Calling Solomon

After all the town hall meetings, after all the shouting, after being talked to death for what seems like eons now, there's still no idea of what a final health care "reform" package will look like - or if one will even pass. And frankly, the acrimonious debate has dragged on so long that we're growing increasingly weary of it.

Nevertheless, what we have seen recently is growing evidence that something must be done, that the current path is unsustainable.

Last week, a survey of 60 health insurers was released that predicted that costs for employer-provided health plans would rise 10.5 percent in the next 12 months, even as inflation is held to near zero percent. Prescription drug costs are expected to rise 9.3 percent.

That means that workers, many already hit by a wage freeze or a cut in benefits, will take another blow to the pocketbook - or they'll cut their insurance coverage.

In Arkansas, family health care premiums rose an estimated 5.8 times faster than workers' earnings from 2000 through 2009, according to a recent report by the consumer health organization Families USA.

In that 10-year period, family health insurance premiums rose by 87.7 percent, while median earnings rose by only 15.2 percent, the report said.

That affects both businesses and individuals. Ron Pollack, executive director of Families USA, said, "It will mean that businesses have a harder time staying competitive, and more and more families have to cope with stagnant wages and the loss of affordable health coverage."

Employers face tough decisions. Do they absorb the increase themselves to keep their employees happy, or do they ask their workers to pay more? How much more can either bear?

According to a survey by the Arkansas Compensation Association, Arkansas businesses are increasingly passing the costs of benefits on to employees.

And any new measure passed by Congress and signed by President Barack Obama won't do a thing to help in the next year or so. Depending on what eventually is approved, it may never help control costs.

In a related story last week, the Obama administration, in the economic forecast by the Office of Management & Budget, said costs associated with health care are at the center of the government's financial woes.

Here's what it said:

"The Federal Government's long-term fiscal shortfall is driven primarily by escalating health care costs. If health care costs continue to grow at their historical rates, Medicare and Medicaid will double as a share of spending on Federal programs within the next 30 years. These growth rates are simply unsustainable and are why slowing the growth in health care costs is the single most important step we can take to put the Nation on firm fiscal footing. For example, slowing the rate of health care cost growth by 0.15 percentage points per year would produce the same amount of savings for the Federal budget as closing the 75-year Social Security shortfall."

The administration forecast this year's federal deficit to run $1.8 trillion, nearly four times last year's record deficit. Even worse, the OMB is predicting a 10-year federal deficit of an astronomical $9 trillion. By the end of the next decade the national debt will equal three-quarters of the entire U.S. economy, it said.

Throughout the health care debate, the president has said he wants a bill that doesn't add to the deficit. Good idea, but how do lawmakers accomplish that?

What is really needed is a way to cut health care costs while maintaining the quality of care. But even that won't bring about the sought-after universal coverage. And little that we've seen will cut the costs. They - and we - need the wisdom of Solomon to resolve this divisive dilemma.