The Fatal Conceit

The legislation itself runs to 2,801 pages when the two companion bills passed in the same week are combined. But most of the major programs require an avalanche of regulations to explain in detail how they will work. These regulations will reach into every corner of our health care sector.

The legislation itself runs to 2,801 pages when the two companion bills passed in the same week are combined. But most of the major programs require an avalanche of regulations to explain in detail how they will work. These regulations will reach into every corner of our health care sector.

When the law creating Medicare and Medicaid was passed in 1965, it required only 137 pages of legislation. In 1998, Dr. Robert Waller, then the chairman of the Mayo Clinic, asked his staff to count the number of pages of regulations this premier health care clinic had to comply with to treat Medicare and Medicaid patients. The answer: More than 132,000 pages. So each page of legislation led to nearly 1,000 pages of regulations!

From Why ObamaCare is Wrong For America by Grace-Marie Turner, James C. Capretta, Thomas P. Miller and Robert E. Moffit.