AUDIO

Online registration for this event is closed. Walk-in registrations will be accepted.

A casual observer of this year's health reform debate in Congress would hear a host of charges against the policies and practices of private health insurers. The oft-recycled list of alleged misdeeds includes excessive administrative costs, exorbitant profits, outrageous executive salaries, lack of competition in highly concentrated markets, inadequate protection against the risk of devastating financial losses, and widespread cancelation of policies covering costly enrollees. Various proposals for reform make it clear that critics of private insurance companies have concluded that the only appropriate remedies to keep this malfunctioning business sector in check are even more tightly centralized regulation and competition from a government-run public health plan.

What are the scope and scale of problems in private insurance markets? Are private insurers angels or demons? Or perhaps just lost souls in a complex maze of contradictory public policy and unrealistic expectations? At this event, AEI health policy scholars and eminent health policy researchers will examine the evidence to determine what is fact and what is fiction. They will discuss how private insurance should function, and outline key reforms that would target the most challenging problems in providing a more secure and affordable insurance protection against unexpected changes in one's health, income, and job status.