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Today's Top News
Insurance Company Profits vs. Care for All
Americans are divided over the question of how best to reform a
dysfunctional health care system.
But the new Republican majority in the House entertains no doubt about what must be done: The for-profit insurance industry must be restored to its “proper” place as the decider of who gets care -- and how much they will have to pay.
In the first major vote of the new Congress, the House voted 245-189 in favor of repealing the modest health care reforms approved last year.
A total of 242 Republicans -- including Wisconsin’s Paul Ryan, James Sensenbrenner, Tom Petri, Sean Duffy and Reid Ribble -- voted for repeal. So too did three conservative Democrats.
A total of 189 “no” votes were cast by Democrats -- including Wisconsinites Tammy Baldwin, Ron Kind and Gwen Moore.
House Speaker John Boehner claimed that the vote represented the will of the American people.
But did it?
Survey research suggests that, while Americans overwhelmingly support health care reform, they are not sure the reform cobbled together by President Obama and the last Congress is the proper fix. According to a new Washington Post/ABC News poll, the country is split three ways: 33 percent for complete repeal of the measure adopted last year, 35 percent for partial repeal, and 30 percent for no repeal.
Those numbers don’t tell the whole story, however.
What about the tens of millions of Americans who are dissatisfied with the current law but who recognize that the whole debate about repealing it is a political show primarily designed to satisfy talk-radio hosts while exciting insurance industry campaign donors?
The Americans who oppose repeal but refuse to buy into the fantasy that the health care system has been sufficiently reformed are right. And there are a lot of them. According to the Associated Press poll, 43 percent of Americans want the government to do more to re-engineer the existing health care system.
That’s millions more than favor the repeal proposed by Republican leaders.
That level of support for more radical reform is the great untold story of the current debate.
The American people are not fools.
Substantial numbers of them understand that what is called “Obamacare” by Republicans is a compromise proposal that, at most, addresses the worst abuses of the nation’s for-profit insurers and health providers while outlining a framework for genuine reform.
Unfortunately, Congress did not take the next and necessary step toward a system that provides all Americans with high-quality health care while holding down costs, which now eat up 17 percent of GDP.
Rather, House Republicans used their new majority to push for a return to the bad old days when insurance executives were deemed to have an absolute right to their multimillion-dollar bonuses but children and others with pre-existing conditions were deemed to have a right only to beg for charity.
If the House debate on repeal of health care served a purpose, it was to illustrate the deep divide between those who believe the highest priority is to preserve insurance industry profits and those who worry about sick kids.
Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, summed up the whole charade with her usual precision when she invited House Republicans to consider their responsibility to represent not just corporations but the common good. “So I would argue that my good friends -- some of them are new and I appreciate their newness -- I appreciate their desire to keep a commitment to constituents -- but when you come to the Congress, you have to govern, you have to look at the whole of America,” she declared during the debate on repeal. “And therefore, looking at the whole of America, you need to look at the crux; the crux is saving lives.”
The congresswoman bluntly rejected the notion that repeal is the economic necessity Republicans suggest. Instead, she proposed, preserving reforms that protect the most vulnerable is a life-and-death necessity. “Frankly, I would just say to you, this is about saving lives. Jobs are very important; we created jobs,” explained Jackson Lee. “But even the title of their legislation, H.R. 2, ‘job-killing’ -- this is killing Americans if we take this away, if we repeal this bill.”
That’s a credible argument, to be sure.
But what of real reform? What about the changes that might get to the heart of the matter of ending the profiteering that makes health care so expensive and inaccessible?
Congressman Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, brought the right perspective to the debate when he reminded the House that “everyone knows that health insurance companies make money by not providing health care. After all, they are in the insurance business. They are not charities. With as many as 129 million Americans suffering from pre-existing conditions, insurance companies want Congress to repeal health care reform. The provisions which require covering people with pre-existing conditions would eventually cut into insurance company profits.”
Kucinich warned: “Repeal means Americans will continue to pay more for insurance but get less -- that is, if they can afford health care insurance in the first place.”
But the co-author (along with Wisconsinites Baldwin and Moore) of legislation that would extend the Medicare system to all Americans, regardless of age, did not stop there.
