Here is a cute little video made by the Independence Institute to explain how bad the public option would be by comparing that policy prescription to what would happen to the airline industry if the government offered a government airlines for transportation customers.
Articles Tagged ‘public-option’
Government Option Example: Would Government Airlines Work?
Wednesday, October 14th, 2009AHIP: Reform will add $4,000 per year to health care premiums
Monday, October 12th, 2009As the Senate Finance Committee prepares for a Tuesday vote on health care reform legislation, the private insurance trade group under the America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) has gone on the offensive saying Max Baucus‘ America’s Healthy Future Act would actually escalate the already skyrocketing rise in health insurance premiums. In a report issued by PriceWaterHouseCoopers and commissioned by AHIP, researchers found that insurance premiums could go up by as much $4,000 per year (an 111-percent increase) if Congress adopts the plan now know as BaucusCare versus a 79-percent increase if no reforms are adopted.
Key Findings
Health reform could have a significant impact on the cost of private health insurance
coverage.There are four provisions included in the Senate Finance Committee proposal that could
increase private health insurance premiums above the levels projected under current law:
o Insurance market reforms coupled with a weak coverage requirement,
o A new tax on high-cost health care plans,
o Cost-shifting as a result of cuts to Medicare, and
o New taxes on several health care sectors.The overall impact of these provisions will be to increase the cost of private insurance
coverage for individuals, families, and businesses above what these costs would be in
the absence of reform.On average, the cost of private health insurance coverage will increase:
o 26 percent between 2009 and 2013 under the current system and by 40 percent
during this same period if these four provisions are implemented.
o 50 percent between 2009 and 2016 under the current system and by 73 percent
during this same period if these four provisions are implemented.
o 79 percent between 2009 and 2019 under the current system and by 111 percent
during this same period if these four provisions are implemented.(From PriceWaterHouseCoopers’ Potential Impact of Health Reform on the
Cost of Private Health Insurance Coverage)
The timing of this new report couldn’t be worse for the White House and Congressional Democrats as three key members of the Finance Committee - Democrats Kent Conrad and Blanche Lincoln along with Republican Olympia Snowe , have yet to announce their intended votes on the bill but have all expressed concern over the potential costs to consumers if Americans are forced to purchase health insurance via an individual mandate which is included in not only the Baucus bill but all five of the bills currently being considered on Capitol Hill.
“This is a self-serving analysis from the insurance industry, one of the major opponents of health insurance reform,” White House spokesman Reid Cherlin said. “It comes on the eve of a vote that will reduce the industry’s profits. It is hard to take it seriously,” he added. (From Reuters’ White House blasts health insurance sector report.)
Democrats Jay Rockefeller and Ron Wyden have also expressed concern that the Finance bill’s lack of a government-run public option insurance plan will leave tens of millions of Americans without an affordable insurance option should Baucus’ cooperatives approach to reform be adopted in a final Senate bill and have refused to throw their support behind the bill ahead of the vote.
If the Finance Committee fails to pass a bill out of committee during tomorrow’s vote - or the vote is postponed due to a lack of support, health care reform could very well be off the table for 2009.
Bozell: Reid Scheming to Ram ObamaCare Through Congress
Thursday, October 8th, 2009In a conference call late Thursday afternoon, Brent Bozell, founder of the Media Research Center, reiterated what he said on Fox and Friends earlier in the day that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid appears poised to sneak President Obama’s public-option health care reform proposal into an unrelated bill. Rather then hold a bi-partisan discussion in both the House and the Senate, Bozell says, “You’re going to get Harry Reid’s bill, passed by the Senate, by the Democrats… immediately rubber-stamping it, no debate, no House-Senate conference, no Republican discussion, and it goes right to the president for his signature, and oh, by the way, no one knows what’s in it.” Talk about a nuclear option.
A senior aide to the Nevada Democratic senator told CNSNews.com, a news site operated by MRC, that it is ‘likely’ the Senate Majority Leader will use House Resolution 1586 as a ‘shell’ for enacting the final version of the Senate’s health care legislation. H.R. 1586 was a bill passed this past March in the House that sought to impose a ninety percent tax on bonuses paid to employees of certain bailed-out financial institutions, specifically AIG. Were Senator Reid to do this, the substance of H.R. 1586 would be removed and replaced with whatever the White House and Congressional Democratic leaders ultimately decide will encompass their health care package. A scam such as this would require the support of sixty senators to vote for cloture on the motion to proceed to H.R. 1586, thus ending debate on the congressional procedure and moving the bill forward. If Reid successfully obtains the sixty votes needed, then debate begins on the health care package. However, Reid could choose to block all amendments and attempt to get a vote on the entire package.
