Health care for all raises a series of fascinating questions.
Why does health care tend to poll better in theory and declines as it becomes closer to fruition? Why does America struggle with an issue that is fait accompli in other industrialized nations?
Why have presidential administrations dating back to 1935 offered the Utopian dream of affordable health care for every man, woman, and child only to have those efforts thwarted by the opposition?
Representing an estimated 15 percent of the economy, the health care industry is a fragmented behemoth consisting of, but not limited to, hospitals, HMOs, physicians, and pharmaceutical companies. Though they possess a variety of interests, many are galvanized in opposition to any new health care legislation and dedicated to maintaining the status quo that they are the ultimate benefactors.
The other problem that has plagued health care as an issue is cost. There are the upfront cost, currently estimated at $1.3 trillion; and if those costs cannot be controlled then there is the problem of health care inflation. Therefore, the possibility of a $1.3 trillion government program spiraling out of control is unfathomable.
Another aspect making health care legislation so challenging is what I define as an "intangible-tangible." It is an intangible until one becomes ill or hurt. At that point, health care becomes a tangible item -- assuming one has it.
The services that we receive are tangible, but the way health care is usually paid for tends to be intangible in the sense that it does not come directly out of pocket. Most of the debate is conducted while health care is in the intangible stage.
It is tough for President Barack Obama to make the "what's in it for me" argument needed to sway a majority of Americans to his side, especially since there has yet to be a clearly defined piece of legislation put forth.
It is difficult to expect a majority of Americans to support legislation that has yet to arrive, already expected to cost a daunting $1.3 trillion. But the $1.3 trillion cost is based on a 10-year period, making the projected health care cost on an annual basis on par with the cost America is currently spending on war. The differences being the cost associated with war are borrowed dollars. Any proposed health care legislation, as the president has already stated, must responsibly control cost, expand coverage, and provide choice.
Though cost is often discussed, it is not ultimately what the health care debate is about -- at least in the public conversation. To be sure, there are myriad public policy aspects to this legislation, some are quite complicated, but that's not driving the debate on Capitol Hill.
When Republican Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina stated in an e-mail: "If we're able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him," it became the most accurate barometer for the political health care debate.
At last week's press conference the president suggested the health care debate was not about him. I disagree; it is definitely about him.
DeMint's comments were not about the 47 million people who don't have health care; it was about stopping the president's agenda.
If stopping Obama on health care would be his Waterloo, would it also be fair to conclude the passage of health care would be the Republicans' Waterloo?
If President Obama were successful on health care, he would have accomplished something that was beyond the reach of Presidents Roosevelt, Truman, Johnson, Carter, and Clinton. He would have ushered in the most significant domestic legislation since Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act in 1935.
Social Security helped Democrats become the dominate political party for more than a generation, are not the same stakes at play if the president signs health care legislation that meets his criteria of cost, coverage, and choice?
As a result, the GOP is forced to advocate for a status quo that has its own spiraling cost that leaves out 47 million individuals, by using the primordial tactics of fear.
Seldom, in American history, has the use of fear to sway public opinion in the short-term proven to serve the public interest in the long-term. Unfortunately for the Republican Party, as the old Texas saying goes: "You dance with who brung ya!"
Byron Williams is an Oakland pastor and syndicated columnist and blog-talk radio host. He is the author of Strip Mall Patriotism: Moral Reflections of the Iraq War. E-mail him at byron@byronspeaks.com or visit his website: byronspeaks.com
Follow Byron Williams on Twitter: www.twitter.com/byronspeaks
12 million of those listed as uninsured, are actually insured by Medicaid. They can use it when they need. 20 million of those listed are young men and their families, at 250% of poverty, who choose to not buy insurance. They choose, that's in interesting idea. Now you will take money away from those people by forcing them to pay.
The bill is also partially paid by $622 billion cuts in Medicare. The seniors will really be unhappy when they read this.
The current bill will just reward the special interest at the cost of the people.
Quit pitching for the special interests. Demand debate to get a bill that really helps people.
Guys, ITALY manages this. So do France, Germany, the UK, every other nation in the western world manages some form of universal healthcare without any of the horror stories that the right is touting. No, they're not perfect, far from it but they are a bunch better than you're poor, you get sick and you die. If you are honestly telling me that the US is so incapable of doing this that you're not even going to try then one has to ask: Why do you hate America?
