"2010-04-13T16:11:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.campaignforliberty.com\/blog.php?view=34576"},"modified":"2010-04-13T12:11:46","modified_gmt":"2010-04-13T16:11:46","slug":"judge-blocks-mass-insurers-from-instituting-double-digit-rate-hikes-for-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/526310","title":{"rendered":"Judge blocks Mass. insurers from instituting double-digit rate hikes, for now"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Matt Holdridge<\/p>\n

From the Boston Globe<\/a><\/em>:<\/p>\n

\n

A Suffolk Superior Court judge yesterday denied a request that would have let six Massachusetts health insurers go forward with double-digit rate hikes for tens of thousands of small businesses and individuals, setting up a protracted battle that could become a test of government’s role in controlling health care costs.<\/p>\n

Judge Stephen E. Neel’s decision against granting the preliminary injunction sought by insurance companies means the state’s rejection of 235 proposed rate increases stands for now. The higher rates would have taken effect April 1.<\/p>\n

The judge rejected the companies’ contention that the insurance market would be thrust into chaos if they could not quickly institute the higher rates. But the ruling is not the final chapter in the battle. Insurers are pursuing appeals within the Division of Insurance. If their appeals are turned down, the court would take up the case later this spring.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

This is likely a look at what is to come nationally – health insurance as a regulated monopoly, special commissions to monitor prices, and ultimately lower quality for consumers. <\/p>\n

Although, as we’ve pointed out numerous times, there hasn’t been a free market in health care for at least 50 years, and the recently passed bill only makes that situation worse. <\/p>\n

As Gennady Stolyarov II states in his article Why Public Utility Monopolies Fail<\/a><\/em>, <\/p>\n

\n

…because the government is a coercive monopoly, it is immune to competition, having barred all prospective competitors from the utility market via the threat of force. The government cannot know what the true cost of its service is,<\/em> since it did not allow the competitive process to discover it. Rather, whatever value the government designates to be the “cost” will be an arbitrary number.<\/p>\n

In a competitive market, private businessmen — driven by the profit motive — would have continually discovered better<\/em> ways to provide utility services. They would have figured out hitherto unknown ways to cut costs, increase productivity, and eliminate waste.<\/p>\n

The government, by restricting competition, prevents these discoveries from taking place and relegates all the consumers of public utilities to having to pay far more than they otherwise might have.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

We must continue to fight on. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Matt Holdridge From the Boston Globe: A Suffolk Superior Court judge yesterday denied a request that would have let six Massachusetts health insurers go forward with double-digit rate hikes for tens of thousands of small businesses and individuals, setting up a protracted battle that could become a test of government’s role in controlling health […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3999,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-526310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3999"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=526310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/526310\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=526310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=526310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=526310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}