The reaction to the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson is one more demonstration of just how angry and unhappy many Americans are—and understandably so. Among all the explanations for Donald Trump’s reelection, none is more salient than the pent-up rage people experience in so many aspects of their lives. As ugly as it may be, we should acknowledge that the anger directed at health insurance companies and much of the healthcare industry is every bit as legitimate as that directed at inflation and illegal immigration.
Please don’t accuse this humble spirit of condoning the assassin’s behavior, or encouraging similar barbarous acts, but when so many people empathize with a cold-blooded killer and want to turn him into a folk hero, there’s no denying that something’s wrong. People relate to the killer’s expression of rage just as they relate to Trump’s quest for retribution. Clearly, voters understood Trump’s anger far more than Kamala’s pursuit of “joy.”
The anger at health insurance companies, along with every other player in the American healthcare system, is justified—big time. America pays more for healthcare than any country in the developed world but has the poorest outcomes to show for it. “Obamacare” is just a half-hearted compromise to prop up a completely broken, dysfunctional system. What we need is to expand Medicare to cover all Americans, not just the elderly—in other words, single-payer, national health insurance—but the legions of industry lobbyists and their Republican allies would immediately scream “socialism” and that would be the end of it.
Trump’s Only Response to the Healthcare Crisis is to Delay, Deny, and Defend—Again and Again and Again.
President-elect Trump claims to have a “concept of a plan” to replace Obamacare, but he and the Republicans have been saying as much since its inception. Trump’s endless promises to fix healthcare during his first term were on par with his embarrassing “infrastructure weeks.” The reason, of course, that Trump and the Republicans never present a healthcare plan of their own is because they’re buying time; the only plan they have is to allow the major industry players to continue ripping off the American public for as long as possible—their own version of delay, deny, defend.
Given the industry’s entrenched power, “fixing” the healthcare system will require an “existential” battle (that word has been overused of late, but here it’s appropriate). Right now insurance companies, healthcare providers, and pharmaceutical makers generate billions of dollars in revenue—much of it at patients’ unnecessary expense—and they’re not about to give it up without a fight. There’s no question that companies need to be fairly compensated for their (often lifesaving) products and services, including the incentive to innovate and develop new drugs, but under the current system patient outcomes are in direct conflict with a corporation’s fundamental goal—increasing shareholder wealth. Every failure to successfully delay, deny and defend means less profit, along with a reduction in the CEO’s stock options and bonuses. Talk about a lack of incentive to fight for the patient’s best interests!
Right Now Insurance Companies and the Rest of the Healthcare Industry have a License to Steal.
What continues to baffle, however, is why so many people who share Trump’s grievance against the status quo happily support his anti-middleclass, pro-top 1%, inequality-inducing policies. What makes them think that Elon Musk and all the other billionaires among Trump’s cabinet picks have their best interests at heart? Until we succeed in reducing our overarching, ever-growing economic inequality, we’re bound to be plagued by violent expressions of anger, whether they take the form of the January 6th Capitol insurrection or the gunning down of a CEO in midtown Manhattan. I continue to champion the preservation of civilized society and the rule of law it requires, but we need to remember that large companies and wealthy individuals, with the aid of their powerful political allies, often hide behind an unjust status quo that allows them to accomplish despicable acts—such as patients dying for lack of proper healthcare. It reminds me all too much of Martin Luther King’s observation that “a riot is the language of the unheard.”