DISQUS

Bush_Bites · 1 year ago

My thinking:

Since it includes the insurance companies (something I don't like, but there ya go), it seems like they would probably be able to chip off enough Repubs to get it passed.

jharp · 1 year ago

Doesn't go far enough for me but I am thrilled nonetheless.

Cheers to Senator Baucus.

ProgressiveTroll · 1 year ago

We need to get this or at least something very similar done, I don't know enough about it yet to make a judgment. I do know we need healthcare to get this awful jobs situation under control. It should be a part of a bailout plan or whatever you want to call it for the auto industry. Healthcare expenses have been hurting the auto industry for years. Premiums and deductibles and the like are going to have to go way down, my family is solidly middle class, although I don't know for how much longer, but there is no way we could pay the premiums on our own.

MyVoice · 1 year ago

Obama's plan was coverage comparable to what Congress receives already, if my memory is right. Does this coverage match Congress's coverage?

vegasbaby · 1 year ago

OT...John...just saw this...students on bus chant "assisinate obama" in Idaho
Crazy stuff....http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Idaho_students_chant_assassinate_Obama_on_1112.html

paulbot5 · 1 year ago

Great....another reason for the government to make you give them money

nicho · 1 year ago

Nice knee-jerk talking point, but the money won't be going to the government. It will be going to insurance companies. This is why we need more regulations in place -- to keep the insurance companies from ripping us off.

AdrianBrowne · 1 year ago

This organization, FreeLancersUnion:

http://freelancersunion.org/

is genuinely a good organization with the best interests of regular people at heart has said "well, this is the system we have and how can we make it work for us" probably views the Baucus plan as a major step in the right direction if not perfect.

nicho · 1 year ago

Sort of like what we have with car insurance now. Unless the rates are tightly regulated -- as they are in some states -- and coverage is standardized as it is with medicare supplement plans, this will be as complicated and confusing as Medicare drug coverage, which benefits only the insurance companies.

Single-payer, universal health care -- just like in the rest of the civilized world.

dances_with_beagles · 1 year ago

Very well stated. Until for-profit health insurance is removed from the picture, any reform is mediocre at best and doesn't address one of the core problems with health care now.

JennieB · 1 year ago

Nothing like auto insurance. If you can't afford auto insurance, you can opt out by choosing not to drive. What happens if you can't afford the health coverage but don't qualify for assistance? Your wages get garnished or you are charged penalty fees that you can't afford?

Obama's plan is much better. People want health coverage and they'll buy it, if it's made affordable and coverage is good.

kladinvt · 1 year ago

It's a good start.

paulbot5 · 1 year ago

1. the federal gov has no right to make you buy healthcare
2. has the government ever been able to regulate something that serves the people, it will end up being corrupted like everything else

jharp · 1 year ago

1) Yes they do
2) Yes. The interstate highway system comes to mind. Private corruption? Government corruption? Both of them are rampant. The only difference is the government corruption can be voted out of office. Private corruption...we're stuck with.

brian · 1 year ago

1.Would you rather they take it right out of your paycheck, like they do in much of the rest of the world?
2. Corruption happens in business, as well. What makes you think it is any better in the business world? It is not.

JennieB · 1 year ago

Exactly. If the government isn't paying the premium, they cannot and should not force people to purchase it. This is not not an issue where the government has to mandate something in order to "protect the general public" as with auto insurance. In which case you can opt out by choosing not to drive.

If the government wants to force people to have health insurance, they can pay for it.

Busboy · 1 year ago

I can't wait for the USA to vote for every sleazebag and illegal alien to receive universal health care. The government can't even afford medicare; and the insurance companies who manage medicare pay between 3 and 6 months in arears. We just fired most of the hospital staff in one county because they simply could not get paid by medicare or medicaid on a timely basis.

brian · 1 year ago

Actually, with Universal Healthcare, which is not what either Obama or Baucus is recommending, would actually reduce cost. Little overhead to submit claims, no middle men, no costs to cover those who are not covered.

