Health Care

One (Small) Good Item Out of the Health Care “Debate”

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I try to stay away from the non-fact maelstrom that is our current, utterly dysfunctional “debate” on health care reform (I put that in parenthesis because I don’t even know what the latest, half-baked plan du jour even is without an up to the minute scorecard).

However – the health care publicity did bring to light and start to quantify one item that could be useful in the future when this all dies down (and hopefully goes nowhere) – the high cost of health care for our governmental employees.

This article discusses “gold plated” health care plans and their cost, and the fact that under some proposals these plans would be subject to an excise tax. From the article:

“We don’t have Cadillac salaries”, said Robert Corner, a 63-year old who works for Nebraska’s department of roads in Lincoln and earns just over $50,000 a year. His parent union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, estimates that it’s average health plan in Nebraska will be worth $31,000 in 2013, the year the new tax thresholds would take effect.

But Mr. Corner – you DO have a Cadillac salary when you take into account the health plan that taxpayers have given you, one likely with small co-pays and very few restrictions. Many of the union plans here in Illinois involve the workers paying almost NOTHING towards their care, and rumbles of a strike whenever they are asked to contribute a dime.

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An Important Qualifier

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Via Instapundit comes a major (albeit British) media report that the Tea Party protest in Washington turnout could be as high as two million.

As impressive as that no doubt upper-limit estimate is, I think that the raw number leaves out an important qualifier. To be  truly accurate, the report should say:

Two million people with jobs…

Getting hundreds of thousands of kids, the professionally unemployed and government workers to show up isn’t that hard (especially if someone buys the bus tickets). Getting two million middle-class, middle-aged people with jobs, careers, children and businesses is way, way more impressive.

We can safely assume that for every individual who made it to the protest that there are dozens of people whose grown-up obligations prevented them from attending.

That thought should keep Obama and Pelosi up at night.

[update (2009-9-13 10:17pm): I should point out that I don’t think anyone really believes that two million people showed up in Washington. One percent of the entire U.S. population is 3 million people so two millions gets you two thirds of the way to one percent of the entire population. I don’t think there is a city in world that could handle that big an influx of people. Washington D.C. itself only has a population for 590,000 so having nearly four times the population of the city show up is really not credible no matter what the senior Democratic leadership thought. On the other hand, having hundreds of thousands of people, most who have never protested before, show up is significant and puts the tea party in the big leagues no matter how you cut it.]

[update (2009-9-13 6:53pm): For unknown reasons, all comments by Hippeprof were deleted from the thread below. This issue is being investigated and we will try to recover the comments. If anyone else saw their comments disappear please email me at the link to the upper right.]

[update (2009-9-13 8:02pm): 20 comments were found to have been removed by the spam filter. We have restored them and I will be cleaning up duplicates and removing the “hey, what happened to my comments?” post in order to keep the thread clean.]

[update (2009-9-12-10:16): The technical problems have resurfaced. Your posts may not show properly. We may have to freeze the comments. If you have an important point to make  you can email at the link to the upper right and I will add your comment to thread manually as time permits.]

Yeah, I’m not really feeling it Mr. President

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Our dear President recently delivered an important speech on health care. Sample excerpts are provided below (in italics) with select commentary by yours truly – a busy working physician with no real expertise in health care policy. I do, however, have a keen sense of  ‘so, this is probably gonna hurt, and hurt bad, right?’

There are those on the left who believe that the only way to fix the system is through a single-payer system like Canada’s, where we would severely restrict the private insurance market and have the government provide coverage for everyone. On the right, there are those who argue that we should end the employer-based system and leave individuals to buy health insurance on their own.

That’s a nice summary of the issues, Mr. President. So, what do you think?

While there remain some significant details to be ironed out, I believe a broad consensus exists for the aspects of the plan I just outlined: consumer protections for those with insurance, an exchange that allows individuals and small businesses to purchase affordable coverage, and a requirement that people who can afford insurance get insurance.

I’m keenly interested in those significant ‘details to be ironed out,’ sir. Is it okay if I remain skeptical about your plan until you, and related House and Senate committees, are done with the ironing? Although, I may not be too pleased with the cuffs-and-collars once that crew is through…..

And to my Republican friends, I say that rather than making wild claims about a government takeover of health care, we should work together to address any legitimate concerns you may have.

Hey, it’s nice to call me a friend (although, I’m not really feeling it for the GOP these days, either), but I sense a problem with your logic. If someone is making a wild claim, what legitimate concerns would that person have?

Second, we’ve estimated that most of this plan can be paid for by finding savings within the existing health care system – a system that is currently full of waste and abuse.

Oh, so that’s where we’ll find my legitimate concerns. Most of the plan will be payed for by savings within the existing health care system, you say? I’m sure that will happen. Also, I might be Angelina Jolie. That’s about as likely, sir.

So, to review: the left and the right disagree, the plan ain’t all worked out, quit complaining about it anyway, Republicans, and pixie dust will pay for everything. Got it! Not making wild claims, sir, just kidding around. Because, this is gonna hurt, and hurt bad, isn’t it?

Health Care and the Crypto-Marxist Model

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From the Presidents latest health care policy speech:

Despite all this, the insurance companies and their allies don’t like this idea. They argue that these private companies can’t fairly compete with the government. And they’d be right if taxpayers were subsidizing this public insurance option. But they won’t be. I’ve insisted that like any private insurance company, the public insurance option would have to be self-sufficient and rely on the premiums it collects. But by avoiding some of the overhead that gets eaten up at private companies by profits and excessive administrative costs and executive salaries, it could provide a good deal for consumers, and would also keep pressure on private insurers to keep their policies affordable and treat their customers better, the same way public colleges and universities provide additional choice and competition to students without in any way inhibiting a vibrant system of private colleges and universities.

There’s a lot that’s revealed in this paragraph about how Obama views the world. Most importantly, I think his statement about profits being inefficient reveals his crypto-Marxist model of economics.

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Because It’s the Politicians’ Money

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Writing on Obama’s claim he would pay for politically-managed health care by eliminating waste, fraud and abuse, Megan McArdle says:

Ah, our old friends, waste, fraud, and abuse, the bane of politicians everywhere.  Based on the number of politicians I have heard during my adult lifetime promising to generate massive savings from cutting waste, fraud, and abuse, I estimate that this diabolical trio accounts for approximately 113% of all Federal spending.  The percentage may be even higher at the state and local levels.

I learned what a scam this was back in my wayward leftist youth when I observed that rightwing politicians loved to claim they would pay for tax cuts, without reducing benefits, by eliminating waste, fraud and abuse.

Of course they never did, and as I grew older I realized that no one ever believed that politicians could find savings of 10%+ in massive government programs as quickly as they could cut taxes. Instead, the “eliminating waste, fraud and abuse” claim served as a ritualistic fig leaf so that politicians wouldn’t have to answer the question of where the real money was coming from.

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