On eve of critical vote, insurance industry group mounts last-minute attack on reform effort

Mykro wrote:

<quoted text>I didn't know we had a "luxury" industry. Is this for all the CEO ripoff artists, or just AIG executives?

By luxury industry I mean things that are not required to live. Travel, restaurants, movies....

Keri wrote:

<quoted text>
By luxury industry I mean things that are not required to live. Travel, restaurants, movies....

This has nothing to do with health insurance and guess what, Sunday morning and the bill passed. So sorry for your loss.

I chose HSA/HDHP as the best option for our family. Its provider network keeps costs low while giving access to quality care, and we choose when to get healthcare without having to pay extra for insurance claims for every little thing. It encourages us to take personal responsibility for our diet, exercise, and tobacco/alcohol/drug avoidance.

Mykro wrote:

<quoted text>This has nothing to do with health insurance and guess what, Sunday morning and the bill passed. So sorry for your loss.

Pelosi's temporary success. It will never pass the Senate. Enjoy your moment.

DJ A wrote:

I chose HSA/HDHP as the best option for our family. Its provider network keeps costs low while giving access to quality care, and we choose when to get healthcare without having to pay extra for insurance claims for every little thing. It encourages us to take personal responsibility for our diet, exercise, and tobacco/alcohol/drug avoidance.

HSAs are a joke. Better hope no one in your family gets chronically sick or injured.

DJ A wrote:

<quoted text> Pelosi's temporary success. It will never pass the Senate. Enjoy your moment.

You're probably right. It's not the public option bill we really need anyway.

Former Republican wrote:

<quoted text>
HSAs are a joke. Better hope no one in your family gets chronically sick or injured.

Actually, my wife is chronically sick. But the HSA pays her bills out of pre-tax dollars. There's also no 25% markup for the insurance premium that would cover a lower deductible.

Lower deductibles mean higher premiums. They must include a margin for the insurance carrier's costs and profits. Deductible HSA contributions, supplemented by tax-free employer contributions, result in the HSA/HDHP combination saving us about $1,000 per year.

DJ A wrote:

<quoted text> Actually, my wife is chronically sick. But the HSA pays her bills out of pre-tax dollars. There's also no 25% markup for the insurance premium that would cover a lower deductible.
Lower deductibles mean higher premiums. They must include a margin for the insurance carrier's costs and profits. Deductible HSA contributions, supplemented by tax-free employer contributions, result in the HSA/HDHP combination saving us about $1,000 per year.

So your HSA has employer subsidies and you have the cash to fund the remainder of your account? Congratulations. Most Americans have neither. At middle to lower income brackets, workers scarcely fund tax advantaged personal accounts of any kind--which isn't surprising, given that US median wages stopped growing in tandem with GDP way back in 1975.

The "ownership society" has been an utter disaster for most. Pensions are gone. Retirement healthcare from employers is gone. 401(k) plans, IRAs and HSAs have not even begun to make up for those losses, as millions of the old and the sick will discover in the next twenty years. The last thing we need is yet another Reagan/Bush shift of risks and burdens onto middle and lower wage earners.

Cash for health care takes priority over cable TV and a second car in our family. Orthodontia and college saving are more important for our teenagers than fast food. Paying our own way is a matter of principle to the extent of our means.

We manage to share over 10% of our income to church and other charities. Government programs are no substitute. Personal responsibility is paramount.

Mykro wrote:

<quoted text>This has nothing to do with health insurance and guess what, Sunday morning and the bill passed. So sorry for your loss.

What loss? I supported this bill, though I doubt it will pass the Senate without getting sliced to shreds. I don't have a great deal of faith in those in Washington.

DJ A wrote:

Neither Dem nor GOP plans help cut costs. They're afraid to make Americans responsible for their individual health care. Real improvements mean tort reform and guaranteed-issue individual plans, with tax credits for premiums, tax penalties (based upon ability to pay, i.e., income) equal to the premiums for failure to purchase.

Baloney. Malpractice costs are about 2% of health care and the answer to that is to STOP MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. You irresponsible people simply want those who commit it get off without punishment.
What kind of an idiot are you.

Health insurance purchase from corporations is simply barbaric. It shows how RepublicRats and BlueCrossingDems place MONEY for CORPORATE EXECUTIVES ahead of the health of the American citizen.

The answer is SINGLE PAYER NATIONAL HEALTH CARE.