“The very idea of health care reform solely within the context of a for-profit system has been more than problematic. Today, 50 million Americans have no health insurance. What are we going to do for them?” asked Kucinich. “Rather than waste time on debating how much reform insurance companies will permit -- if any -- it is time to change the debate. It is time to end the for-profit health care model. It is time for not-for-profit health care — single-payer, universal, Medicare for all — with an emphasis on wellness and personal responsibility.”
Comments
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33 Comments so far
Show Allwill the beneficiaries of the most profitable enterprise allow their cash cow to turn into a non-profit entity for all people?
history tells us that there will be no such change without a bloody fight.
In 1971 before Canada finalized its National Health care plan (before that it was transformed province by province) The USA spent 7.6 percent GDP on Health Care as opposed to 7.1 percent GDP in Canada.
Since that time Canada has seen its costs increased to 10.3 percent GDP as opposed to the US at 17.2. Canada has an "older" population.
Since that time Canada has also become more ethnicly diverse.
Everyone has coverage In Canada wherein some 50 million Americans do not.
This should clearly show the US system is dysfunctional and that the Market can not curtail costs.
The market is NOT more efficient.
The Canadians also have a longer life expectancy and a lower infant mortality rate.
We, on the other hand, have our freedom and are not enslaved by a commie/socialist medical system like the one the Canadians have.
Bachmann/Palin 2012
I would think a comparison of per capita costs would be more relevant than costs as a percent of GDP.
What the heck kind of comment is that? The US pays almost TWICE per capita on its health care.
They pay almost twice as much as a portion of their GDP on their health care.
The relative size of the economies to one another was about the same as was the relative size of populations. Whats your point?
My point was just what I said. I don't know what GDP has to do with it, but the per capita cost comparison seems much more relevant. Since you knew one statistic, I thought you might know the other. I think the fact that the U.S. spends nearly twice as much per capita as Canada is something people can understand. (Please link me to the source of your information if you can.)
Just today I explained single-payer to someone, saying it would save the the U.S. $400 billion/year through efficiency and elimination of unnecessary costs. When I said "it's what they have in Canada," the person opined that she has friends in Canada and (when she visited a few years ago) the friends complained of having to wait for procedures. Her healthcare is better, she said. I reminded her that she has both Medicare and private health insurance, whereas many Americans have inadequate or no coverage. I said that Canada has a kind of Medicare, but rather than covering only those 65 and over, it covers everyone. I said that Canadians are not prohibited from buying supplemental insurance. (Am I right about that?)
Had I known that Canada pays half as much per capita as the U.S., I could have mentioned that as well.
One reason to use GDP is that it illustrates that the workers in this country are producing more than enough to pay for decent wages, housing, and health care. In other words, the things the people need are things they have already earned. Measuring it per capita makes it seem as though health care is an expense. Of course, one way of looking at it serves the agenda of one class, the other serves the agenda of the other class. When we look at GDP, we can see that the average working class person (working or not) is producing something like $120,000. Yet the average worker (excluding those who are not working) is making less than $40,000. Here is the strange thing - there are people right here who will defend that disappearing $80,000 - the boss has expenses and other troubles, the boss took a risk, etc.
From the working class point of view, we are already producing more than enough to take care of all of our needs, including health care. But from the boss's point of view, from the ruling class point of view, what they have taken is "theirs" and no matter how much the worker has produced they are only "worth" whatever the boss can get away with paying them - which is barely enough to sustain the worker. Health care then becomes an "expense" that "we" (those who are raking off all of the money) "can't afford." Per capita works to support that analysis. GDP works to support an analysis from our point of view, rather than theirs.
Be that as it may, I think the cost per capita argument is more readily understandable and more useful in introducing uninformed Americans to the concept of single-payer.
There is no need to "sell" anything here with clever phrasing, and no need to talk about "single payer." Unless, that is, we are not going to be serious about this issue and if we are going to insist that the upper 10% needs to be pandered to and that "all stakeholders" needs must be considered, and if we think that we must worship at the alters of "practicality" and "being realistic" - both of which are a crock.
Universal health care. Period. 70% of the public will support that without any fancy footwork, 3D chess, rope-a-dope, clever phrasing, compromises, debates with wingnuts, or accommodation of the upscale few and their delicate sensibilities.
