In last week's Miami Herald former Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala has a piece on what she calls the "crisis" in health care insurance.

Ms. Shalala notes that roughly 44 million Americans have no health insurance and can't get the basic health care services that they need. This problem is putting a huge economic burden on the citizens of the United States.

Skyrocketing health care costs are putting a huge burden on small businesses too. Many can no longer afford to offer health insurance to their employees. It's simply not financially viable for them to continue to offer it. This leaves hundreds of thousands of Americans with no health insurance.

It's become a vicious cycle. Employers are unable to offer health insurance because of the rising costs. Individuals with no health insurance don't go in to see a doctor until they are very ill and the cost for treating them is much greater than it would be had they gone in earlier. As they have no insurance they can't possibly pay the entire cost, in general. Thus hospitals and doctors must charge inflated rates to cover the cost of those who cannot pay.

A single payer universal health care system would cover everyone. In the end it could even be the cheaper alternative to the current system...as I'll address in the next post.