Clinton to offer health care plan

[papau]

Source: AP

http://www.sanluisobispo.com/news/politics/story/144207.html

Clinton to offer health care plan
By BETH FOUHY
Associated Press Writer

DES MOINES, Iowa --<snip>With a price tag of about $110 billion per year, Clinton's "American Health Choices Plan" represents her first major effort to achieve universal health coverage since 1994, when the plan she authored during her husband's first term collapsed.

<snip>Clinton's plan builds on the existing employer-based system of coverage. People who receive insurance through the workplace could continue to do so; businesses, in turn, would be required to offer insurance to employees, or contribute to a government-run pool that would help pay for those not covered. Clinton would also offer a tax subsidy to small businesses to help them afford the cost of providing coverage to their workers.

For individuals and families who are not covered by employers or whose employer-based coverage is inadequate, Clinton would offer expanded versions of two existing government programs: Medicare, and the health insurance plan currently offered to federal employees. Consumers could choose between either government-run program, but aides stress that no new federal bureaucracy would be created under the Clinton plan.

Aides said Clinton will propose several specific measures to pay for her plan, including an end to some of the Bush-era tax cuts for people making more than $250,000 per year. Edwards has vowed to completely repeal the tax cuts for high earners to pay for the cost of his plan, estimated at $90 billion-$120 billion per year, while Obama would pay for his plan in part by letting the tax cuts expire in 2010.<snip>




Read more: http://www.sanluisobispo.com/news/politics/story/144207.html

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Both Clinton and Edwards go the individual mandate route

[OzarkDem]

1. Just when we thought corporate America couldn't steal any more

Dems helped them find a new way to rob the Treasury.

[Baby Snooks]

9. Rob the treasury and rip off the poor some more...

Notice she doesn't address the problem of the homeless. I suppose they will have to set up a Pay Pal account at the public library?

[Donkeykick]

21. Corporate America is Going to...

find a way to get their hands in to the till, no matter what is done, anyways. :shrug:

[PSPS]

2. Just another giveaway to the insurance companies and their billion-dollar CEO's

[roamer65]

3. Hey Hillary, why not just put everone under Medicare...

and expand the benefits with the money saved in administrative costs? Good grief...

[Hieronymus]

4. That is Edwards' plan. Medicare has very low administrative cost .. efficient.

[roamer65]

5. That's why I'll vote for Edwards in the MI primary, if I can.

There is some craziness with the date of our primary and the only one on the ballot may be HRC. If she's is, then I'll be sitting our primary out.

After we move everyone to Medicare, then fund it with higher taxes on the wealthy and a modest payroll tax. We'll then be where Canada was 40 years ago. If John moves everyone to Medicare, half of the battle will be done :)

[Baby Snooks]

11. How modest?

Why more tax? Why create a new program at all? Why not, indeed, just guarantee health insurance through the Medicare/Medicaid program for those who don't qualify for Medicaid but still cannot afford health insurance? Supplement the funding for it through a payroll deduction for enrollment. A small deduction. Maybe on a sliding scale. Politicians don't know the meaning of modest.

Why not cut some of the special interest budget items, the "earmarks," to fund the expansion of the existing program through the taxes we already pay? No offense but this is what turns a lot of people off of Democrats. Tax the rich, tax the middle class, and tax the poor. The rich don't care because their accountants find ways for them not to pay the taxes anyway, the middle class makes do, and the poor end up going hungry. And sometimes the poor end up homeless. Because they couldn't live on what was left after the taxes. Sometimes the middle class end up homeless as well. None of the candidates really talk about the growing problem of the homeless. Just the people who can pay more taxes and pay health insurance premiums. A growing number of people cannot pay the premiums. And forcing them to pay is going to do what? Only ensure that they have no health care at all.

We have had enough waste from the current administration and will be paying for it for many years to come. These plans will only add to the burden. We are told to live within our means. Why not tell the government to do the same? The government needs to finally pay for what it needs to pay for to provide for the citizens, including some level of guaranteed health care for Americans, and then give whatever is left to their buddies and brother-in-laws.

How about some equalization finally? Raise the "no tax" income levels for the poor, lower the tax percentages for the middle class, and raise the tax percentages for the rich. And tax, finally, the corporations. If for no other reason to make up for the taxes the CEOs of the corporations don't pay.

[Mojorabbit]

25. This would not help us

We can afford health insurance premiums. My husband though has a pre existing condition and NO ONE will insure him at any price. His last carrier left the state and dropped him. They cherry pick who they want to cover when it comes to purchasing insurance.

[depakid]

6. That IS NOT his plan

Edwards' plan is boondoggle too- and the so called "health market" will UNDERMINE the government plan through adverse selection (among other things).

Not that Hilarycare 2.0 is remotely better.

None of the "leading" Dems will address the fundamental problems- and because of that failure, they're all trying to sell Americans a bill of shoddy goods. A more apt metaphor would be: trying to put a couple of band aids on gaping wounds.

[truth2power]

23. Because that would cut out the insurance companies...

Hillary wouldn't do anything that would prevent the insurance companies from getting their pound of flesh.

I want to see something that says universal health CARE, not universal health INSURANCE.

[regnaD kciN]

7. Such a deal...

Clinton would offer expanded versions of two existing government programs: Medicare, and the health insurance plan currently offered to federal employees.

My wife works for the federal government, and we're covered by "the health insurance plan currently offered to federal employees." I don't know the exact premium, but it's over $300 per month. Is HRC suggesting an "individual mandate" program where people who aren't covered by their employers be required to shell out that much, or more, per month?