Should the House vote on the bill as passed by the Senate without amending it, it could then be sent directly to President Obama’s desk for his signature (behind closed doors, no doubt, as was the case with the stimulus package) without the need for those pesky checks and balances. Here’s where it gets real scary: the actual text of the legislation will be determined by Reid himself, who at his own leisure can draft and insert textual language that was never approved by either the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee or the Senate Finance Committee.
This all seems a little much to wrap your brain around, right? Why would Senator Harry Reid, who trails in the polls in his own state behind Republican opponents, choose to do this? What politician in their right mind would sign on for this? Democratic candidates across the board are getting clobbered by their Republican opponents, so would this not make a catastrophic situation even worse? There is certainly enough corruption and lack of distain for the American populous to believe that the Democratic majority are capable of such a swindle, but why now? Does Harry Reid, with all his bent up ego, see himself as the modern day General Custer and this is his last stand? That if he is going to go down, he’s going to take every one else with him? From a political scientist stand point, this scenario does not make sense and, if it does come to pass, would only reek of desperation in the eyes of the American people, further damaging what little support the Democrats in Congress find themselves standing with now.
Baucuscare Bill Vote Delayed for Cost Report
Tuesday, October 6th, 2009What could very well result in a resounding death knell for public-option health care reform legislation at a time when the White House and the Congressional Democratic leadership have grown increasingly desperate in their efforts to push it forward, a key vote in the Senate Finance Committee has been pushed back to later this week, and perhaps into next week as well. Crucial fence riders, including Maine Republican Olympia Snowe and West Virginia Democrat Jay Rockefeller, await an estimate on how much Senator Max Baucus’s overhaul of the American health care system would cost before committing themselves either way for the bill.
The Obama administration and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) have put relentless pressure on the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Finance to schedule a vote on his health care reform bill, America’s Healthy Future Act of 2009, prior to the release of the program’s estimated cost by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), to no avail. The reason behind this may be that the president knows that it is very likely the CBO’s findings will come out against him as so many, if not all, of their studies related to the health care issue this past summer have exactly that.
And while former Health and Human Services secretary under President George W. Bush and former governor of Wisconsin, Tommy Thompson, and former Democratic House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt have both urged Congress to overcome their differences and get the job done on health care reform, their rallying cry hasn’t exactly inspired confidence in the hearts of wavering senators. Thompson and Gephardt admitted that there still remained many “troublesome and unresolved” issues in the Baucuscare bill. What is more is that former Tennessee senator Bill Frist, who to TIME magazine expressed support for health care reform, recanted, saying that the proposal is “not where I want it to be. It’s going to cost way too much, and we’re not going to get all the uninsured into the marketplace.”
Even if the CBO report comes out against the Baucus bill and it fails to pass the Finance Committee with a majority vote, there still remains Senator Reid’s ‘nuclear’ option that he has threatened Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats with in the past should they fail to reach an agreement. And yet there is even doubt there would be enough Democratic support for that. Falling approval numbers for President Obama and the rise in the number of dissatisfied independent voters has many senators, if some who have been in office for quite some time, concerned about their job security. The ‘nuclear’ option, if passed, would likely be the president calling on Democratic senators to commit seppuku for the sake of progressivism; a call very few would care to endure.
Rep. Tom Price: The ‘Tide is Turning’ in Health Care Debate
Monday, October 5th, 2009Dr. Tom Price, representative for the 6th Congressional District of Georgia, said candidly in a late-afternoon conference call on Thursday, October 1st, that from where he sits, in the ‘cross-hairs’ of the health care debate, the ‘tide is turning’ because ‘people are waking up’ to the grim reality we as Americans face under a government-run health care system.
The chairman of the Republican Study Committee (RSC), a group of over one hundred and ten House Republicans organized for the purpose of advancing a conservative social and economic agenda in the House of Representatives, argued that it is not just the public-option proposal that stands to destroy the quality of health care in America, though it certainly remains the biggest topic of concern for conservative legislators. Two other specific areas of concern include the pay-or-play employer mandate as well as the idea, included in every single plan proposed by the Democrats, that decisions have to made by Washington and not between a patient and his doctor. Every single one of these proposals has the potential to do great harm to this country’s health care system.
Representative Price insisted that any health care reform legislators, Republican or Democrat, propose must be based on six principles – accessibility, affordability, quality, responsiveness, innovation, and choices.
