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twitterLETTER TO THE EDITOR:
On way or another, we’ll pay for reform
Sunday, Nov. 1, 2009 | 2:02 a.m.
The proposed health care legislation will cost you money and raise the deficit, contrary to what you have been told.
In one Senate health care bill, $40 billion of the costs were to be covered by a tax on medical equipment manufacturers. That tax, of course, would be passed on to you and me in higher costs for medical equipment.
These companies then sent their lobbyists to the House and so far were able to get revenue generated by the tax reduced to $20 billion. Now that the House is $20 billion short of the revenue it would need, what will it do?
House members will either find some other industry to tax, and the tax will be passed along to us, or they will put the $20 billion on the government credit card, which will be paid for by us.
Heads, we lose. Tails, we lose.
Contrary to what the government tells you, there is no free lunch and the only protection from Congress’ spending is to have lobbyists who can help shift taxes to someone else. And guess who the ultimate payer is? It is us, folks. It is always us.
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The Sun
Locally owned and independent for more than 50 years.
So your plan then is to do nothing and just trust that your current health plan costs will remain unchanged. Hey, who knows? Maybe they'll even go down next year. Right!
Do you know whether your boss is required to provide you with health insurance? Is he required to pick up any particular percentage or is it entirely up to him? If you should lose your job, will you be able to afford COBRA? For how long? Have you been to see a doctor any time in the past? If so, when you do get rehired, will the new company plan reject you and your pre-existing condition? If you're over 50, will the new plan welcome you with open arms, or do you think they might examine your medical history more carefully than they might someone 21?
Just something to think about.
"The proposed health care legislation will cost you money and raise the deficit, contrary to what you have been told."
And also reduce your service
Why is it that we cannot start with a simple healthcare bill that handles the bulk of the concerns most liberal and conservative have - without a public option plan/single-payer plan -- it would pass
- Give everyone equal access to tax deductible (same as a business provided deduction) health insurance by, multi-state Health Insurance Exchanges and State and Regional Cooperatives open to individuals and small employers, and paid access to Medicare for early retirement.
- Subsidize transient uncovered people who are laid off (COBRA or Medicare) and those that earn up to 2 times the poverty level (4 times is too high a threshold).
- Require coverage of pre-existing conditions on a new policy, prevent dropping coverage.
- Individual mandate - as a minimum everyone has a "minimal essential benefits - catastrophic" healthcare policy.
- Eliminated cost shifting where one plans pricing power gets a lower rate than other less powerful insurers. That is the cost of a red pill is the same for all.
- Impose tort reform to reduce defensive medicine.
- Government investment in innovation and technology.
- Automate Healthcare records to eliminate duplicate tests by multiple doctors.
- Reduce fraud, corruption and eliminate billing scams.
Future, let's meet and have a friendly "TOKE"! Clinton knowingly stripped Black folks from the public dole (welfare), however, he knowingly kept criminal and illegal Mexicans and FLDS-LDS members on this cash-cow. Other WASP-only welfare programs (subsidies): farming, faith-based initiative, dairy, health insurance carriers, ranching, oil & gas, groundwater distribution, mineral extractors, etc.
You mean we already don't pay larcenous premiums only to be denied care when we need it, not to mention being denied coverage altogether, at the whim of the insurance companies?
First off, all other civilized nations with Universal Health provide equal or better health care to their citizens and at half the cost because, among other things, a national plan does not have to make a profit out of people's misery. I have lived in England and have seen their NHS system first hand so articles like this are nothing but corporate-backed propaganda to me.
Second, every member of our Congress enjoy government-run health care so how come none of them ever complains about it? It is only their fellow citizens they want to deprive of it to protect the bottom line of their corporate "campaign contributors".
Third, in no other civilized country with universal health care, their citizens routinely go bankrupt to pay for medical bills which seems like one hell of a tax to me. In fact, it is a phenomenon unique to us and it is our national disgrace.
Fourth, I presume every staff member of the Las Vegas Sun enjoys a group health plan because it lowers the cost by spreading the risk around. So why is it so hard to think of universal health care as a prepaid nationwide group health plan under which you pay for it when you don't need it so that you can have guaranteed access to it when you do need it?
They don't care how much this piece of garbage will cost, it is FAIRRRR. The liberals love Cuba. Every citizen is poor and they all have equally bad health care so liberals rate that FAIRRRR.
Since the previous poster chose to mention Cuba, here are some comparative statistics on public health between the U.S., France and Cuba for the benefit of those who care for facts:
Source: World Health Organization (http://www.who.int/countries/en/)
U.S.
Life expectancy at birth m/f (years): 75/80
Healthy life expectancy at birth m/f (years, 2003): 67/71
Probability of dying under five (per 1 000 live births): 8
Probability of dying between 15 and 60 years m/f (per 1 000 population): 137/80
Total expenditure on health per capita (Intl $, 2006): 6,714
Total expenditure on health as % of GDP (2006): 15.3
France:
Life expectancy at birth m/f (years): 77/84
Healthy life expectancy at birth m/f (years, 2003): 69/75
Probability of dying under five (per 1 000 live births): 5
Probability of dying between 15 and 60 years m/f (per 1 000 population): 124/57
Total expenditure on health per capita (Intl $, 2006): 3,554
Total expenditure on health as % of GDP (2006): 11.1
Cuba
Life expectancy at birth m/f (years): 76/80
Healthy life expectancy at birth m/f (years, 2003): 67/70
Probability of dying under five (per 1 000 live births): 7
Probability of dying between 15 and 60 years m/f (per 1 000 population): 127/82
Total expenditure on health per capita (Intl $, 2006): 363
Total expenditure on health as % of GDP (2006): 7.1
Dear DaveinLV--thanks for the post of facts which are sorely needed in opinions/letters in the SUN. Facts and Objectivity should rule our forming of opinions. Thanks!
