2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumPaul Krugman: Why I Support Hillary's Vision for Health Care - Not Bernie's
Health reform is the signature achievement of the Obama presidency. It was the biggest expansion of the social safety net since Medicare was established in the 1960s. It more or less achieves a goal access to health insurance for all Americans that progressives have been trying to reach for three generations. And it is already producing dramatic results, with the percentage of uninsured Americans falling to record lows.
Obamacare is, however, what engineers would call a kludge: a somewhat awkward, clumsy device with lots of moving parts. This makes it more expensive than it should be, and will probably always cause a significant number of people to fall through the cracks.
The question for progressives a question that is now central to the Democratic primary is whether these failings mean that they should re-litigate their own biggest political success in almost half a century, and try for something better.
My answer, as you might guess, is that they shouldnt, that they should seek incremental change on health care (Bring back the public option!) and focus their main efforts on other issues that is, that Bernie Sanders is wrong about this and Hillary Clinton is right. But the main point is that we should think clearly about why health reform looks the way it does.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/18/opinion/health-reform-realities.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-right-region®ion=opinion-c-col-right-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-right-region&_r=1
Autumn
(45,079 posts)The Unaffordable Care Act. Bernie's plan is better for the American people. Obamacare was sold as a steeping stone so it's time to take that step.
RandySF
(58,805 posts)shireen
(8,333 posts)provide the numbers for a plan providing full coverage.
Autumn
(45,079 posts)With the rising costs I'm ready to join the uninsured again.
jeff47
(26,549 posts)Admiral Loinpresser
(3,859 posts)NCTraveler
(30,481 posts)Ohhh wait. Nevermind. I see Krugman hanging out with Gutierrez, Warren, and Obama. It's so crowded that I am losing track. I hope Sanders supporters don't hear about how Sanders himself helped to write the legislation. Actually I do. Sanders would be an awesome addition under the bus and I'm sure he could use a break from the current bus drivers.
Krugman is right here and right when it comes to the Tea Party legislation last week. Audit the Fed my ass. Lay it out there Krugman.
Autumn
(45,079 posts)the American people who can't afford to buy insurance and deserve healthcare, a human right and the American tax payers who are on the hook for subsidies payed with their tax dollars to corporations.
questionseverything
(9,654 posts)First, like it or not, incumbent players have a lot of power. Private insurers played a major part in killing health reform in the early 1990s, so this time around reformers went for a system that preserved their role and gave them plenty of new business.
Second, single-payer would require a lot of additional tax revenue and we would be talking about taxes on the middle class, not just the wealthy. Its true that higher taxes would be offset by a sharp reduction or even elimination of private insurance premiums, but it would be difficult to make that case to the broad public, especially given the chorus of misinformation you know would dominate the airwaves.
Finally, and I suspect most important, switching to single-payer would impose a lot of disruption on tens of millions of families who currently have good coverage through their employers. You might say that they would end up just as well off, and it might well be true for most people although not those with especially good policies. But getting voters to believe that would be a very steep climb.
What this means, as the health policy expert Harold Pollack points out, is that a simple, straightforward single-payer system just isnt going to happen. Even if you imagine a political earthquake that eliminated the power of the insurance industry and objections to higher taxes, youd still have to protect the interests of workers with better-than-average coverage, so that in practice single-payer, American style, would be almost as kludgy as Obamacare.
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translation
#1 the insurance company lobbyist are too powerful
#2 the American people are too stupid to stop paying 12 grand a year in insurance rather than 6 grand in taxes
#3 the American people are too selfish and stupid
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kenfrequed
(7,865 posts)Thank you.
kenfrequed
(7,865 posts)Insurance companies have continued to post high profit margins even after the affordable care act.
I think Krugman is arguing from a perspective that is doomed to failure. One of the many reasons the Republicans are continuing their quixotic crusade against the ACA is that it serves as a counter to any legislation the Democrats bring up in favor of adding a public option. Sure, a lot of them would love to have "I killed obamacare" on their resume for when they go back to some job working for a lobbying firm, but they honestly know they are never going to get enough Democrats to go along with it.
Bringing it up constantly is just symbolism and reasserting their position against expansion.