Because the people are smart enough to know there is no such thing as a Utopia.
http://www.harrisdecima.com/en/downloads/pdf/news_releases/071009E.pdf
More at:http://www.thelaloblog.com/1/post/2009/07/shona-holmes-does-not-speak-for-me.html
What no one tells the average American is that Canadians also have access to extended medical insurance that covers things like prescriptions, short term and long term disability, dental etc. Private clinics are also available in some provinces as well for elective procedures, MRI's etc. This isn't the Soviet Union.
In reality, the biggest challenge to the Canadian healthcare system is twofold: 1. Your for-profit/eliminate the most costly patient system tends to put upward pressure on our costs and 2. powerful Canadians who have worked feverishly to subtly undermine key aspects of our system in an attempt to prove that it doesn't work by trying to make it fail.
Yet despite all that, Canadians would never go back to a for-profit system:
http://www.harrisdecima.com/en/downloads/pdf/news_releases/071009E.pdf
Coverage for EVERYONE who applies
Structured premium payments of not more than 100 per individual, 300 per family
Deductibles capped at $2000 and based on income (means testing every year like the va)
No mandates forcing people to purchase insurance (a windfall for private carriers)
No triggers (also a windfall to private carriers)
No subsidies to private insurance carriers
No taxes on employer provided benefits
If someone has private insurance and wants the public option, they can drop private with no problem and be covered immediately under public.
No mandates on employers to buy into the public option to cover employees. Has to be free choice.
Everyone with coverage gets treated for new or pre-existing conditions.
Fairly negotiated reimbursement to private pracitce, specialty doctors and hospitals
Fairly negotiated prices for medications, even on name brand stuff which has no generic equivalent.
AND IT HAS TO BE EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY. Within 1 month of the above bill passing, Americans must be able to start buying in and using it.
It must be administered by an autonomous federal agency. Monies paid in must not be co-mingled with any other money, does not go into the general fund so it can be looted.
The ONLY payouts from this fund will be for: payments to practicioners, pharmacies and admin. In 5 years if we see significan overages, those overages will be used to suplement medicare and fund medical research.
See my next post on funding
20 million under insured
Subtract 10 million poor/indigent/mentally ill, etc, who are uninsured and will have to get free care = 37 mill un-insured who can pay.
18.5 million can pay $50/mo = 925,000,000
18.5 mill can pay $100 = $1,850,000,000
20 mill under insured will switch and can pay $100 = 2,000,000,000
That is a grand total of $4,775,000,000
That is FOUR BILLION, SEVEN HUNDRED SEVENTY FIVE MILLION DOLLARS IN PREMIUM PAYMENTS PER MONTH. FIFTY SEVEN BILLION THREE HUNDRED THIRTY MILLION PER YEAR IN PREMIUMS FOR ONE SET OF PEOPLE.
That does'nt count the millions who'll switch from private companies if they can pay $100 or 200 per month and have their entire family covered even with pre-existing conditions. Repeal bush tax cuts asap another 700 billion.
After thinking about it more, institute a 1 penny federal sales tax on EVERY item. I can hear the opponents shouting about making the poor poorer, but my statement is 1 cent on each item NOT on every dollar or hundred dollars. From candy bars to big screen tv's to your house. 1 cent on everything. If your grocery bill was $100. for 53 items, your bill would be $100.53. That's not putting people in the poorhouse especially when we've been dealing with price increases. Also, if you're saving 300-500 per month on insurance, you have that money to spend and put back in the economy, save, or invest.
The public option is dead, aint gonna happen. WHY? Because the Federal govt. is ran by and for money, and the private insurers and drug companys have loads of money. WE DONT.
The politicians know this and will not vote in a public option which will change the gig for the for profiteers. The public option would force price reductions, and negotiate prices for drugs, reducing their sales and profits.
Guess how much money the private insurers and drug companys have to spend on defeating the public option..............hundreds of millions......to flood the airwaves to defeat the public option. To scare jim and jill sixpack, to defeat Obama care entirely.
So the politicians choose not to pick this fight, and will simply declare victory on reducing the number of uninsured.
The battle on cost reduction will be lost. In fact Obama care will only RAISE spending on health care as millions of formerly uninsured will now see a doctor. And guess what, they will need cholesterol lowering drugs, be prediabetic, hypertensive, needing more care and more drugs.
