H/t to Vivian Paige.
This is a concise, simple explanation of the public option, a plan which has been made unecessarily complex by pundits and politicians with a vested interest in killing it.
Thanks to Robert Reich for boiling it down to the simple, non-scary concept that it actually is.
1 comment:
Its what he is not saying that is so wrong. The public option does not need to make money. The public option would conform to the new gov't mandates. The government will be setting the rules. Those rules have already been described in Obama's speeches. If your plan changes at all, your new plan has to meet those mandates. Your insurance company would not be able to match the costs.
He says that "cooperatives are too small and are designed to fail. He just described the plan that Congress is on. If the public option is planning to pay like medicare, then, we will have less options in medical care since medicare underpays, therefore raising the costs for everyone else. Many doctors won't take medicare anymore for that reason.
He's lying about the drug companies wanting the plan to fail since Obama and Congress already made deals with them. They support reform. The insurance companies don't like the public opttion since it would drive private insurance away, as Medicare did.
From Reason:It's not so hard to understand. "The drug makers stand to gain millions of new customers," the Times said.
And from the Journal: "If health legislation succeeds, the [insurance] industry would likely get a fresh batch of new customers. In particular, many young and healthy people who currently forgo coverage would be forced to sign up." No wonder insurers are willing to stop "discriminating" against sick people. (Forget that the essence of insurance is discrimination according to risk.)
Not that Big Pharma and Big Insurance like every detail of the Democratic plan. Drug companies don't want Medicare negotiating drug prices—for good reason. If it forces drug prices down, research and development will be discouraged. (Depending whom you believe, Obama may or may not have agreed with the drug companies on this point.)
As for the insurance companies, they worry—legitimately—that a government insurance company—the so-called public option"—would drive them out of business. This isn't alarmism. It's economics. The public option would have no bottom line to worry about and therefore could engage in "predatory pricing" against the private insurers.
But despite these differences, the biggest companies in these two industries are on board with "reform."
If they truly want to reform the insurance industry, let buyers go out of state to shop for it. Put tax incentives to promote free healthcare to the indigent and promote insurance availability for pre-existing needs.
A Congressman is now a "political operative"? One that called a lie, a lie? They did have to go back and make sure that the bill stopped illegals from getting care.
The concerned public read the bills. They knew more about them than did Congress. Robert Reich is a political hack.
Reich did nothing to explain the public option.
Mark Impomeni at Redstate:
The Obama Administration inadvertently confirmed that the president’s plan will begin a slow take over of the health care system by the federal government. How else could this be interpreted?
“Undocumented immigrants would be able to buy insurance in the non-exchange private market, just as they do today. That market will shrink as the exchange takes hold, but it will still exist and will be subject to reforms such as the bans on pre-existing conditions and caps.”
In other words, as the federal exchange takes hold, plans not complying with the federal government’s standards will start to disappear. Eventually, it won’t make any sense for any company to offer health insurance as the federal requirements will make the business of providing health insurance far too expensive, and the premiums far too expensive for the insured.
On top of all this, there is no constitutional authority for the federal government to do this.
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