The reason this all gets so complicated and convoluted and why there is so much confusion and failure is because too many liberal and progressives are trying to go in two directions at once - supporting and defending the existing social and political conventions and arrangements, while at the same time objecting to the symptoms of those existing social and political conventions and arrangements. You can;t go in two opposite directions at once. Yet that is what is promoted right here day after day.
Universal health care. Period.
Universal health care comes in a variety of forms and single payer is the best of them.
OK, I will refine my answer. Universal health care: all people get the same level of health care guaranteed, funded through progressive taxation.
If single payer is a "form" - one of a variety of forms - all the more reason to not be promoting it.
Where do you get that 70% figure? Here are the polls I've seen:
Kaiser Health Tracking Poll, July 2009: 58% favor "having a national health plan in which all Americans would get their insurance through an expanded, universal form of Medicare-for all."
New York Times/CBS News poll, February 2009: 59% say "the government should provide national health insurance."
Annals of Internal Medicine, Study of Physician Support of National Health Insurance, April 2008: 59% of [doctors] "support government legislation to establish national health insurance."
Associated Press-Yahoo Poll, December 2007: 65% say "the United States should adopt a universal health insurance program in which everyone is covered under a program like Medicare that is run by the government and financed by taxpayers."
CNN/Opinion Research Poll, May 2007: 64% think "the government should provide a national health insurance program for all Americans, even if this would require higher taxes."
Understood but..
I would point out though that using Health care dollars spent as a percentage of GDP is MORE then just a little useful when making country to country comparisons.
You can point out that when Comparing GDP growth/size 17 percent of the US economy is based on health care expenditures. People get fixated on GDP numbers.
Now the traditional Economists take is "the bigger the gdp the better" and "the higher GDP growth the better"
Here is an example that makes that argument bogus.
If US expenditures as a portion of GDP climbed to 30 percent in the next 30 years a full third of the economies size and much of its growth is based upon being INEFFICIENT in delivering a service. Economists/congressmen/Presidents will all boast about GDP growth as a sign of a healthy economy when it is anything BUT.
People have to keep this in mind when they claim "The US economy is stronger then that in the EU because GDP growth is higher"
Now bundle into that the "GDP growth" in the US economy due to the huge growth in the prison population and compare that to Canada and Europe...and so on.
You end up having a whole lot of "failure" spun as success.
I'm a little out of my element here, but I think I remember Ralph Nader criticizing the GDP measure (along the lines you mention) and pointing out that fraud and waste are part of GDP. I appears, therefor, that if implementing single-payer in the U.S. would slice $400 billion/year in health insurance inefficiency from GDP, and if that same amount were then applied to actual healthcare, the healthcare dollars spent as a percentage of GDP would go up, not down.
Can you tell me about "waits" for medical procedures in Canada, or the purchase of supplemental private health insurance?
The waits tend to be for Surgeries that are considered non critical. I myself have never waited for anything albeit i do not use the system much. My parents both are in their 80's and use it a lot and have never waited.
THAT said wait times can be improved. One of the issues that caused this was a Policy position back in the 1990's where the Government felt too many Doctors being trained so cut back on funding to Universities for the training Of Doctors.
The other was the Feds cutting funding to the provinces for health Care.
As to supplemntal insurance I really do not know what you ask here. You can get enhanced insurance via private Insurance companies. This gets you private hospital beds, enhanced travel insurance if out of the country and the like.
Most provinces do NOT cover dental procedures and the prescription drug plans a mixed bag from province to province.
My private insurance via my Compnay results in an 10 dollar or so deduction a month from my pay. This gets me prescription drug coverage with a 2 dollar co pay, dental insurance with the compnay paying 80 percent plus the private bed/tv and stuff like that in a hospital.
Thanks. That's the information I was looking for.
"The American people are not fools."
LOL. Good One! Yes, they are!
Restore the Hill-Burton act (passed in 1946; displaced by HMO under Nixon I believe).
To hell with the insurance companies. There is no more disgusting, selfish, greedy, arrogant bunch of scum bags on this planet. There is a reason why EVERY other industrialized country has made it ILLEGAL for insurance companies to be in the primary care field. Its' because when they are allowed in control, there is NO health care going on. There is nothing but profit taking. People should be more important than profits.
I am for a single payer system, it's the ONLY way that makes ANY sense. Those on the right are FOOLS. They are out of touch with HUMANS, they spend too much time with the big money boys, NONE of whom give a damn about this country, it's people, or providing health care for ANYONE. It's ALL about money, NOTHING else.