The Georgia representative went on to say that Democrats are lying when they claim Republicans and conservatives are against any kind of health care reform and that they have not produced a single alternative solution to their proposals. He agrees with Congressional Democrats that our health care system is not perfect and that it contains serious problems that need to be addressed, although they are far different from anything they have in mind. Among the things we need to solve in health care system, Price says, includes fixing insurance problems, specifically the areas of portability and patients with pre-existing injuries who can’t get coverage, as well as the lawsuit abuse issue and the establishment of the patient/doctor relationship into law.
And, contrary to the claims made by the Democrats that House Republicans have offered up nothing in return for their proposals, the RSC to date has written up thirty-five health care-related laws or bills, including HR 3400, the Empowering Patients First Act. The bill addresses four main principles – access to coverage for all Americans, coverage truly owned by the patient, improvement of the health care delivery structure, and the reining in of out of control costs.
HR 3400 makes the purchase of health care financially feasible for all Americans, covers pre-existing conditions, protects employer-sponsored insurance, and shines light on existing health care plans. The legislation also grants a far greater choice and portability to the patient, gives employers more flexibility in the benefits they offer their employees, and expands the individual market through the creation of several pooling mechanism. The delivery structure is advanced thanks to the establishment of doctor-led quality measures and the reimbursement of physicians. And finally, the cost of the plan is offset through decreasing defensive medicine, savings from health care efficiencies, sifting out waste, fraud and abuse, plus an annual one-percent non defense discretionary spending step down.
Whatever politicians ultimately decide to move forward with in terms of reforming the nation’s health care system, Price firmly believes that we as American citizens have to ensure that that plan safeguards our ability to make our own medical decisions, not politicians on the Washington Beltway to make them for us. Entrenching the patient/doctor relationship, he believes, is the pulse of the health care issue.
WashPost: Wyden and Rockefeller may vote against Finance bill
Monday, October 5th, 2009In today’s Washington Post, Ceci Connolly reports that Senate Democrats Ron Wyden and Jay Rockefeller “have refused to pledge support” for the Senate Finance bill expected to come to a vote this week. Should the two liberal Dems vote “no” on the amended America’s Healthy Future Act, health care reform would be dealt a serious blow as Finance chairman Max Baucus would be forced to reopen negotiation on the final bill needed to move the reform debate into the next phase.
“More needs to be done to hold insurance companies accountable, to hold premiums down for the American people,” Wyden said in an interview Sunday. “I want to continue these discussions.” (From Democrats Wyden, Rockefeller Withhold Support of Panel’s Bill in the Washington Post.)
Wyden and Rockefeller’s opposition comes as a result of Finance Committee defeats of public option amendments proposed by Rockefeller and Democrat Chuck Schumer. The Baucus bill is currently the only one of five bills in Congress that does not include some form of a government-run public option health insurance plan.
As things stand, Harry Reid is running out of time and options in the getting a bill through the Senate. He has yet to retract his promise to go nuclear and attempt to pass a health care reform bill via budget reconciliation, but in order to do so he must invoke that process no later than October 15. If the Finance Committee is forced to reopen debate, there is little chance the Congressional Budget Office could score a new bill in time for Finance to hold another vote and give Reid a bill to merge with the late Ted Kennedy’s HELP (Health, Education, Labor and Pensions) Committee over the next 10 days.
It was thought that Democrat proponents of the public option would allow the Finance Bill to pass out of committee and lobby Reid to drop the bill’s cooperatives in favor of Kennedy’s public option proposal before a floor vote in the Senate, but Wyden and Rockefeller have seemingly joined House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in her ‘public option or bust’ approach to health care reform.
Rasmussen: 63% of Americans Fear Losing Health Plan With Obamacare
Sunday, October 4th, 2009Based on the responses of one thousand likely voters to a Rasmussen survey conducted over the telephone nationally, sixty-three percent of respondents said they believed that guaranteeing no one would be forced to change their health insurance coverage was a far greater priority than simply handing American citizens, as well as illegal aliens, the choice of a public-option health insurance plan. Only twenty-nine percent of those surveyed took the opposite position.
Despite reassurances from President Obama that if you like your current health care coverage you can keep it under his health care reform proposal, fifty-three percent of insured voters remain convinced that it is likely they would have to change their health insurance coverage should the bill, proposed by the president and supported by progressives, were to become law. This helps clarify, if but a little, the confusion over why, if fifty-four percent of Americans agree that this country’s health care system needs major changes, only forty-one percent support the president’s comprehensive reform agenda.