Anyone who wants to compare Cuba's health care with the U.S. should move to Cuba and get their medical care there.
How much is freedom worth?
How many residents of the U.S. who are Cuban by birth want to go back to Cuba to get medical treatment, communist style...
DaveinLV rants: "You mean we already don't pay larcenous premiums only to be denied care when we need it, not to mention being denied coverage altogether, at the whim of the insurance companies?"
No Dave, I have not been denied care when I need it. And that goes for my entire family.
Insurance premiums are high, but so is the cost of doing business for the medical providers.
And you dare to compare Cuba with the U.S. What a piece of work.
When do you think was the last time a Cuban doctor or Cuban hospital was sued for malpractice?
Ghostcommander... There are other things to consider than just statistics. Like quality of life. Or in Cuba's case, life itself...
The WHO has about as much credibility as dog feces. They look at such stupid and worthless things as the tax structure of a country. How evenly healthcare is distributed. Individual countries make different decisions as to what to use in the statistics given. In most of Europe if a baby dies in the first 24 hours after birth it is considered stillborn. In the US it is conseidered live birth.
The WHO is a bunch of lying socialist scum. Go to their website and read the criteria they use. It is all BS and lies. If you believe it, it shows what a fool you really are.
The bottom line:
"The House health care bill unveiled Thursday clocks in at 1,990 pages and about 400,000 words. With an estimated 10-year cost of $894 billion, that comes out to about $2.24 million per word."
Check it out -- http://www.politico.com/news/stories/100...
GhostCommander:
Facts and objectivity only matter to those who value them. Judging from the reaction of one poster to my numbers (who has questioned them but has not bothered to present any facts of his own) his position seems to be "my mind is made up, don't confuse me with facts" and the corporations take full advantage of that mentality.
The irony is that many of those who hold such adamant views one day find themselves without a job, with a pre-existing condition or something their insurance company decides not to pay for (the rate is one of the highest in California according to several reports such as http://www.bobcesca.com/blog-archives/20... ) at which time they face financial disaster and even bankruptcy and their very own words come back and haunt them. Even among those who manage to avoid such misfortunes, I doubt how many choose to voluntarily turn down the "government-run" Medicare when their own time comes.
Which only goes to prove the truth behind the statement by Florynce R. Kennedy, "There can be no really pervasive system of oppression . . . without the consent of the oppressed."
But not to worry. Although this Congress is going to deliver an even worse health care system than the one already exists (it is actually possible, believe me) still some day universal health care will come to America like the rest of the civilized world because, as Winston Churchill had said, "The Americans will always do the right thing... After they've exhausted all the alternatives."
A single payor system is less expensive than multiple. Interviews I have seen with Doctors shows their frustration with the current multiple payor system. Either go to single payor or at the very least standardize the formats used by each insurer when submitting for payment.
So short of a single payor. Give a Gubment option and standardize the format that all insurers will use.
Go through all recent cases of malparactice and find the average cost for , death, loss of limb, removing the wrong kidney, leaving in a sponge, etc. and make payment based on that. Assign a COLA formula to increase as the years go by. Litigate only new, substantially different, circumstances.
Is it so strange? Really? Insurers have already established the rates for many of the things mentioned above and more. Every procedure has been identified and a "reasonable" and "customary" cost assigned to it.
Tort reform. Standard billing form for payment. Is that so difficult?
What I am wondering is how are they going to enforce the "must have" insurance requirement. Will they repo my body and part it out if I cannot or will not buy insurance?
destruct_mutt:
Re: how are they going to enforce the "must have" insurance requirement.
A most pertinent question but never underestimate the Congress when it comes to thoughtlessness and stupidity which you and I eventually end up paying for.
I think DaveinLV may be refering to me but I have read the WHO report, which by the way is many years old. I have read it and it is such a bunch of nonsense that I have trouble remembering it. The whole thing is sheer stupidity. I don't want to cite specifics but it is online for anyone who wants to wade through all the lies and distortion it contains.
It typically goes something like since we have a lot of black young men in their late teens and early twenties dying in North Las Vegas and the reason they die must be lack of health care. Any fool knows the reason they are dying is bacuse they are involved in gangs and drug dealing and other bad lifestyle choice. It has nothing to do with healthcare.
I'm glad DaveinLV clued me in. Next time I get seriously ill I will hop a plane to Cuba and get cured. I understand their world class doctors make about $60 dollars a month.
The Merchant of Venice - William Shakespeare
Where will they be taking their "pound of flesh" from?
We are the ones LOSING NOW. Time to change course. The wallstreet healthcare will destroy us.
Public option is then only way out
jb101:
Those young black men in their 20's that are dying in N Las Vegas. They all die of lead poisoning. A very common ailment amongst druggies.
DaveinLV makes sense. Get that banana out of your ear. Now all the insurance execs join the bankers, doctors, big business folks and their lawyers at republican clubs. And they golf on us. Dine on us. Drink to our health! It's been a pretty good run for them. Throw out the sick; fleece 'em. Cherry pick. Raise the premiums and lower the service. Pre-existing...
We'll err and err and err again, but less and less and less.
The public option is like the divestiture of AT&T. It put an end to a monopoly by opening up the market to realistic competition. Look at the facts against the backdrop of what the civilized world pays for and receives for their money. The health insurance industry has been a lucrative cash cow. Our current approach is unsustainable because health and economy for millions outweigh extravagant wealth for .00000013% of our population.
I don't know how the public option is like the divestiture of AT&T. The "Baby Bells" did not have to compete with the Federal Government.
I don't see where a 3% profit margin is a lucrative cash cow for the health insurance industry or can be called extravagant wealth.
We need to fix the problems with health care,not a government takeover of our health care system...