Putting in a super-compromiser and corporate and insurance company friendly candidate like Hillary will never get a pubic option passed. I haven't heard Hillary even mention "public option" this election cycle (if she has please correct me). But even if she had endorsed a public option in 2015 or 1016 as part of her healthcare reform plan there is no chance it would go anywhere without a change in congress. If it even changed a bit to the point where it was close either way she would still have to compromise. Hell, Bernie would also have to compromise.
But if you are going to try to get additional reforms done you need to ask for more than you are willing to settle for. If you want a public option you have to start asking for single payer and then compromise for a public option. You will not get anywhere close otherwise.
And as to taking back congress, we will not win back congress if we don't excite voters and Hillary is completely unexciting. She does not inspire the base nor does she bring in a lot of independents the way Bernie Sanders would. She gets a few of the conservative and moderate democrats excited and the donors excited but she doesn't create the fire that the Sanders campaign does.
Krugman either doesn't understand politics or doesn't get healthcare reform.
He is simply advocating for private health insurance companies.
MoonRiver
(36,926 posts)Professor Krugman because...
kenfrequed
(7,865 posts)None of them truly dwell or utilize his understanding of economics.
Instead he tries to make a realpolitik sort of analysis about public will and what is possible. He might be a genius in economics but he is wrong in political matters.
Also, you didn't counter any of my argument. You just did the 'appeal to authority' trip. If you want to actually make an argument I will listen.
ucrdem
(15,512 posts)and Krugman gets it.
jeff47
(26,549 posts)If you say "we will go no further!", then little bits and pieces will be broken off until you've de-facto lost.
If you'd like an example of how this works, look at abortion in Texas. No frontal attack against it was successful. Just decades of lots and lots and lots and lots of compromises. And since the Democratic starting point for those compromises was the status-quo, each compromise lost ground.
If you want to keep the ACA, you start with something well beyond the ACA. Then when you compromise, you don't lose ground. Your "compromise" is to keep the ACA. And sometimes, you gain ground.
Admiral Loinpresser
(3,859 posts)It is still much cheaper for me to pay the ACA tax penalty than buy health coverage. So I want Bernie's plan, or if I can't have that I want to repeal the ACA.
Nanjeanne
(4,960 posts)Did Hillary call for a Public Option in her plan for healthcare? On her site I see she is going to:
Defend Affordable Care Act (last I looked it didn't have a public option in it)
Build on it to expand affordable coverage (no details on how she will achieve this)
Slow growth of overall health care costs including prescriptions drugs (how?)
Make it possible for providers to deliver the very best care to patients (I think we all want that!)
Lower out of pocket costs like copays and deductibles (she tells us how deductibles have risen but she doesn't say what she would do about it)
Reduce cost of prescription drugs. (I know she tweeted she would put a cap on prescriptions drugs but I haven't seen any details about this. Her website says "Hillary believes we need to demand lower drug costs for hardworking families and seniors." OK - I demand lower drug costs. Did it work?)
Transform our health care system to reward value and quality. (I'm not exactly sure what this means but I'm all for quality when it comes to healthcare!)
I haven't found anything in detail on her website and when I google Hillary Clinton Healthcare Plan - I just get articles. Would love to see her complete plan.
What I can't understand from Krugman's article is - he's saying Hillary is right--we should build on the ACA by putting in a public option. But Hillary has never said she would build on the ACA by putting in a public option. So how is she right and Bernie wrong? I think with Bernie pushing for Medicare 4 All, there is a better chance of a compromise with a public option being added to the ACA as an incremental step - than supporting Hillary when she has never spoken in favor of the public option. Maybe I'm wrong but I don't really think I've ever heard words like "I will fight to bring back the Public Option to improve the ACA". Sorry Paul - Hillary isn't right about it based on anything she has said.
DemocratSinceBirth
(99,710 posts)What does the youngest recipient of the John Bates Clark Medal for Economics and a Nobel Prize for Economics know?
jeff47
(26,549 posts)About as much as any random person.
mmonk
(52,589 posts)LexVegas
(6,060 posts)riversedge
(70,214 posts)oasis
(49,382 posts)Now, I don't know which way to turn.
GeorgeGist
(25,321 posts)[font size = 4] Medicare. [/font size]For all.