The radical Leftist Democrats are closing in on successfully forcing you to adopt the public option.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid today announced that his mushed-together bill will have a public option. Of course, this doesn't really change anything from what we suspected would happen. Remember, the key thing to remember here is that any public option will end up with government control. Think about it this way...does the government 'option' need to turn a profit to stay in existence? No, it's propped up by taxpayer dollars, and can lose money for as long as Congress allows it. So, the government 'option' can undercut all private options on price, thus being an attractive solution for businesses that are already struggling. They'll dump their private insurance and put all their employees onto the government plan instead. When this happens a lot, the private insurance companies will lose their customer base and fold. Thus, the 'public option' will invariably end as the only option. No matter what the Democrats choose to call it.
Reid is trying to sucker enough nervous Senators by touting an opt-out provision where states could supposedly opt out of the federal plan. Here's why that won't work:
The problem is that even if legislation allows individual states to opt out of a government plan, any national plan will incur costs that would likely be borne by all taxpayers, regardless of whether or not their state carries the plan. For instance, any government plan would have to have initial start up costs -- in the House Democrats' bill these amount to $2 billion, which would be given to the Secretary of Health and Human Services. And if the government plan begins losing money and needs to be bailed out by the federal government, taxpayers in all states would bear the burden.
Heritage adds:
While it is difficult to understand its true impact until legislative language is available, taxpayers who will bear the cost burdens of a new government health care entitlement should keep a few points in mind:
1. States could only op-out of the public plan, not of the entire bill.
This is only an “opt-out” of one section of the massive health care proposal. There are literally hundreds of provisions that the states may find unacceptable, like the costly Medicaid expansion...
2. A state opt-out does not eliminate the public plan.
The federal government would likely require any state wishing to opt-out to still meet federal conditions. It could come, for example, as an explicit requirement that a state set up a public plan “option” that mirrors the federal public plan or as a public plan masquerading as a “co-op” that is in effect controlled, funded and accountable to the government...
3. Experience shows that a federal public plan would likely be the easiest option for state officials.
With the typical bureaucratic red tape and administrative complexity accompanying a state opt-out, states would likely discourage states from opting-out...
Crushing State Innovation.
The massive bills in the House and Senate- with individual and employer mandates, federal control over health insurance benefits, new boards and commissions micromanaging what taxpayers get or don’t get, new fees, taxes and insurance costs- is a challenge to the citizens of the states. Bright and innovative state officials would prefer to embark on their own reforms, but these bills would crush creativity, innovation and experimentation under the weight of federal control and conformity.
It's just parsing, redefinition, and spin. Don't buy it - the ultimate aim of health care reform is to have government control of your health care. If that wasn't the goal, there would be no political reason to do it.
Here's the dirty little secret - ObamaKennedyDeathCare will essentially force people to buy insurance, even if they can't afford it:
George Mason University economics professor Tyler Cowen pointed out:
AMERICANS seem to like the idea of broadening health insurance coverage, but they may not want to be forced to buy it. With health care costs high and rising, such government mandates would make many people worse off.
The proposals now before Congress would require just about everyone to buy health insurance or to get it through their employers — which would generally result in lower wages. In other words, millions of people would be compelled to spend lots of money on something they previously did not want, at least not at prevailing prices.
Estimates of this burden vary, but for a family of four it could range up to $14,000 a year over the next decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Right now, many Americans take the gamble of going without insurance, just as many of us take our chances with how much we drive or how little we exercise.In effect, if these proposals pass, the Democrats would be telling the working poor: “If you have been choosing between food and health insurance, you no longer have that choice. You must buy the health insurance, and we will decide what kind of health insurance you will buy and how much you will pay for it.”
Bottom line: "those earning incomes just over the federal poverty line would face an effective marginal income tax rate of 70 percent! And that’s before including the effects of losing food stamps and housing subsidies."
And what about the costs? Again, this is one of the key questions. Who will pay the costs? Health care costs money, and someone has to pay it. This new system will be phenomenally expensive, so someone will have to pay the bill...who will it be? And what about the new administrative costs that will be incurred to the tune of $60 billion a year? How about the increased payroll taxes, which could be quadruple what they are now?
Abortion could still present a problem for passage. Time will tell.
A final, merged bill will likely come out in the next few days. Don't expect to have much time to read it, and don't expect it to be anything less than 1200-1500 pages. You can count on details being available here when it happens.
There's my two cents.
Related Reading:
No comments:
Post a Comment