Busboy · 1 year ago

You don't understand. The insurance companies manage medicare. The government has no employees to manage it; only oversee it. There would have to be a vast bureaucracy put in place if the government was going to "hands on" manage health care. The USA would have to try to convince people from the insurance business to come to work for the USA. Health care recipients would get even less of a share of the money for illnesses. It's the way government run industries operate.

Busboy · 1 year ago

Last number I heard was that for every dollar going in to medicare? Thirty cents actually got paid to medicare providers (hospitals, doctors and affiliated providers).
Go for it! Line the bureaucrat and insurance company's pockets with your hard earned cash.

brian · 1 year ago

Where did you hear that? I think you got what they are willing to pay to what is actually paid from the Medicare pot, which is above 95%.

Busboy · 1 year ago

You're a dreamer!

brian · 1 year ago

Medicare spends than $1 for each claim processed.
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/OnCall/Story?id=34348...

Busboy · 1 year ago

I don't think you understand what is meant by "overhead". Medicare accepts bids from insurance companies for managing the system. Medicare doesn't have a lot of employees that contribute to their "overhead" costs. The costs are in the hiring of insurance companies that have the contracts. Their overhead per claim is enormous; but probably less than if it were a gov't bureauocracy..

Bush_Bites · 1 year ago

The profit an insurance company has to pay their stockholders should be included in your "overhead" estimate.

Busboy · 1 year ago

yes

brian · 1 year ago

If you do a search, you will find that private insurance companies range in the 75-85% of giving what they have taken in to paying out. I highly doubt that only 30% per dollar is going to pay the bills.

SCLiberal · 1 year ago

So all Americans would be required to donate to the insurance industry. How much more Republican can you get?

GET RID OF THE MIDDLEMAN. NO HEALTH INSURANCE INDUSTRY. PERIOD.

Kucinich has it right.

paulbot5 · 1 year ago

health insurance is supposed to be for super expensive and rare procedures, not everything

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

bullshit. if you're paying into a policy to the tune of $5K - $12K per year it's supposed to cover office visits, emergency room visits and anything inbetween.... and if you haven't noticed the insurance companies don't pay for the "super expensive and rare procedures" ... those are exactly the things they try and weasel out of and stick the policy holder with the bill.

MNUSA · 1 year ago

Health insurance usually covers preventative care (annual physicals, vaccinations, mammograms, blood tests for cholesterol and diabetes, blood pressure, weight, etc.) - sometimes more important than sick care.

bjtwuk · 1 year ago

I'm just curious about one thing: If Americans are mandated to buy health insurance -- and this is a question that Hillary Clinton repeatedly refused to answer during the primaries -- what would be the penalty taken out against anybody who violated the law and did not buy health insurance?

sukabi1 · 1 year ago

mandating health insurance isn't going to fix anything... if a person doesn't already have health insurance it's usually because they can't afford it, not because they don't want it.

This will do nothing to reform the current health care crisis in this country... it's just a bigger handout to the insurance industry.

MNUSA · 1 year ago

Mandating health insurance will fix something - people who don't have health insurance. Universal health insurance should take into consideration a person's income and should be affordable. Who pays for these people's health care now? Either they don't get it or we all pay. Health care shouldn't be a choice - it's a responsibility.

cab02149 · 1 year ago

Although I have big doubts the established system would help make it work rather than sabotage it, the myriad examples from around the world, including Switzerland, point towards the wisdom of ending our insurance based system as we know it. Other countries did it so can we. Times are tough, but consider this: if Healthcare is at 22% of GDP and GDP will stagnate, how could we wait, when healthcare needs will not change with the economy? Economists have stated that healthcare is more grave a threat to the nations economy than the wall street crisis. When the industrialized world is doing it for between 7 and 9 % of their GDP, we can't stand still any longer. I think Dennis Kucinich's approach is best. Expand Medicare and have Medicare seek bids for drugs. No more fooling with compromise. Someone's ox will get gored. Corporations is that ox. It is a risk of business. Become an employee if you don't like the risk. Take us to court.

