Explore Candidates and Issues
Rudy Giuliani on Health Care
This candidate has withdrawn from the election
"The reason we have the best health care system in the world is because our health care system is primarily private, market-driven, and profit motivated. Those are all good things if properly regulated. Those things I just mentioned may actually be the genius of our success."
Using explicitly partisan language, perhaps intended to stir memories of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's failed bid to reform health care as first lady more than a decade ago, Mr. Giuliani cited horror stories and selective statistics about health care in foreign countries that provide universal coverage. Mr. Giuliani said that a "socialist" model would bankrupt the government. "That is where Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards are taking you," he said. "You have got to see the trap. Otherwise we are in for a disaster. We are in for Canadian health care, French health care, British health care."
Using explicitly partisan language, perhaps intended to stir memories of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's failed bid to reform health care as first lady more than a decade ago, Mr. Giuliani cited horror stories and selective statistics about health care in foreign countries that provide universal coverage. Mr. Giuliani said that a "socialist" model would bankrupt the government. "That is where Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards are taking you," he said. "You have got to see the trap. Otherwise we are in for a disaster. We are in for Canadian health care, French health care, British health care."
He has criticized proposals for universal health care, saying that "socialization" is not the solution.
"The reason we have the best health care system in the world is because our health care system is primarily private, market-driven, and profit motivated. Those are all good things if properly regulated. Those things I just mentioned may actually be the genius of our success."
While saying the government needed to "find ways" to expand access to health insurance, Mr. Giuliani criticized Democratic proposals for universal health care that he said would threaten a "socialization" of the American medical system. "That would be a terrible, terrible mistake," he said. The solutions, he said, "have to be free market solutions. They have to be a competitive system."
As mayor, he implemented a program called HealthStat, which identified and enrolled uninsured children in health insurance programs.
Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani announced today that as part of a back-to-school campaign to help uninsured children obtain health insurance, enrollers will be stationed at hundreds of stores and schools citywide. Every weekend through September 9, parents will be able to visit any of 32 Modell's, Sears and Cookie's locations and enroll their children in Child Health Plus, a government-funded health insurance program covering a wide range of services. The Mayor also announced today that he has signed an Executive Order making the Mayor's Office of Health Insurance Access a permanent City office to ensure the continued success of the HealthStat initiative. HealthStat has enrolled more than 151,000 children in health insurance since the Mayor launched the initiative last year.
"The bill had two very unfortunate parts to it. One, it would reduce Medicaid Advantage, which is a very, very successful program that actually does bring about some form of a free-market solution. And second, it would have the really odd effect of moving children who presently have private insurance to becoming wards of the state, basically having them move in the direction toward socialized medicine. That would be a terrible thing to do. What we should do is increase the number of people who have private insurance. In order to do that, we should give them a major tax deduction, $15,000, let them have a health savings account as part of that. They'll have an incentive to own their own health insurance. That's the thing that's wrong with the market here. It is not really good to move this thing in terms of more government control of health care."
2007 GOP Iowa Straw Poll debate Aug 5, 2007
"Americans without employer-based insurance should have tax benefits just as the 175 million Americans with employment-based coverage do. Rudy proposes an income exclusion of up to $15,000 for those without employer coverage to make insurance more affordable."
What I am recommending is that we give incentives to Americans right in the very beginning to go get their own health insurance. How do you do that? You create a $15,000 tax exemption for a family, $7,500 for a single individual...If you go find a health policy for $12,000 that meets your needs, then you get $3,000 in tax-free money for yourself."
The problem with our health insurance is it's government- and employer-dominated. People don't make individual choices. It's your health; you should own your health insurance. We need 100 million Americans making different decisions that will bring down the cost of health insurance; it will bring down the cost of prescription medicines. Free-market principles are the only things that reduce cost and improve quality.
2007 GOP debate at Saint Anselm College Jun 3, 2007
He also said he opposed any government mandates that would require people or businesses to buy insurance, which is central to the universal health care plan neighboring Massachusetts passed in April 2006 when Mitt Romney, a Republican rival, was governor there.