Keri wrote:

<quoted text>
I completely agree that they need regulations to be forced to behave properly. Any "for profit" outfit will never benefit the people, they strive to benefit themselves. But what you are talking about is Universal Health Care which, having been to Canada, The UK and France, I've seen first hand how it works and can tell you it is the way to go. However it should have been done after WW2. Now these companies are huge and putting them out of business would send unemployment skyrocketing and further damage our economy. What Obama seems to be trying to do is find a middle ground to keep these companies afloat and insure the uninsured/uninsurable. I think that is quite the right thing to do. Jackasses in Washington are messing it up however. My local Representative says that Bacus' option would cost an average family making $66,000 a year nearly $600 a month which is not affordable.He is also talking a lot about the tax to small businesses that do not provide care which could also impact unemployment.
What he is not doing is telling me what will work, what he proposes instead of opposes which is a problem with Republicans these days. They bash what is being proposed but don't seem to propose much in the way of an alternative. I did hear something about allowing insurance sales across state lines which I wonder why was ever outlawed in the first place. That doesn't solve the uninsured/uninsurable problems but it could lower costs. I want to hear about some alternatives to what the government is proposing.

The alternatives to what the government is proposing (whatever that may be today, hard to tell as they are still bickering about it) is what we already have today. Baucus is a putz. He is simply putting his campaign coffers and self-preservation ahead of his constituents and the health of the American public.

The health care industry has had forever to FIX ITSELF. All it has done is grow at multiple times the rate of inflation while killing 100K-200K people a year with medical malpractice and another 45K from lack of health insurance coverage.

We have given these corporations and private interests all the time in the world. It is time to do something different. That something different is the system that other industrialized democracies have implemented around the world.

That something different is the system that we provide for citizens, arbitrarily, 65 and older.

We KNOW single payer health care in the form of Medicare. We also KNOW socialized health care in the form of the VA. None of this is new. It is all old hat.

We look at the crappy system that is Aetna and United Health Care and the Blues and say, we prefer to expand Medicare and outlaw private insurance companies. We say that those companies do nothing but act like corrupt and greedy bankers standing between us and our health care.

We say that those companies do nothing but take 100% of our money, keep 20% and dole out 80% for our health care. Who the hell needs them?

NO ONE.

The only reason the right wing RepublicRats and BlueCrossingDems chat about interstate commerce in health care is that they hope one state (Delaware, Texas, who knows) will have really low standards for those companies and the lowest common denominator will prevail. All those companies will incorporate in the lowest standard state and peddle the garbage policies nationwide.

The system would actually get worse. That is what they are counting on.

As it is, huge swaths of the country have virtually no choice in health care. There is very little competition which is also proof as to why the ridiculous co op notion is a nonstarter. IIRC the Blues say they cover 100 million Americans...that is 1/3rd of all of us.

Does that sound like competition is alive and well?

DJ A wrote:

Cash for health care takes priority over cable TV and a second car in our family. Orthodontia and college saving are more important for our teenagers than fast food. Paying our own way is a matter of principle to the extent of our means.
We manage to share over 10% of our income to church and other charities. Government programs are no substitute. Personal responsibility is paramount.

Goldman Sachs thinks that you are a schmoo. They like the fact that your tax money goes to bail out AIG (and GS through the backdoor) when they fail to watch over their gambling operations. They love the fact that even after all of this is evident, the right wingers of the world think that scraping by in a world of plenty is the right thing to do.

Silly.

Oregon Is Disgusting wrote:

<quoted text>
Baloney. Malpractice costs are about 2% of health care and the answer to that is to STOP MEDICAL MALPRACTICE. You irresponsible people simply want those who commit it get off without punishment.
What kind of an idiot are you.
Health insurance purchase from corporations is simply barbaric. It shows how RepublicRats and BlueCrossingDems place MONEY for CORPORATE EXECUTIVES ahead of the health of the American citizen.
The answer is SINGLE PAYER NATIONAL HEALTH CARE.

Site your source!

Keri wrote:

<quoted text>
What loss? I supported this bill, though I doubt it will pass the Senate without getting sliced to shreds. I don't have a great deal of faith in those in Washington.

Well you sure had me fooled. I can't figure out your support for the bill with what you've posted.

Rose wrote:

<quoted text>
Site your source!

The word is cite.

Look it up. Do your own homework. Read multiple sources.

Oregon Is Disgusting wrote:

<quoted text>
Goldman Sachs thinks that you are a schmoo. They like the fact that your tax money goes to bail out AIG (and GS through the backdoor) when they fail to watch over their gambling operations. They love the fact that even after all of this is evident, the right wingers of the world think that scraping by in a world of plenty is the right thing to do.
Silly.

I can't control what Goldman Sachs thinks, and don't really care. All I can control is what I think and do. Self-sufficiency is the right goal.

Mykro wrote:

<quoted text>Well you sure had me fooled. I can't figure out your support for the bill with what you've posted.

Any time the government wants to spend that much money, I'll have questions. I don't blindly follow anyone. Questions doesn't mean a lack of support. I don't want to pay for health insurance for thirty years only to have a "for profit" guy tell me I'm not covered. The system is broken and we need to fix it. My question is How and How Much?

And how to get a reasonable bill through all the corrupt politics in Washington....

What's missing: Tort reform; tax incentives; cost controls on care.