Busboy · 1 year ago

Medicare taxes pay only half the cost of medicare billings. The rest come from the general fund.
A sales tax rate of 22% is what it is estimated to take in order to fund universal health care. I refer to cab02149's comment below. 22% of GDP. And, that's a minimum. When things are "free", everyone will go to the doctor; some to just get off work...

JennieB · 1 year ago

Mandating health coverage is the wrong approach and I do not support it. Everyone who can even remotely afford health insurance will get it. But to force people to pay for health insurance before paying their mortgage or rent, if they can't afford to do both, is incidious and wrong. These people oftentimes make enough money so that they don't qualify for assistance, yet they still can't make ends meet and, I for one, would not put my health insurance before my mortgage or food. That is what I didn't like about Hillary's plan and I don't like about this one.

Bush_Bites · 1 year ago

Well, the mandate is basically to force young people to buy insurance, because they use less health care so are able to pay in to keep the whole thing afloat for broken-down old farts like Busboy.

SCLiberal · 1 year ago

From the Hightower Lowdown: (http://www.hightowerlowdown.org/node/584)

Let's refute a few of the Big Lies that have kept a national, single-payer health plan from even being considered.

IT'S SOCIALIZED MEDICINE.Wrong, Limbaugh-breath. Like Medicare, government doesn't deliver the health care under a single-payer system (SPS) -- you still go to your choice of doctors and hospitals. SPS, as the name suggests, is merely a government-run payment system. Instead of you and me paying inflated premiums to profit-seeking insurance giants which then pay our medical bills, SPS eliminates the rip-off overhead of the middleman and pays all of our bills directly to the providers.

PRIVATE IS ALWAYS BETTER THAN PUBLIC. Not at performing truly public functions, such as assuring health care for all. Presently, up to a third of the health premiums we pay to insurance corporations go not to health care but to their profits, marketing campaigns, CEO pay packages, posh headquarters, lobbying firms, and -- most damning -- massive bureaucracies whose sole purpose is to try to deny coverage for our medical treatments. With SPS, all of these costs are eliminated -- Medicare, for example, spends only 2% of its revenues on administrative costs.

WE CAN'T AFFORD TO COVER EVERYONE. We can't afford NOT to have universal care. When today's uninsured millions get sick, they end up at the ER -- the most expensive care there is. Also, they get no preventative care, which is far cheaper than paying for the serious illnesses that they later develop. A decade ago, Taiwan switched from a U.S.-style corporatized system to a Canadian-style SPS. They quickly went from 60% of their people covered to practically all -- with virtually zero increase in overall health spending.

THERE'LL BE WAITING LISTS. Hello! Have you ever tried to get a quick appointment with your family doctor -- especially at night or on weekends? Only a third of Americans have same-day access to their own doctor. It takes days, even if you have insurance -- ask an uninsured American about waiting lists! And forget about trying to see a specialist within a month of calling. No country with SPS has a waiting list for emergency care and few have them for primary care. Waits for other procedures are almost always for elective surgeries (liposuction, face lifts, tennis elbow, non-essential MRIs, etc.).

Paul_In_SF · 1 year ago

I'm sorry, but I refuse to buy medical coverage until such time as the drug and medical industries have been re-regulated. As it is, they are both running out of control. I don't trust them and I won't spend any of my money on them. As far as I MUST by coverage? Fuck that.

Older_Wiser · 1 year ago

Universal health care. No middlemen (i.e., no insurance companies). The ONLY way to go. Emphasize prevention, not drugs and band aids.

There is a hell of a lot to undo in this society. Everything is tainted, not just food.

Busboy · 1 year ago

Did you miss the entire discussion below or are you just invariant?

MNUSA · 1 year ago

The Repubs will oppose any spending that benefits the public. Now, if their corporate masters want anything - the sky's the limit.

dula · 1 year ago

still waiting to hear a round about figure for the People...are we talking $100 a month out of pocket? $500? How can we make a decision (not that we have one to make) when we don't know the damage to the struggling Class?