DEAR EDITOR:

Is there something that tells us the distribution of American health care is not just wrong, but more wrong than most people have yet to imagine?

Here’s one clue. You’re a part-time worker. You earn $20 an hour, work 20 hours a week and earn a total of $400 a week. You want to be enrolled in group health insurance. Your Human Resources guy tells you, “Son, you don’t work enough hours.” You start to work 40 hours a week full time. Your HR guy pulls you aside, “Here’s your group health card and directory of providers.”

Makes sense, doesn’t it? You worked more hours, and your group health enrollment is part of your additional compensation, right?

Except it isn’t. When you went from 20 hours per week to 40 hours per week, you got an additional $400 as full compensation for the increased hours worked.

So why did you get that group health insurance card if you didn’t work for it? Why have you been allowed to believe that you did work for it? What are the public policy implications of 170 million group health enrollees believing what’s not true?

Here’s a second clue that something’s gone terribly wrong. Look at your group health insurance card. Your name is on it. There’s a second name on it, too. What is that name and what does it mean? Why is that no one in the academy, in think tanks, in policy-making positions, among political elites, will talk about the mystery of that second name?

Ban group health insurance now. It’s the wrong payer. It’s the wrong way. It’s the wrong reason. It’s the wrong people. It’s just wrong.

JACK LABUSCH

Niles