Oh, but of course she'll make it easier to afford such an expense by giving out tax cuts/credits. From which party have I heard that "solution" before?

Right now, HRC is combining the worst of Republican (laissez-faire support for Big Insurance) and Democratic (forcing everyone to buy something mandated by the government) stereotypes. And this is supposed to be the solution to our health-care crisis???

:grr:

[defendandprotect]

8. Why not just put everyone into MEDICARE -- ???

The program already exists --
simply over a period of about six months, start putting different blocks of age groups into it --

MEDICARE FOR EVERYONE -- !!!

[rawtribe]

10. Good idea!

http://www.dennis4president.com/go/issues/a-healthy-nation/

[Baby Snooks]

12. Great idea...

And no doubt everyone in the health care industry has sent out letters to everyone that the position of the health care industry is "ABK."

Anyone But Kucinich. There are probably quite a few of those letters going out from quite a few sectors. Maybe that in itself would be the best reason to vote for him in the primary.

[iaviate1]

13. Why not? HRC has been bought by Corporations....

If we've learned anything, it's that we cannot have a President for the Corporations. We need a President for the People! There's no reason we can't take care of our employees... we're the most productive country on the face of this planet and every other first world nation can take care of their people and we can too!

[piesRsquare]

14. That's exactly what John Kerry proposed in 2004

Roll back the tax cuts and expand Medicare to cover everyone. Whoever wants to keep their private insurance can do so, but they could dump it and switch to Medicare with no problem, should they ever want to.

I've mentioned this to so many people in the past few years--many of them Kerry voters. Sometimes I wonder if I'm the only person on the planet who actually read Kerry's plan for health care reform on his website. The man went so far as to have hot-shot economist-budget-expenses people (conservative AND liberal) check out his plan...they ALL confirmed IT WOULD WORK.

I am definitely NOT going with Hillary. From this thread, Edwards doesn't seem to be proposing anything as good as Kerry's plan, but after reading this article about Hillary's "plan", I'll stick to Edwards. For now.

[defendandprotect]

26. Didn't someone in Bill Clinton's administration also suggest it -- up to age 57, I think?

So we could have been beginning the enlarging of the system at least that far back.

And that's another reason why the GOP wants to destroy Medicare -- because it's a ready made system
which we can enlarge to include everyone.

[aquart]

15. No, no, no, no!

Tell you what. Disband Homeland Security and use their facilities to set up the single payer universal healthcare. Therefore no new bureaucracy would be created. There would still be the same amount, spending the same amount, but usefully instead of uselessly.

Everyone's scared of throwing the insurance companies out of work. BUT THEY DON'T INSURE ANYONE ANYWAY. The insurance companies have become legal thieves, taking all, giving squat. Better they crash and burn and rise anew from the ashes. (I'm sure they can get disaster relief. Perhaps they're insured.)

[Lasher]

18. You're wrong in one respect.

Everyone is not scared of throwing the insurance companies out of work. I'm not.

[aquart]

19. I accept your correction.

Truly, they need to wander in the wilderness and rediscover humility and the simple joys of humble life.

[cyclezealot]

16. a good reason to not support her

We don't need no more HMO crap or insurance exclusions. No thanks. And to think taxpayers would finance their robbery of the sick.

[JTFrog]

17. Good Grief.

While I sit here being pissed off that my health insurance company just refused to pay for a god damn physical exam, this is just the news I need. Screw the health insurance companies and anyone who keeps enabling them.

No surprise at all coming from her. None, zip, zero. She should be made to wear the goddamn corporate logo's in public just like athletes when they are bought off.

[Highway61]

20. It's NOT enough

take the profit OUT of health-care .....period. All the candidates will offer the same, just tweaked differently. They are getting loads of $$$$ from drug and insurance companies. It's all "more of the same".
The ONLY candidate with a solution is Dennis. He can't and won't be bought. Truly health-care for all. If everyone gave $10, and I mean everyone, Dennis would blow them all away. The Media and big business won't give DK the time of day...WE need to get his message out and voice heard.

[Maribelle]

22. So, has anyone actually read her health care plan yet?

I have searched everywhere for the actual plan she is offering.

[antigop]

24. is the ins. plan for federal employees a "government program"?

Here is what the article says:
>>
For individuals and families who are not covered by employers or whose employer-based coverage is inadequate, Clinton would offer expanded versions of two existing government programs: Medicare, and the health insurance plan currently offered to federal employees.
>>

Aren't private insurance companies involved in the plan for federal employees? Do they have HMOs? Do they have to go through private companies for payment/billing?

[donkeyotay]

27. Will her program do anything to control profits, or make us a bottomless

subsidy to corporations who then turn around and buy off our representation in congress?

The extra profits help WellPoint-Blue Cross hire among the most expensive executives in the industry. WellPoint-Blue Cross' CEO Larry Glasscock was the highest paid health plan executive in 2006, earning $23.9 million in salary, stocks and other benefits, such as an "executive physical", travel for his wife, and use of the company jet.

On top of that, Glasscock earned $9.5 million from selling company stocks, and became vested in another $19 million in shares, bringing his total compensation to $52.4 million in 2006. (That's enough to provide about 29,000 California children with health insurance).

http://www.sickofbluecross.com/profits_over_people/

[DuaneBidoux]

28. Great, we're going to keeping feeding the monster.