By Taylor Paraboschi

In the midst of the excitement of the third and final presidential debate held at the University on Wednesday, law professors Efthimios Parasidis and Joel Weintraub held a panel discussion in the Sidney R. Siben and Walter Siben Moot Courtroom to discuss the United States current health care policy, and the challenges the next president will have to face. Both professors talked about how costly health care coverage has become for U.S. citizens, citing that not only is spending the most costly in the world, at $6,697 per capita, but that the United States is also one of the few countries in the world to not grant universal health care coverage. Parasidis goes on to add that the health care coverage fails to achieve adequate outcomes, leaving 45.7 million (8 million of whom are children) people uninsured.

In the panel discussion, Parasidis and Weintraub laid out an outline of each candidates health care policy, and discussed the benefits and downfalls of each. Senator McCain’s policy consists of focusing on tax credits, giving $2500 to individuals, and $5000 to families, in order to allow them to purchase/keep their health care. In contrast, Senator Obama’s plan strives to increase competition by creating a National Health Insurance Exchange program. His plan will also require that all children receive health care insurance, and parents/guardians will be fined if a child does not receive it.

While both Senator Obama’s and Senator McCain’s policies have their strengths and weakness, there is much debate as to how well the new policies will be received by the population in general. Not only has the current health care system been in place since World War II (60+ years), but the people who are covered by it are generally happy with what they have. 90 percent of current health care coverage is supported by employers and most people feel that their employers are far more equipped to pick a smarter, more generous health care coverage. According to Parasidis, employer health care coverage is like an added bonus to a person’s paycheck. “They are putting money that one would receive in a paycheck to good use in the form of free health care.”

With the amount of control that employers have on a persons health care, there is much debate as to the downfalls of this. Not only are people less likely to leave their jobs because of the free coverage, but if someone looses their employment, let loose their free health care. Parasidis adds that people with the “highest income are going to receive the greatest benefits.”

Weintraub goes on to say that while people in general have “a desire for a change”, many people are wary of the effectiveness of specific changes. He adds that “proposals for rapid change risks endangering greater resistance,” and that policies need to be introduced slowly.

When the topic of socialized medicine was brought up, Parasidis commented that even though there was “no desire to put the government in control of the health care system, yet there is no problem with the government being an insurer for it.” He goes on to say that one solution for lowering costs of medicine is to start importing medication from foreign countries. Weintraub adds that the “government can do things with health care that individuals cant do on their own, so putting health care in the hands of the government might not necessarily be a bad thing, and it can turn out to have a positive outcome.”