NY Times/CBS News Poll: Wide Support For Government-Run Option Competing With Private Insurers

New York Times:

Americans overwhelmingly support substantial changes to the health care system and are strongly behind one of the most contentious proposals Congress is considering, a government-run insurance plan to compete with private insurers, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.

Read the whole story: New York Times

Comments

[Badfickle]

When I go down to the car dealership to buy a car, I pay money and I get a car. The auto industry makes money by providing cars for money.

When I go to buy insurance it doesn't work that way. I don't pay money and get health care. I pay money and the insurance cartel gives me the vague promise that in the future I might get health care. Unless they can some how use their team of criminals to get out of paying up. If you get sick and need health care they don't make money from giving you health care. They make money by finding a way to deny you health care or jacking up your rates until you can't pay the premiums anymore.

[FaceReality2]

"They make money by finding a way to deny you health care or jacking up your rates until you can't pay the premiums anymore."

Why the hell can't everyone understand that?

Health insurers told Congress they will continue to rescind policies after people get sick.

WellPoint Inc., UnitedHealth Group and Assurant Inc. canceled the coverage of more than 20,000 people, allowing the companies to avoid paying more than $300 million in medical claims over a five-year period.

Stupak, the committee chairman, asked the CEOs of each company whether they would at least commit to immediately stopping rescissions except where they could show "intentional fraud." The answer from all three executives: "No."

Here's the YouTube :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_29CCVI1ao4

Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) said that a public insurance plan should be a part of any overhaul because it would force private companies to treat consumers fairly or risk losing them.

[lysistrata]

I wish he would say he is ready to fight for national health care.

[aspelling]

US health care is good. Not great but really good. But at the same time is highly overpriced. There are many components to it - profit seeking privae entities, government overregulations, liability lawsuits and insurance and pure corruption.
Doctors has created such a system where a patient cannot do anything legally without paying them. They got away with it because patients stopped paying these money from their own pocket but rely on insurance.
For example, many drugs you can freely buy in pharmacies in Europe after you ask pharmacist an advice in US requires visit to a doctor - sat $20 co-pay plus $200 from your insurance. This way doctors generate a stream of patients and cash flow. Doctors are happy because they get money for a simple decision that don't require their degree and patients happy as well because they don't pay for it.

Take glasses, for example. You can buy decent name glasses for $35 in EU/Poland which will cost you $350 in Pearl Vision. And yes, $35 includes eye exam if you don't know your prescription. If you know it you just tell what it is and take all responsibility if new glasses don't fit properly. In MA you cannot even order glasses or contacts without paying $180 for eye exam. This was done to protect cash cow for optometrists and licensed optical technicians.
Guess what - I'm buying this stuff elsewhere

[Eoin45]

"US health care is good. Not great but really good" Yeah right, if you can afford it. My significant other couldn't afford health insurance as an indepedent contractor. A recent cancer operation set her back $44,000 out of her life savings. I had to buy healthinsurance for a former spouse and was appalled at the monthly payment and high deductible for the best deal I could find. You're lucky you can afford to "buy this stuff elsewhere". Many can't afford to buy it anywhere,

[marijam]

Any many can't get coverage for any price.

[aspelling]

Tell me about it.
This year we had to drop "big boy" insurance company for our employees due to a 25% increase in costs and switched to a small MA company operating in the framework of MA mandated health care program.
Not only this insurance is cheaper than what we have before it also provides better benefits.
The only drawback is that is covers only doctors in their system, but all my doctors are there.

[helonias]

HEALTH INSURANCE COMPANY PROFITS IN 2007:
1. UnitedHealth Group — $ 4.654 BILLION. UnitedHealth Group owns Oxford, PacifiCare, IBA, AmeriChoice, Evercare, Ovations, MAMSI and Ingenix, a healthcare data company
2. WellPoint — $ 3.345 BILLION. Wellpoint owns BLUES across the US, including Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Wisconsin, Empire HealthChoice Assurance, Healthy Alliance, and many others
3. Aetna Inc. — $ 1.831 BILLION
4. CIGNA Corp — $ 1.115 BILLION
5. Humana Inc. — $ 834 million
6. Coventry Health Care — $626 million. Coventry owns Altius, Carelink, Group Health Plan, HealthAmerica, OmniCare, WellPath, others

[kesmarn]

Great research! Thanks for posting.

[LeftCoastLarry]

Off topic.
We're not discussing the quality of health care. The subject at hand is the availability and affordability of health care. The insurance companies who stand between us and our doctor.
Now, we have a system that rations health care. That's unacceptable. The best solution is a comprehensive single payer system. If we must settle for less, a viable public option in competition with the insurance companies.

[YewNeekId]

Obama needs to take leadership and drive this home for the American people.

