• Location: in the bedroom with Abby watching baseball
• Mood: contemplative
• Music: Motley Crue-"Doctor Feelgood"

The History of Health Care Reform: Gerald Ford

In August 1974, after Richard Nixon resigned from office in the wake of the Watergate scandal, President Gerald Ford was faced with the problem of deciding what to do with Richard Nixon's call for health care reform. As a long time congressman, Ford knew many of the players in congress and tried to work with them to achieve the elusive goal of health care legislation. Democratic Congressman Wilbur Mills of Arkansas tried to advance a compromise bill that was based on Nixon's plan, but he gave up when the conservative half of his congressional health committee decided to back the American Medical Association's "Medicredit" voluntary tax credit plan. In December 1974, Mills resigned as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee and was succeeded by Representative Al Ullman, a Democrat from Oregon, who opposed payroll tax and general federal revenue financing of national health insurance.



In January 1975, in the midst of the worst recession in the four decades since the Great Depression, Ford said he would veto any health insurance reform because he felt that the nation could not afford such as scheme at that point in time. Senator Ted Kennedy responded by sponsoring his original universal national health insurance bill. In April 1975, after the November 1974 mid-term elections, the AMA replaced its "Medicredit" plan with an employer mandate proposal similar to Nixon's 1974 plan.

Ford wrestled with coming up with a solution for the problems of illness and individual financial hardship in the face of rising healthcare costs, not only for patients but for the nation as well. In his 1976 address, Ford sought to deal with these issues by proposing "catastrophic health insurance for everybody covered by Medicare." To finance it, he suggested raising fees for short-term care and lowering costs for senior citizens. Ford said in his State of the Union: "Nobody, after reaching age 65, will have to pay more than $500 a year for covered hospital or nursing home care, nor more than $250 for 1 year's doctor bills." But Ford also made clear in his speech that he did not support a national healthcare program. However he did suggestd that "we combine 16 existing Federal programs, including Medicaid, into a single $10 billion Federal grant. Funds would be divided among States under a new formula which provides a larger share of Federal money to those States that have a larger share of low-income families." Ford's proposal failed to generate enough support to convert into legislation.




In April 1976, Democratic presidential candidate Jimmy Carter proposed health care reform that included key features of Kennedy's universal national health insurance bill. Ford was defeated in his bid for election to the Presidency in his own right, and the problem of national health care was punted to Jimmy Carter.