Texas 2036 released new polling Sept. 1 showing broad support among Texas voters for state action to improve transparency and competition in the healthcare market. The nonpartisan policy organization said four in five voters or more supported making it easier to know who owns a hospital or doctor’s office and to know the price of a medical procedure ahead of time.
The release was timed to a hearing the same day of the Texas House Select Committee on Health Care Affordability, chaired by state Rep. James Frank, R-Wichita Falls, with state Rep. Toni Rose, D-Dallas, as vice chair. Charles Miller, Texas 2036’s director of health and economic mobility policy, was scheduled to testify before the committee as an invited witness, according to the organization.
“Texans are looking for state government action on healthcare affordability,” Miller said in the release. “They want real-time actionable information about service prices, more robust state action to promote sufficient competition in the healthcare market and, above all, for lawmakers to give serious attention to solutions that can bring prices down.”
According to the results from the 10th edition of the Texas Voter Poll, 90 percent of voters agreed Texans should have the right to know who owns their hospitals, doctors’ offices and health insurers, compared with 5 percent who disagreed. Eighty-one percent supported more active state regulation of healthcare mergers to maintain competition, up from 75 percent when Texas 2036 last asked the question in November 2024. Seventy-nine percent favored requiring transparent and binding pricing before delivery of non-emergency care, while 11 percent opposed it.
The organization reported that support also outweighed opposition for several proposals aimed at increasing competition, including enhanced antitrust enforcement at 58 percent in favor, breaking up existing healthcare companies at 59 percent, prohibiting hospitals and insurers from owning physician groups at 59 percent, and banning private equity ownership of healthcare providers at 55 percent.
Texas 2036 said voters were less united on other approaches. Government price controls or rate setting drew a much narrower margin of support, and voters were almost evenly divided on moving toward a single-payer system. The least popular option, according to the poll, was doing nothing, which 61 percent of voters opposed and 18 percent favored.
“Voters aren’t demanding one particular solution. They are giving state leaders room to work,” Miller said. “The common ground is affordability, transparency and competition, and that’s a strong foundation for meaningful action.”
The poll was conducted Aug. 22–26 by Baselice & Associates for Texas 2036 and surveyed 1,369 registered voters, weighted to a base of 1,001, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percent, the organization said.