Your Health Care System: A Map

The Clinton plan was tremendously complicated. And given how many of the old Republican arguments against health reform are resurfacing this year, it's likely we'll be seeing a similar chart sometime this summer. But these charts leave out one key fact: The U.S. health care system is already a mind-numbing web of institutions, agencies, and businesses. And, while that may be self-evident to anybody who's ever had to handle a billing dispute between insurer and hospital, it's easy to lose sight of that in the scrum of congressional debate. So, just to keep this very relevant piece of information in mind, we've drawn up our own chart--of American health care, as it is now. And, just to make sure we weren't getting it wrong, we got some help from our friends at the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. (Click the map to enlarge or download the file.)