Obama care will FAIL miserably in reining in cost for health care and we will be back at this debate in the next decade when costs will be even higher.
profit and bonuses, big profits and big bonuses! we didn't start back before the greed
and before health care became just another profit making commodity like you canadians and the rest of the civilized world..........its too late.
we doomed.
guess we will just have to book flights to India for those medical-tourist trips......
the round trip airfare, health care received by american trained doctors, and recouperation at a resort is cheaper than just the operation here..........
isn't that sad.
Yes. Just as much as the taxpayer (you) benefits from the taxes of those who are concerned about fitness/nutrition. People who contribute more than they receive in benefits.
Otherwise, you would have someone between you and your doctor making decisions on healthcare. Someone who is judging your lifestyle. Exactly what you have now.
Just another economic rape of the American people by Big Business and the GOP.
When the Rethugs are not de-regulating in the interests of the mega-corps and shifting the power away from the public, the US government has historically performed many of its functions well.
These are the top 7 health insurance companies based on profit over the trailing 12 months, if they're not in this list then they're making less profit than these:
AFLAC Inc. 10.68%
Aon Corp. 8.69%
Stancorp Fin'l (Standard Insurance Company) 8.15%
Assurant Inc. 7.82%
Unum Group 7.17%
Triple S Mgmt. 2.84%
American Independent 0.38%
Let's bust some fiction. Fiction 1: The argument that private healthcare is a monopoly on its face is silly, a monopoly is one company that controls an industry, there's many healthcare companies.
Fiction 2: Healthcare companies are greedy. Look at the profit margins of the top performers, you call that greed? Ridiculous. Now, I will be the first to say that there's greed with individual executives that occurs, but this is a problem in many large enterprises. The salaries that these greedy clowns make in some cases is obscene, but a drop in the bucket relative to "costs of healthcare"
Fiction 3: That government will operate our healthcare efficiently and lessor expense. Please list your government run programs that are in the black. If they're in the red than (which they are) then why would you trust government to run 20% of our economy?
Some here exclaim EU single payor system rationing is a myth, I implore you to get past anecdotes and review the readily available material that many EU countries are facing relative to healthcare.
Sure, healthcare is expensive, read my earlier post on ways to fix it.
Oldsop I'm a Fan of Oldsop I'm a fan of this user permalink
"We do not live in a democracy.
We live in a democratic republic."
Both of you should look up the word "monopoly" and "price fixing". Also what is 10% of say $3 trillion? Or 1% of 1/5th of the GDP?
If your governemnt programs would stop giving corporate welfare then maybe, just maybe the post office would be in the black. Have you ever known a corporation to pay in full for all that junk mail it sends out?
Or maybe if your profiteering masters didn't fraud medicare and medicade out of billions, maybe they would be okay? Do public schools go out of business because of private schools? Is Fedex going out of business because of the post office?
Do you have any evidence of the EU rationing? No? Is that why you have no citations? Nothing but maybe one fake story out of Canada about a cyst?
Based on your "percentages", I'm sure a 1% tax on the top will not be a big margin for them.
Pg 22 of the HealthCare Bill MANDATES the Govt will audit books of ALL EMPLOYERS that self- insure!!
Pg 30 Sec 123 of HC bill - THERE WILL BE A GOV'T COMMITTEE that decides what treatments/benefits you can get.
Pg 29 lines 4-16 in the HC bill - YOUR HEALTHCARE IS RATIONED!!!
Pg 42 of HC Bill - The Health Choices Commissioner will choose your HC Benefits for you. You will have no choice!
PG 50 Section 152 in HC bill - HC will be provided to ALL non -US citizens, illegal or otherwise
Pg 58HC Bill - Gov't will have real-time access to individual finances and a National ID Healthcard will be issued!
Pg 59 HC Bill lines 21-24 Gov't will have direct access to your bank accounts for electronic funds transfer.
PG 65 Sec 164 is a payoff subsidized plan for retirees and their families in Unions & community organizations.
Pg 72 Lines 8-14 Gov't is creating an HC Exchange to bring private HC plans under Gov't control.
PG 84 Sec 203 HC bill - Gov't mandates ALL benefit packages for private HC plans in the Exchange
PG 85 Line 7 HC Bill - Specific for Benefit Levels for Plans = The Gov't will ration your Healthcare!
You'll be opting out of medicare and not driving on anything that isn't a private toll road, etc? Let's privatize the military, shall we?
Here's another news flash. We've been living in a mixed economy since before the term "socialism" was even coined.
"This would be the largest take over of rights, privacy, and freedom in US history."
No, Ron. That would be the phony War on Terror. And all the rest of the phony, gangsta occupations the US has perpetrated around the world.