Kaiser Health News, in conjunction with The Atlantic
Originally published on September 20, 2012
Republican vice
presidential nominee Paul Ryan says his proposal to overhaul Medicare would use
market competition to tame costs in the government health program relied on by
almost 50 million people.
As models, he often cites
the health program for federal employees – including members of Congress -- and
Medicare’s prescription drug program. "It works with federal employees, it
works with the prescription drug benefit, and more to the point, it saves Medicare,"
Ryan said on "Meet the Press" in April.
Both of those programs get
high marks from beneficiaries for the choices they offer. But their track
record on cost control is more complicated, raising questions about whether the
competitive model is in fact the silver bullet that backers have suggested.
The federal employee
health insurance program is often touted as holding down the increase in
premium prices more successfully than private workplace plans or government-run
programs. But a data analysis done for Kaiser Health News (KHN) and interviews
with experts shows it has not held down costs per enrollee as efficiently as
Medicare during the past decade.
Average spending in the
federal workers’ program grew at 7.1 percent annually per enrollee, higher than
the 5.8 percent growth rate for traditional Medicare – excluding the drug
program -- over the decade ending in 2010, according to data analyzed at KHN’s
request. The analysis, based on 10-year averages, was done by Walton
Francis, a consultant and principal author for 30 years of the Consumers’
Checkbook Guide to Health Plans for Federal Employees.