To hell with the insurance companies, to hell with their profits, to hell with their workers, to hell with the entire industry and their 30% profit margins. HUMANS are what SHOULD matter. But just like I said when Reagan put us on this IDIOT course, you can either care for HUMANS or you can care about money. You will NEVER do both. And here we are, a country that cares about money and says to hell with HUMANS. WAY TO GO, CONSERVATIVES. GREAT world you've given us.
It's just mind-boggling, every other industrialized democracy has some form or version of universal health care. No one goes bankrupt from medical expenses, the overall costs are cheaper and with better results than the USA. When the hell do we get a brain in this country? Somehow we got a brain in 1965 when the LBJ administration passed Medicare and Medicaid. But never fear, the right wing fascistic GOP is busy at work to destroy Medicare and Medicaid. That phony fraud Paul Ryan wants to turn Medicare into a voucher system! OMG, what an absolutely putrid idea.
I'm glad to see Dennis mouth the words for Single-Payer Medicare for All. Too bad he and the other members of the progressive caucus did not hold their ground and vote that way but what can we expect-- you Dennis, and all your friends in that den of iniquity you call a Congress all have your price or you wouldn't be there. Congress is a lost cause. Don't call your Congressman or Senator about single-payer. Just assume that if he reached federal office his hands are already tied. Put your efforts toward action at the state level where the absolute corruption of money has not yet taken hold, where a campaign is not wholesaled to mass media and the winner is almost always the one who buys the most thirty second spots. Work at a local and state level for single-payer and ignore the calls for money or time which come from a Congressman who will never be persuaded to vote on your side of this issue because his hand is already in the Insurance company's pocket. He's just playing you if he's part of the Congress.
"Put your efforts toward action at the state level where the absolute corruption of money has not yet taken hold"
You must not live in Illinois then. LOL.
But seriously, you are right. Single payer is only going to happen by starting at the local level and working it's way up. What is happening in Vermont is very encouraging and I strongly urge you to read Harvard Professor William Hsiao's report that he gave to the State of Vermont recently, if you haven't already done so. Very enlightening.
Here is the link:
http://www.leg.state.vt.us/jfo/
healthcare/FINAL%20VT%20Draft%20Hsiao%20Report.pdf
It never ceases to amuse me that the GOP continues to engage in diatribes about "massive and inefficient government bureaucracy", yet they conveniently ignore the inefficient bureaucracies that exist in the private sector, namely the health insurance companies.
Therefore, my conclusion is that these guys aren't the pro-efficiency advocates that they try to portray, oh no. They and those that support them are selfish jerks that could care less that millions of their fellow Americans are hurting badly. Sheila Jackson Lee is right. This is about helping those that are having a tough time helping themselves. (Wasn't it that Jesus guy that said something like that a few years back?) No, not according to the GOP version of the Bible.
There used to be a time in this nation when people would be falling over the person next to them to help out. Now all we get is "not my problem" and "It's the poor's fault for being poor".
How on Earth did we get to this point? It makes me sad, it really does. But it angers me more than anything.
Single Payer Now!
Kucinich has shown himself as the brain-dead twit that he is by suing the Capitol cafeteria for $150K over having a pit in the olive they served him. Seriously! You can't make these things up. See http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2011/01/26/2011-01-26_dennis_kucinich_ohio_us_rep_sues_congressional_cafeteria_over_dangerous_olive_pi.html?r=news
He's actually a typical left-wing dingbat. This is only the most recent proof.
For the reich wingnutter, Horace:
Oh, but when right wingers and corporations file law suits it's A-OK, no problem.
John Boehner sued fellow Rep. Jim McDermott (D) over a disputed freedom of speech issue. McDermott has argued that he was within his First Amendment rights.
Santorum's wife sued a doctor for $500000 in 1999.
In December 1999, Santorum supported his wife's medical malpractice lawsuit against her chiropractor for $500,000.
In 1999, Bush sued Enterprise Rent-A-Car over a minor fender-bender involving one of his daughters in which no one was hurt. Although his insurance would have covered the repair costs, making a lawsuit unnecessary, Bush sought additional money from Enterprise.
Trent Lott sued State Farm Insurance Company over the loss of his home during Katrina.
