Testifying in Olympia is a privilege. Even if lawmakers already have their minds made up about a given piece of legislation, you have the opportunity to offer a perspective they might not have heard before. You also have a chance to let other people listening to your testimony know what you like about a proposal — or if you have concerns with it. 

I try to remember my gratitude for the opportunity to be a part of the lawmaking process, even when I’m afforded only one minute. 

As French mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal is credited with saying (as are Mark Twain and others), “If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter.” 

On Thursday, I attended a meeting of the Senate Committee on Health and Long-Term Committee planning to testify in a public hearing on legislation titled, “Senate Joint Memorial 8004, Concerning universal health care.”  Shortly after the meeting was called to order, I was made aware people testifying would only be allowed one minute. My rose-colored glasses counted on two or three, as I have been allowed in other public hearings.

I scrambled and cut the already short, two-minute testimony I had prepared during the lawmaking committee’s discussion on another matter. 

The first thing that had to go was my thank you to the committee for its time. I was thankful, but who has time to say so when you only have a minute to try and make a point? I was already wishing I had a one-syllable name. 

SJM 8004 is almost identical to SJM 8006, which I was concerned with starting in 2023. It requests the federal government to enact a national universal health care program. That is even more unlikely to happen in 2025 than it was in 2023, which is why the legislation also asks the government to allow Washington state to implement a taxpayer-financed system of care for the state on its own “by reducing barriers or granting appropriate waivers.” SJM 8004 was scheduled for executive session today. If it was voted on, I assume it passed and will move along in the process.

Instead of leaving a minute of text on the cutting-room floor, I’ll offer it up here with the testimony I gave Thursday. And maybe add a few seconds: 

I’m Elizabeth New with the WashingtonPolicy Center.

Health care costs are escalating due to many factors, and our state is headed in the wrong direction. Continuing to pursue taxpayer-financed health care sets us up for failure. It offers no hope for cost-containment, just a shifting of who pays the ever-increasing costs and how. 

If universal, taxpayer-financed healthcare worked, it’d be easier to understand asking the federal government to enact it or help Washington go it alone. But we know from other countries that affordability, access and quality are not achieved. In taxpayer-financed systems, demand always outstrips supply, and then waitlisting and rations begin. 

The Fraser Institute in Canada writes that in 2024,  physicians across Canada reported a median wait time of 30.0 weeks between a referral from a general practitioner and receipt of treatment. That’s up from 27.7 in 2023. It’s 222% longer than the 9.3-week wait Canadian patients could expect in 1993.

In Great Britain, a Wall Street Journal article reported that people who suffer heart attacks or strokes wait more than 1½ hours on average for an ambulance. The Royal College of Emergency Medicine estimated 300 to 500 people suffer premature deaths each week because of a lack of access to timely care. It added that more than one in 10 people are stuck on waiting lists for non-emergency hospital treatment for things like hip replacements. 

Trading one bad system for another isn’t the way to go. 

Instead of adopting a flawed system, we should reduce government intervention and embrace market-driven solutions that enhance quality and reduce costs. This includes eliminating regulations and mandates that inflate expenses. As Sen. Annette Cleveland, D-Vancouver, rightly remarked in a recent meeting, “We have to keep in mind coverage mandates do increase costs.” 

The Legislature could also help promote price transparency to empower consumers, advance telehealth services and remove Certificate of Need requirements to foster competition and increase access.

Innovations like the Surgery Center of Oklahoma, Health Savings Accounts and direct primary care models demonstrate the effectiveness of free-market approaches. 

We also desperately need more informed consumers who have a stake in the game and an incentive to be healthier in the first place. If someone is paying for your health care, you have no need to care about its cost. We need to change this, not promise to supply "free" health care to all. 

More taxpayer dependency does not help us get where we want to go.