LaFerrara on NJ Health Care Reforms

The October 14, 2008 edition of the New Jersey Star-Ledger printed the following LTE by Mike LaFerrara supporting free market health care reforms in New Jersey:

Insurance freedom

A free market is a recognition of every individual's inalienable right to think and act on his own judgment, including entering freely into contractual agreements with others for his own well-being. It leaves him free from coercive interference by others, including government officials and politicians. Anything else is a violation of those rights. The health insurance crisis is directly attributable to the lack of a free market.

Assembly Bill 2767, the New Jersey Healthcare Choice Act, would be a huge step toward rectifying this injustice. The bill would open up New Jersey's insurance market to policies offered in any state. Individuals and health insurance companies from around the country would be free to contract voluntarily to mutual advantage. Unfortunately, a hearing on this bill is being blocked in committee, according to one of its sponsors, Assemblyman Jay Webber.

Insurance Committee Chairman Gary Schaer should end this blockage. If "government of the people" means anything, Trenton should end the rights-violating restraint-of-trade practice of forbidding state residents from buying out-of-state health insurance policies and enact this bill into law.

-- Michael A. LaFerrara, Flemington

This would be a good step in the right direction. Plus, state legislatures could easily implement this reform without permission from the federal government -- all they need is the political will.