10 Ways Government Stifles Competition

Perhaps the worst example of government stifling competition is President Obama’s “Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care” plan. Supposedly, insurers would still compete, but under Obamacare, the new federal health board (15 government bureaucrats) will decide which medical treatments are acceptable, rather than doctors or even insurers. Already, Insured individuals are seeing their existing policies cancelled and replaced with offers of new policies that conform to the new standards set federally. These new policies mandate coverage for all that is needed by only a few, resulting in greatly increased cost to the consumer, and reducing the variety of available plans. As insurers scramble to meet the requirements set by bureaucrats, they are ignoring the actual needs of people, and their policies are becoming more homogenous. With drastically reduced variety among insurers, real competition is lacking, and the end result will be stagnation, lack of innovation, and dramatically poorer service.
Competition spurs innovation, and innovation improves everyone’s living standard. Perception of societal problems as arising from competition and requiring government intervention is the motivation for most new laws, programs, and agencies. But not only is the cure worse than the disease, there may have been no disease in the first place! We need more innovation and fewer of the slow, rigid, unresponsive, rule-driven bureaucracies that arise from government programs.