[underoath]

Everybody go to www.change.org and sign the petition for a real public option

[droftim]

I don't want a "public option" that will add another layer of confusion to an out of control system. I don't want anything that is based on the model we have now. People keep saying that a public option will result in less employer paid coverage. Guess what? Employers have already decided that the model is unsustainable and want out:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/15/business/15insure.html

A public option will not control costs, it will be designed to protect insurers and end up being too expensive for most people who really need it:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/16/health/policy/16mass.html?scp=1&sq=massachusetts%20healthcare&st=cse

Mitch McConnell and company want everyone to keep arguing about a public option because they don't want to allow any serious discussion of Single-Payer, Universal Healthcare.

Single-Payer is no more out of the question than getting Obama elected was. We can do this people...as long as we don't let politicians divert us.

Learn more about what Healthcare for all means in other countries - http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91971170

[droftim]

I don't want a "public option", I want Single-Payer, Universal Healthcare and I will not let anyone tell me that what is being discussed is as good as it gets.

There is no way at change.org to say that -- they want you to waffle with the President,.

[tailgateshirts]

OHHH - Its a CBS Poll, thats why Scarborough wont use this poll when he talks about health care and shows the Deficit / Stimulus poll instead....

[Peabodies]

Non Sequitur, the Wiley comic strip, June 19, 2009, a bar scene --- "I stopped pursuing the American Dream when I found out it means I'd need to move to France".

[kesmarn]

Good one! For all the posts about how terrible the French health care system supposedly is, I don't see the French rushing to switch over to our (dysfunctional) model.

[gino618]

After reading the poll questions, it's pretty clear that while a majority of people would LIKE that government run option (of those responding) - a good number, if not a majority, don't necessarily think that this Congress or POTUS are best suited to do it, are concerned about the cost, concerned about the quality of care, and /or really don't know much about the current proposals to make an informed decision.

[kasinca]

It amazes me that the hypocritical fiscal cops of the lunatic right wing had nothing to say about Baby Bush and his $1.3 Trillion tax cut for the wealthy while he was lying us into an unnecessary war in Iraq to pad the pockets of the executives of Halliburton, oil companies, and the miltary industrial comples. I would challenge one of your geniuses to advise me and the rest when the GOP has ever been fiscally conservative while in office. Reagan increased the deficit and raised taxes, Daddy Bush the same, and the story of Baby Bush is known around the world.
I would thank all you hypocritical naysayers to just sit down and let us try to do something different. We voted you incompetent people out of office for a reason. Learn to accept your role of second string. Sit down and wait until you win an election.

[k6007]

Hear, hear.

[gino618]

Not only does your rant totally hijack my own comments into your own self-serving liberal talking points, but it also confirms that the left's own mantra of 'free speech' and 'all views should be heard' is nothing but a bumper sticker unless you are the minority.

I, and others, will not sit down and will not be quiet while you and others like you bully your weight around and take this country and its policies down a road that most do not want.

Winning an election does not give carte blanche, and it isn't a 'mandate' for every single thing you wish to implement.

[tokenconservative]

You're an idiot if you honestly think a 187 billion dollar budget deficit (the highest recorded non-recession deficit, which was in 2007) pales in comparison to Obama's 1.75 trillion projected deficit in 2011 excluding healthcare (which the CBO came out and said only 2 days ago would end up spiralling into 1.6 trillion a year). We can debate values all day long, but doubling the federal debt (which, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, will happen under Obama in only 22 months into his term) means that he at least matched Bush's spending palooza. All of this being said, we've never had an externally-proclaimed fiscal conservative in the White House; both Bushes campaigned on some level of "compassionate conservatism", and Reagan primarily a foreign policy expert rather than a domestic cutter (I know he's been idealized as such, but that doesn't make it true).

[myscreennameistoolong]

ding ding! We have a winner!

[kitkatborn]

All together now. NO COMPROMISE. NO COMPROMISE.

[rollingdivision]

In France co-payments run between 10 and 40 percent, and physicians can balance bill over and above government reimbursement rates, something not allowed in the U.S. Medicare program. On average, FRENCH PATIENTS PAY ROUGHLY AS MUCH OUT OF POCKET AS DO AMERICANS. About 92% of French residents have complementary private health insurance. “More than 92% of French residents have complementary private insurance.” This insurance pays for additional fees in order to access higher quality providers. Private health insurances makes up 12.7% of French health care spending. These complementary private insurance funds are very loosely regulated (less than in the U.S.) and the only stringent requirement is guaranteed renewability. Private insurance benefits are not equally distributed so there is, in essence, a TWO TIER SYSTEM.
French doctors are paid by the national health insurance system based on a centrally planned fee schedule, but doctors can charge whatever price they want. The fees are based on an up front treatment lump sum, which is similar to DRGs in the U.S. The PATIENT–OR THEIR PRIVATE INSURANCE–MUST MAKE UP THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE FEE CHARGED BY THE DOCTOR AND THE AMOUNT PAID FOR BY THE UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE SYSTEM. The French legal system is fairly tort-averse, severely restricting all malpractice suits.

