Healthcare: a prediction market
Yesterday, my husband, an agent and I wasted 90 minutes pouring over the healthcare policy “choices” we have.
Healthcare in the U.S. is a prediction market. Do you place your bet on being healthy and safe, bet that the risk of catastrophic illness or accident is low to save money on a cheaper premium with high deductibles and copays? Or do you bet that the risk of catastrophe is high and pay for a high-priced premium with low deductibles? Or some indecipherable combination? Betting against you every step of the way is one of the most complicated and increasingly vertically integrated industries in the USA. Capitalism whose profits are dependent on not delivering a service.
Regardless of your choice, you end up paying more in fees, copays and deductibles, and get the same service quality as the rest of the civilized world who pay a fixed tax. This is one prediction market that should not be in business.
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Cindy Doklan
Midtown
No to increased profit margin for TEP
Tucson Electric Power is asking the Arizona Corporation Commission for another rate hike just three years after the last one. We’re already paying huge amounts of money to cool our homes in hotter, longer summers now, and prices for food, transportation, housing and medical care keep climbing, especially since the Iran war began. Higher petroleum prices raise the cost of everything.
Yet TEP wants more than cost recovery, upgrades or maintenance. It is asking the ACC to raise its return on equity from 9.5% to 9.75%, a higher profit for the same service.
To add insult to injury, TEP wants an Annual Rate Adjustment Mechanism (ARAM) that would automatically raise our rates in future years withpit going through a full rate case.
I urge the ACC to protect Arizona ratepayers: please deny the higher RoE, deny the overall rate increase, and above all, deny the ARAM.
Tamora Muir
Southeast side
Hegseth should be impeached
Secretary Pete Hegseth should be impeached for several offenses, and none are policy issues. He put details about an air strike on insecure communications systems before the strike had even launched. That action would have me still in jail. The second strike on the crew of the alleged drug boat in the Caribbean raised questions about compliance wtih the laws of war. The minimum requirement of leadership is to lead by example. He failed that requirement on Veterans Day at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. He threatens a U.S. Senator with a court-martial for speaking the truth about the right of service members to refuse unlawful orders.
Don Ries
Southeast side
TEP and power to the people
Which of the following things is least like the others: communism, socialism, capitalism or a large pepperoni pizza? Answer — capitalism; because it's the only thing that can't feed a family of four (joke from Cold War times).
Tim Steller's recent column on the defeat of Prop. 421, "Why voters jolted TEP," got me ruminating over the advantages of making Tucson Electric Power a public utility like Tucson Water — the yellow brick road leading to a green energy future. Many touted the $2 million Fortis Inc. (TEP's Canadian parent company) would have donated to the city every year to plant trees, but the whole deal sounded like reverse socialism to me, considering the company had a net income of $283 million in 2025.
Bravo to the group Public Power for Tucson, which helped defeat Prop. 421, spending only $1,600 compared to $4.3 million spent by proponents, so they deserve the first slice of pizza. Voters have given Tucson an amazing opportunity for a brighter and more affordable future.
Richard Boren
Midtown
Acceptable immigration reform
I believe that immigration reform can be accomplished. It will require compassionate compromises by both the Democrats and Republicans.
It will require control of America's borders and the enforcement of its immigration laws.
We need to ensure adequate Border Patrol staffing.
Deport people who commit serious violent crimes. Enforce visa-overstay laws.
Provide adequate immigration judges and resources.
No unnecessary separation of families. Safe and humane detention facilities.
Ensure access to legal representation where appropriate.
A nation has both the right and the responsibility to control who enters its borders. But it also has a responsibility to treat people already living within its borders fairly and humanely.
I strongly believe that someone who entered the United States illegally 20 years ago, has worked, paid taxes, raised a family, committed no crimes and learned English, should be given an opportunity to earn American citizenship.
I think that is one of the most important questions at the heart of immigration reform.
Tom McGorray
Northwest side
1980 Groundwater Management Act redux
Once heralded as groundbreaking legislation, the 1980 Groundwater Management Act is sorely in need of an update to curb the exploitation of rural groundwater basins and active management area industrial use permits (read: data center groundwater use and more). Attempts to amend the law have been continually stalled and stopped for years in the Arizona House of Representatives or the Arizona Senate by GOP Rep. Gail Griffin (now Senator-Elect) in her role as perpetual committee chair of all things associated with groundwater. A tireless supporter of real estate and agricultural industries, her efforts to block meaningful groundwater law reform will be her legacy. Hopefully, the incoming Democratic majorities will be successful in passing long-overdue reforms.
Sheldon Clark
Vail
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