Favor for the creation of a government-run non-profit health insurance option stood at forty-six percent when respondents were asked whether they would choose that rather then a private health insurance plan. When these same individuals were then asked about the creation of a public-option should it be known that it would encourage companies to drop private health insurance coverage for workers, however, support dropped drastically to twenty-nine percent.
In addition to this, slightly more then half of likely voters, fifty-three percent, believe the government-run public-option system would cost taxpayers money. Again, this despite repeated claimed made by the White House and the Congressional Democratic leadership that this would not be the case. Not surprisingly, the greatest support for the idea that President Obama’s plan would cost taxpayers more then their current health care coverage came from seniors, sixty-two percent of which said costs would increase under the proposal. And, finally, slightly less then half of likely voters, forty-eight percent, believe health insurance companies would still provide better quality service and more choices than a government-run public-option system.
Senate Committee on Finance Approves State-Based Public Option Plan
Sunday, October 4th, 2009Just when the majority of Americans thought they could sleep a little easier since the Senate Committee on Finance squashed the so-called public option, they approve of another version of it just Thursday.
That’s right, ladies and gentlemen. The public option passed the Senate Committee on Finance Thursday. But, it’s not “nationalized health care.” You see, Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) and his cohorts on the Left passed an amendment that would create a state-based public option program, a measure proposed by Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA).
“This proposal is about giving federal dollars to the states and putting them in the driver’s seat,” Cantwell said. “It is a public plan, but negotiated with the private sector.”
All Democrats except Sen. Blanche Lincoln (Ark.) voted to support the Cantwell amendment and all Republicans voted against it. Baucus, who has resisted adding a public option of any kind to his bill based on the argument that there is not enough support in the Senate, was enthusiastic about Cantwell’s proposal. “This is a great amendment,” he said.
Sen. Baucus believed that there wasn’t enough support for a federal public option, but now he backs a state public option. After governors on both sides of the aisle resisted co-operatives for the enormous entitlement strain they would create, it is doubtful they would throw support behind this measure either. With states so heavily (and disproportionately) subsidizing health care infrastructure locally, the state-based public option would only further deplete their already barren coffers, which would serve as yet another excuse to raise taxes. When the federal government doesn’t kick enough money to state X, its lawmakers will have to find a way to fund it.
Still, all Democrats but Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas voted for the amendment, indicating they believe they could garner support for shifting the financial and regulatory burden of health care to the states. Politically, it makes sense. After all, the Democrats have to pass something, or risk President Obama facing his, as Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) called it, Waterloo. But, if the program fails, Congress can dodge the blame and instead point to the failures of individual states.
Here are the “nuts and bolts” of the plan:
Under the Cantwell amendment, people with incomes between 133 percent and 200 percent of the federal poverty level who do not get insurance at work would enroll in these state-based programs. The federal tax credits that would otherwise have been given to those individuals would instead be paid to states to finance the plan. Cantwell based her amendment on a program in Washington state.
States could choose to set up their plans, which would negotiate with medical providers on payment rates rather than base them on Medicare’s fees, as other public option plans would do. Cantwell and Baucus said the amendment would save money. “We are putting someone in charge, finally, of negotiating rates,” Cantwell said.The benefits offered by these state plans would have to be at least as good as under Medicaid or through a private plan sold through the health insurance exchange in the legislation.
Republicans complained that any claims that the state plans would save money were purely speculative because Cantwell’s amendment has not been scored by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). “There is no CBO score to tell us that,” said Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.). “We don’t know that.” Republicans also pointed out that Baucus had ruled numerous GOP amendments out of order because there were not CBO scores.
So, an amendment that has not been scored by the Congressional Budget Office is going to be sandwiched in the Baucus health care bill, an amendment that would obligate states to more entitlements and more bureaucracy. The government is going to negotiate rates. Oh, and those tax cuts have been eliminated, too. Splendid. Just splendid.
The American Spectator
The American Spectator
Patients First
Americans for Prosperity
NRO
National Review Online
News Fifty
National Headline News from All 50 States
Heritage Foundation- The Foundry
Official Blog of the Heritage Foundation
Health Care Freedom Coalition
Affordable Health Care Agenda
Association of American Physicians and Surgeons
AAPS and Health Care Reform
The American Spectator
Patients First
Americans for Prosperity
NRO
National Review Online
News Fifty
National Headline News from All 50 States
Heritage Foundation- The Foundry
Official Blog of the Heritage Foundation
Health Care Freedom Coalition
Affordable Health Care Agenda
Association of American Physicians and Surgeons
AAPS and Health Care Reform
