The Medicare-for-All Moment

There is only one solution to the twin problems of escalating health care costs and the epidemic of the uninsured: a Medicare-for-All, single payer system.

Unfortunately, the healthcare debate on Capitol Hill has evolved without serious consideration of the Medicare-for-All single payer health proposal. There are many reasons for this, but one is that many who actually support Medicare-for-All have claimed that the proposal is "not feasible."

With the House leadership having settled on a single proposal, now is the time to set aside worries about feasibility. The House process is resolved. Members of Congress should have the opportunity to vote on the merits, up-or-down, on a Medicare-for-All single payer health proposal.

Whether they will have this chance is in the hands of Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and is likely to be decided soon. Contact her right away to urge that the House be permitted to vote on a Medicare-for-All single payer health proposal. Call [phone] or (as a second best alternative, submit comments on the Speaker's web page).

Representative Anthony Weiner, D-New York, has proposed to introduce such a Medicare-for-All measure on the House floor in the form of an amendment to the leadership's healthcare package. If a vote is permitted, it will mark the first time either house of Congress has voted on Medicare-for-All, and will be a landmark in the inevitable march to a national Medicare-for-All system.

Meanwhile, Representative Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, is seeking to enable states to implement their own Medicare-for-All single payer health initiatives. Representative Kucinich introduced an amendment in the House Education and Labor Committee to facilitate such action, by providing for waivers of ERISA (employee benefit) requirements for states adopting single payer plans. This amendment passed the committee with bipartisan support. If Speaker Pelosi decides to incorporate it into the leadership bill, it stands a good chance of becoming law.

Although there are reasons to be skeptical, one can hope that the health reform package that ultimately becomes law will significantly expand coverage and curb insurance industry abuses.

But it is certain that the health reform package will not solve the overwhelming problems of coverage, cost and quality of care facing the country. Solving those problems requires going to the source: the health insurance corporations.

With its private health insurance industry-dominated system, the United States spends far more than other wealthy nations on health care (at least 50 percent more than every country except Luxembourg) but sports middling health indicators.

The private health insurance industry-dominated system in the United States permits 45 million people to live without health insurance, denying them access to preventative and routine care, resulting in the death of at least 35,000 people a year.

The private health insurance industry-dominated system tolerates private health insurance companies making life-and-death rationing decisions for millions of people with only minimal accountability.

The private health insurance industry-dominated system lets private health insurers refuse to take sick people as customers and engage in endless manipulations to discard its customers if they do become sick.

The private health insurance industry-dominated system features a system in which medical bills and illness contribute to almost two of every three personal bankruptcies -- even though three-quarters of these bankrupt people had insurance when they became sick.

Not least, the private health insurance industry-dominated health care system translates into a private health insurance industry-dominated political system. As a result, too many politicians refuse to consider real solutions.

There is a cure all for these ills. It is a Medicare-for-All, single-payer system, in which the government pays medical bills (thus operating as the "single payer").

In a Medicare-for-All system, health care is available as a matter of right. No one is denied treatment because they can't pay. No one is mandated to buy coverage. No one is denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions. No one goes bankrupt paying medical bills.

A Medicare-for-All system would save $350 billion - $400 billion a year in costs (up to $4 trillion over the 10-year period routinely analyzed by the Congressional Budget Office) -- enough to cover all of the uninsured. No scandalous CEO pay packages. No money siphoned out of the system by rent-seeking middlemen. No needless paperwork and bureaucracy.

A Medicare-for-All system succeeds by doing away with the private health insurance industry.

The powerful insurers, understandably, don't like this idea. Yet despite waves of deceptive and misleading propaganda about the purported horrors of government-run insurance, the people do like the idea of Medicare-for-All -- polls show it is supported by a majority of the public.

But insurance industry dollars have spoken louder than the people's voices. And so Medicare-for-All hasn't been given a serious hearing in Congress. Speaker Pelosi should at least enable a clean up-or-down vote. Call [phone] and urge her to do so.

 

Comments

[whillice - Huffpost Blogger]

Beautiful. Thinking about this as a basic moral issue, in what world is it a good idea to say who lives and dies based on how much money they can pay or how much their employer can provide?

Oh, that's right-- corporate world. Where the Almighty Dollar rules and everyone bows down before Gordon Gecko.

The other side is the "Medicare for Everyone" is simple and easily recognizable. All this broo-ha-ha over a public option or a trigger or an opt-in or opt-out just creates more playground for the special interests to play in.

[GreshamGuy]

Taken without reference to the names, looking only at the actions, the private health insurance industry bears an uncanny resemblance to a protection racket.

Pay or die.

[MikaS]

Wellpoint

Annual Revenue - $61.3 billion
Net Profit - 2.5 billion
Wellpoint CEO: Angela Braley
Braley's salary: $9.8 million/year
In 2009, Wellpoint has spent 752 families' yearly premiums on lobbying. ($9,529,747.00)
The average payment to a Wellpoint lobbyist would cover 49 individual yearly premiums. ($232,000.00)
Wellpoint currently employs 33 lobbying groups in Wahsington, DC.
986 people pay a year's worth of premiums so Wellpoint can hire lobbying firms.
~In this decade alone, Wellpoint spent $101,170,939.00 lobbying congress.