Robert Bork sued the Yale Club for over $1,000,000 because he tripped and fell in the club.
Big corporations are always suing other corporations.
Tort restrictions advocated by hypocritical right wing tort reform hawks virtually never limit the rights of corporations to sue business competitors for commercial losses.
Major corporations like Exxon support laws to limit the ability of average consumers to sue their insurance companies when those companies unfairly deny claims. But when Lloyds of London refused to pay Exxon $250 million for losses it suffered as a cargo owner resulting from the Valdez oil spill in Alaska, Exxon did what all consumers should have the right to do. Exxon sued its insurance company. In this case, Exxon won.
Exxon has used the courts for other purposes as well. For example, in August 1998, Exxon sued Mobil Oil Corp. for patent infringement involving a catalyst that makes better plastics. A jury awarded Exxon $171 million and a judge issued an order prohibiting Mobil from infringing on Exxon's patent.
Johnson & Johnson, makers of Mylanta in partnership with Merck, sued Smithkline Beecham Corporation for false advertising regarding the nutritional benefit of Tums over Mylanta. The court dismissed Johnson & Johnson's complaint. The lower court's decision was upheld on appeal.
In 1995, Johnson & Johnson/Merck filed another false advertising suit against SmithKline over claims that Tums and Tagamet HB were superior to Pepcid AC. The court issued a preliminary injunction, ordering SmithKline to suspend the ads. In 1999, Johnson & Johnson sued Bausch & Lomb for making claims about the superiority of its extended wear contact lenses.
In a direct democracy, the people socialize necessities and privatize luxuries.
Well stated,of course in a plutocratic oilagarchy(sic),the masters of the universe,privatise the profits and socialise the losses.
peace
Single-payer health insurance would save $350-$400 billion a year. Everyone would have access to health care. And, the single-payer insurance administrator would have no incentive — profit, bonus or career advancement — to deny needed healthcare.
"The reason we spend more and get less than the rest of the world is because we have a patchwork system of for-profit payers. Private insurers necessarily waste health dollars on things that have nothing to do with care: overhead, underwriting, billing, sales and marketing departments as well as huge profits and exorbitant executive pay. Doctors and hospitals must maintain costly administrative staffs to deal with the bureaucracy [of multiple payers]. Combined, this needless administration consumes one-third (31 percent) of Americans’ health dollars.
Single-payer financing is the only way to recapture this wasted money. The potential savings on paperwork, more than $350 billion per year, are enough to provide comprehensive coverage to everyone without paying any more than we already do."
http://www.pnhp.org/facts/single-payer-resources
I live in the district of Congresswoman Jackson-Lee. If you can find an even greater grand-stander show-boat in Congress than she is you tell me who that is. Whenever there is an opportunity for her to be seen on TV she makes sure that she is seen. Yes, health-care is about saving lives but it is also about just plain living healthily. My broken rib was not life-threatening but it was good to have it checked by a doctor. I have seen doctors numerous times for such non-life-threatening situations. Should I have refrained from bothering my physicians because it was not about saving my life, Ms. J-L?
Article: "“Obamacare” by Republicans is a compromise proposal that, at most, addresses the worst abuses of the nation’s for-profit insurers and health providers while outlining a framework for genuine reform."
Wrong - This bill isn't a compromise, it is a giveaway to the insurance companies and sellout of the American public.
Wrong - This bill doesn't address the worst abuses of the nation's for-profit insurers as the bill doesn't stop them from raising rates through the roof, which is what they've been doing even since the bill was passed. So what if you can't be denied insurance due to pre-existing conditions of you can't afford the insurance.
Wrong - This bill doesn't provide an outline for genuine reform; rather, it engraves in stone our subservience to private health insurance companies.
Compair administration costs of medicare programs to insurance.
Medicare:5%
Insurance:22%
This means that 5 percent of the money that is spent on Medicare type programs is spent for administrative costs. Compare that to insurance which 22% of the money goes to administrative costs.
I saw this on a frontline show not too long ago.
Talk is cheap but any Congress critter who refuses to repeal Obamacare even after it's obvious that it has nothing to do with health care is not serious about single payer health care for all. As for those who repeal it, either they're doing it for political reasons or they really want single payer instead. My guess is the former but I still insist that Obamacare be repealed and that single payer get a public hearing this time around.