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March 21, 2010

Health care stocks, canary in a coal mine?

As Gavin Newsom pointed out on Real Time, if this bill is so bad for health insurance companies, why did their stock prices go up yesterday when news started to emerge that passage of the bill looked more probable? - Mitchell Bard

Commentators who I respect, such as Steve Novick, seem to be in favor of the pending legislation. His caution that we can't afford to wait another 16 years is not an inconsequential factor IMHO. And yet...

There are those who argue that the rising health care stocks are indicative that this legislation is ultimately doomed to fizzle out before it gets to the White House. Citing an apparent corrolation between health care stock strength and the election of Scott Brown as evidence seems to me to be somewhat unpursuasive given that major health care reform has been on the table since Obama's election, long before we even knew who Scott Brown was. And health care stocks did well then too. But even so, the fact remains that health care stocks have been doing quite well ever since the possibility of "health care reform" ramped up, with or without the election of a neoteabagger Republican in Massachusetts.

Is this pending bill something that you want to be legally required to buy into? If not, what are the realistic alternatives?

Posted by Kevin at March 21, 2010 11:17 AM