United Health Group

United Health Group CEO: Stephen Hemsley
Hemsley's Salary: $3.2 million/year
Total value of Stephen Hemsley stock options: $744,232,068.00
A few years ago, one in every seven hundred dollars spent on health care in the U.S. went to pay him. Every day of 2009, Stephen Hemsley has earned $819,363.10
Stephen Hemsley has earned $102,741.68 an hour in 2009.
United Health spent over $12.6 million since 2007 to lobby against health care reform.
This could cover the average health care cost of 992 families of four for one year.

(part 1)

[MikaS]

Cigna

The CEO of Cigna is Edward Hanway.
In 2008:
Annual revenue: $29.1 Billion
Net Income: $292 Million CEO Salary: $12.2 Million
Hanway's 5-year compensation: $120.5 Million
$120.5 Million would cover the yearly out-of-pocket health care costs for the population of Providence,RI.

The three largest insurance companies saved $300,000,000 in the last five years by dumping the sick.
~U.S. worker's out-of-pocket expenses have risen 93% since 2000.~
~Profits have risen 438% for the top 10 insurance companies in the same time.

Information obtained in films here:

http://sickforprofit.com/

Medicare for All!

(Part 2)

[EbonBear]

I live under a universal single-payer system. I am British and served by the NHS which I use frequently (I suffer from a chronic condition). While it's admittedly not perfect (it's difficult to think of what could be), nor is it as bad as the cherry-picked failures mentioned by the media would have you believe. Yes, things go wrong and people occasionally slip through the cracks, as they do in any system, but most of the country gets good care, in reasonable time, at relatively little cost (NHS budget averages $2000 per citizen).

I have never been presented with a bill for my care. All of my doctor's visits (every fortnight, occasionally more often), psychiatric sessions (at least every 2 weeks), medication and tests are paid for (from the taxes I paid when I was able to work). The only time I've heard the words "pre-existing condition" is when my doctor was checking my medication wouldn't interefere with any other condition I had.

It's not perfect. But it is a he// of a lot better than what you currently have and there's a wealth of data available for the USA to study. Unless you guys are deadset on reinventing the wheel again.

[Samalabear]

EbonBear, our government is failing us miserably. This bill that has passed the House is a nightmare. Simply put, neither Obama nor our Congress is listening to us. And we don't have to reinvent the wheel, you're right. We already have an example of single-payer to build on, our Medicare (Canada) and our Veteran's Administration (NHS example). The polls show overwhelming support for an expansion of Medicare as the PO. This would eventually lead us to single payer -- and this the rub. The powers-to-be from the WH on down do not want this to happen. They want to keep the status quo.

It's a sad state of affairs.

[sociocanuck]

As a Canadian with a chronic condition of sorts I think I can very much identify with your state of mind. And I agree that our systems are not 'perfect', but a heck of a lot better than wholly Class and Status based alternatives.

The thing holding us back is a modality: with respect to most social constructs Canada and the U.K. are, like America, fundamentally Liberal Welfare States ('liberal' in the economic sense of the term, not the smear you see coming from dissenters on this site) - which is only one step down from Corporatist. We have a more progressive healthcare system, indeed, but it is hindered by the overall sociopolitical system in which it lies.

Truly Social Democratic Welfare States, on the other hand (Scandinavian nations, mostly) can have their Universal Healthcare cakes and eat them too; because the system on which they stand is far more focused on socialization and social justice across almost every political issue.

[AwakeNow]

Truly this is the only solution to a healthcare system that is dysfunctional. The cost of care is astronomical and growing all the time. Making healthcare available to smaller numbers of people. Businesses are unable to cover their employees if they are a small business. Average citizens have less and less disposable income to spend, save, or invest. This effects vast numbers of people and many sectors of our nation. I would also like to say that there are citizens who are protesting in insurance office lobbies, Nancy Pelosi's office, and elsewhere; who have agreed to risk arrest to stand up for the benefit of the majority of their fellow citizens. To these brave citizens I wish to state my most sincere appreciation on my behalf and that of my children and grand-children. I am hoping in the future that there will be a brave new branch of media that will report honestly on the protests, issues, and people leading and practicing our right to freedom of speech.

[gregczar]

God Bless You, Robert Weissman

[Tyler-Durden]

THIS IS THE TRUTH RIGHT HERE, PEOPLE.

if you EVER think you'll go to a doctor...

if you EVER think you may contract cancer...

if you EVER think you may contract diabetes...

IF YOU EVER CARED ABOUT THE HEALTH OF ANYONE YOU LOVED...

you would be DEMANDING SINGLE PAYER SYSTEM. to h311 with insurance companies. they have run themselves out of business with their own greed, and are not too big to fail. only the greed of the politicians stands between us and our best method for healthcare.

[ncmom54]

Bravo! very well said.