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A recent New York Times highlighted Maine’s attempts at comprehensive healthcare reform. Their experiences serve as a cautionary tale for Congress.   The state established a public health insurance plan, expanded Medicare and Medicaid eligibility, and banned insurers from refusing to cover people with pre-existing conditions, but those actions have done  little to insure more of its residents.  Contrary to the promises of public option supporters, health care costs have only continued to rise in the state.

Reasons for the high health care costs range from the state-specific to the general. Unlike the bill that recently passed the House of Representatives, Maine’s healthcare reform legislation didn’t include a mandate to buy health insurance plans. It’s a vicious cycle: forcing health insurance companies to offer policies to unhealthy people with pre-existing conditions raises the rates for younger people; young adults will be even less likely to buy health insurance if their premiums go up, which results in the insurer’s risk being spread among less people. In the end, the older, unhealthier population remains in the pool and must contend with less affordable health insurance. Therefore, there is a larger uninsured population.

Granted, Maine is a market dominated by just one private health insurance company (which, with its effective monopoly, can increase premiums to their liking); and its population is older, sicker, and poorer than the U.S. in general. Senator Olympia Snowe points to her state as a cautionary tale of what may happen if drastic changes are made too fast. Snowe is a Republican that supports healthcare reform but is against the public option. Budgeting problems have caused Maine to cap enrollment of its own public option health insurance plan at under 9,000. The federal government, unlike most states, is allowed to run a deficit. However, it isn’t exactly rolling in the money right now either.

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