[LeftCoastLarry]

My big fear is that they will come up with a weak ineffectual plan with a trigger, or co-op, or some such nonsense and they will expect us to buy into it because "it's better than nothing".
Don't buy it!
They pulled that stunt with Medicare Part D with the promise that it would be improved later.
Medicare Part D was written by Big Pharma for Big Pharma.
We cannot let the insurance companies write the health care reform plan.
No strong public option, no reform.

[Helzapoppin]

In the absence of a purely universal single-payer system, I say let's have the public option AND let those who remain with private or employer-based insurance join these co-ops. I'd bet real money the public plan still comes out on top.

[droftim]

I hate to disappoint you but the idea of a "public option" is a diversionary sham. It will not do anything about controlling costs. Any public option will be designed to protect the private carriers and end up contributing to even more cost escalation. If we accept this, the Republicans will have a field day 5 years from now when things are even worse.

We need Single-Payer, Universal Healthcare and we need it now.

[Helzapoppin]

I would like to ask those who respond to these polls that they are satisfied with their current coverage as opposed to a public single-payer plan, what their preference would be if they found themselves unemployed.

I had great employer-provided health insurance too. Until that employer decided they didn't need me anymore.

[gino618]

As much as you'd like, being a liberal, to twist the answers to meet you own goals, you can't. The fact is that those who answered such are satisfied and ARE covered. Also - there is nothing in the question which states whether those who ARE satisfied are covered by their employer so your statement is based on a false premise.

[kasinca]

76% of Americans have a brain. A large percentage of the other 24% are wingnuts who live in an alternate reality because they get false information from FAUX Noise and the liars with (R) associated with their names. Face it, if the GOP had not lied, do you really think they would have ever won an election? Honestly, if they had told you that they were going to rip us off and lie us into an unnecessary war, would they have been elected?

[JuliaRain]

You are projecting.

Those who already have insurance can keep it.

Others are trying to find a practical solution for their families. Don't vilify your fellow citizens for this.

Remember, they helped pay for your military and your infrastructure.

[Pigeon2]

I have great insurance....I want to KEEP it....If I become unemployed? Go to a County Hospital for treatment....I have worked in HC for 25 yrs...My FICA goes to Medicaid, food stamps, etc....People talk about "Big Brother" supporting them..Who do they think Big Brother is? It`s my FICA taken out every 2 weeks...

[amarti57]

This is in stark contrast to Friday's Rasmussen Report on healthcare.

Hmmm... which one should we trust?

[kesmarn]

Since Rasmussen was so consistently wrong all the way through the 2008 campaign season, I'll go with this one.

[tokenconservative]

The two studies asked different questions - Rasmussen was whether healthcare ought to be free, the NYT was whether "significant changes ought to be made."

[amarti57]

And the NYTimes was right? Go back and check their polling figures... and, in case you were wondering, Rasmussen was right in 2004. NYTimes was not. So, using your qualifier, Rasmussen is 1 for 2 while NYTimes is 0 for 2.

[kitkatborn]

I hope the President does not compromise on this to please the Republicans. They are no longer a relevant political force in this country & may never be again unless they can clean up their act.

[HPdevotee]

I don't pretend to know all the ins and outs of this complex health care over-haul. I can talk to my experience with 2 gov't run health systems though. Medicare and VA care.

My husband has been on medicare for 3 years now and we are very happy with it. He has had major surgery once and has cancer screenings on a regular basis. Never once was he denied care nor was there ever a problem with doctors or specialists, in fact, he was referred to the best cancer surgeon in our area..no problems.

My mother was a vet (she has since passed) and the last years of her life were brutal...spinal surgeries, copd, asthma, on oxygen.. well, the list goes on. I know what kind of care she received at the VA because I was basically her conservator and it was excellent. Never once did she suffer needlessly because of red tape, long lines or any of the other scare-tactics people are saying...Also, her end-of-life care in hospice (paid for by the VA) was second to none. She constantly talked about how 'blessed' she was to have the VA.

I know without a doubt that if it were not for the VA, my mother would have suffered unimaginably and been destitute and if not for medicare, I probably would not have my husband today. So, people can shout about 'socialized' medicine and 'horror stories' all they want, but I know better.

[Helzapoppin]

exactly. Since retiring, my mother has had to have two knee replacements and hospitalization for a minor heart attack. Her treatment on Medicare compared to the hoops she used to have to jump through with employer-provided insurance has been like night and day.