Healthcare is back on the agenda in Washington. Last week, President Joe Biden released his budget proposal, which includes billions in new taxes and price controls on prescription drugs to help avert Medicare's fiscal crisis and underwrite billions in health insurance subsidies. But in a divided Congress, it's unlikely to go anywhere.

Instead, lawmakers need to look at more incremental approaches to health reform — ones that empower patients to take greater control of their care. Injecting more market dynamism into our healthcare system is the only way to improve quality and reduce costs.

Government has long exercised outsize influence on patient care. Federal and state rules dictate what kind of insurance people can buy, whether and where providers can build new facilities, how various providers may practice, and which drugs they may take.

Government accounts for nearly half of all health spending in this country. More than one-third of people are directly dependent on the government for health coverage.

All this government intervention hasn't yielded much in the way of patient satisfaction. A majority of people are unhappy with the handling of healthcare in the United States.

Putting more power into patients' hands wouldn't just ease that frustration. It would also increase consumer choice, thereby forcing insurance companies and providers to compete for patients' business. And where there's competition, there's better quality and less expensive care.

Lawmakers can begin by expanding access to health savings accounts . HSAs allow patients to set aside pretax dollars to cover medical expenses. Since they're using their own money, account holders have an incentive to spend wisely. Perhaps they'll choose a provider who offers the best service at the lowest price but isn't in their insurer's network. Or maybe they'll pay the cash price, which can be cheaper than paying with insurance, for treatment to avoid waiting for prior authorization or a coverage decision from their health plan.

Those sorts of consumer decisions save patients and the health system money, yet just 10% of people have access to an HSA. Federal rules only allow individuals and families enrolled in a high-deductible health plan — one with a minimum deductible of $1,400 and $2,800, respectively — to contribute to an HSA.

People who have HSAs can only contribute up to $3,650 per year. For a family, the annual contribution limit is $7,300. That's senseless. Permitting people without high-deductible health plans to contribute to HSAs and raising the contribution cap would empower millions more patients to decide how to spend their healthcare dollars — and generate savings throughout the healthcare system in the process.

To help patients make informed decisions about where to spend those dollars, federal officials must also make healthcare pricing more transparent. Since 2021, hospitals have been required to publish the prices they charge for 300 shoppable services in an easily readable file. Yet a new study suggests less than a quarter of hospitals are fully compliant. As a result, patients can't shop around for the best deal on their care. And hospitals are insulated from the sort of competition that can drive costs down across the healthcare system.

Consider how the market for LASIK eye surgery has evolved. Since the procedure isn't usually covered by insurance, patients must pay out of pocket. To attract customers, providers publish their prices and routinely offer deals and discounts — think "buy one eye, get one free" — on surgery. It's unsurprising that the price of LASIK has dropped by up to 30% in the last 10 years.

Congress can also empower patients by protecting access to short-term health plans. Such plans aren't subject to Obamacare 's cost-inflating mandates, so they're cheaper than exchange plans. That can make them an appropriate alternative for people looking for no-frills low-cost coverage, such as those who are young and healthy or between jobs.

Patients can enroll in a short-term plan for one year, and insurers can renew that coverage for up to three years. But some Democrats want to outlaw them altogether and convince people that short-term plans are "junk" because they don't comply with Obamacare. Several states, including California, New York, and New Jersey, have already banned short-term plans.

Research shows that short-term plans are far from "junk." The Manhattan Institute's Chris Pope found that even for "high-risk" people, such as a 60-year-old smoker, short-term plans can provide similar benefits at a lower cost than exchange plans.

Lawmakers must preserve access to short-term plans. Doing so, in combination with expanding access to HSAs and more transparent pricing, would go a long way toward empowering patients and bringing down healthcare costs.

Sally C. Pipes is president, CEO, and Thomas W. Smith fellow in Health Care Policy at the Pacific Research Institute. Her latest book is False Premise, False Promise: The Disastrous Reality of Medicare for All (Encounter 2020). Follow her on Twitter @sallypipes.