Tap Dancing around the health care issue.

[SoCalDem]

The one glaring omission I see continually about ALL the health care plans is this...

No matter what plan is being discussed, they are ALWAYS reluctant to discuss ELIGIBILITY, and PROOF of eligibility.

No matter what plan we end up with (not in MY lifetime, probably :( ) there HAS to be a way to identify who is eligible to participate, and who is not.

This is the 800 lb gorilla in the living room. Not a single candidate has even mentioned it, but without it, NO plan can succeed.

Republicans shy away from it because they know that a large percentage of their base would flip out at the thought of "big gubbmint" mandating them to carry a photo citizenship ID to access health care. (even though these same people think it's okie-dokie to demand that democratic voters carry photo IDs to vote)..

Democrats are reluctant to mention it, because to do so, would lose a lot of people who are either poor or may have sketchy citizenship issues.

If the candidates contnue to insist on "insurance" as the deliverer of medical care, they can all push the eligibility issue away from themselves, and rely on the insurors to take care of the details.. Insurors probably don't care all that much about citizenship/eligibility, since their prime concern is collecting PREMIUMS, followed by denial of services, anyway...

Legislators are just "talking", when they claim to support health care for us all.. It's a nice idea, in principle, but they cannot bring themselves to do what's necessary to actually make it happen, because it would cost them votes..

My best guess is that we will continue to limp along until the Boomers start to die off in greater numbers, and once the country is "smaller", maybe a plan could be workable.

Until they are willing to deep-six ALL the insurors AND are prepared to issue biometric IDs that have citizenship verification built in (passports), we cannot have universal health care.

[Bonobo]

1. I have a question: If it should be UNIVERSAL as Hillary says...

then why just make it "affordable-ish" and then require that everyone buy it whether they can afford it or not?

Why not just say that everyone is covered? Why not just pay for our coverage? They certainly could throw enough money at the problem if they truly felt that it was something that EVERYONE MUST HAVE. Why penalize people? Why must companies/middlemen make a profit in the middle of something that is a GOD-GIVEN RIGHT?

[The_Casual_Observer]

2. "GOD-GIVEN RIGHT"

Is this one of the 10 commandments or something? People pay heavy taxes in countries that have medical plans. That would be a real bitch in the USA.

[RaleighNCDUer]

6. Not if you are actually getting something of value for those taxes.

What is insurance, anyway, but a tax paid to a private entity instead of the government? With current health insurance plans running between 9,000 and 14,000/yr (tho we don't really see it if the employer is covering the insurance) how is it better to have that go to some executive in Connecticut instead of the Department of Health and Human Services? You are STILL going to be paying it - and just because the company (or in my case, the state) is paying it that doesn't mean you are NOT, because that is money that otherwise would be going to you in your paycheck.

[SoCalDem]

10. Yay.. you GET it.. you really GET it

Once the insurance companies are out of the picture, and employers no longer hold life&death power over their employees, they get more money in their paychecks..and the health care is "paid" in the form of a universal charge to us ALL..

When employees finally start getting paid what they make now PLUS what their employer "says" he pays for them, they will know for sure whether they want to stay with that job, or look elsewhere.. Universal health care opens up all kinds of opportunities, and will make wages rise.

[redqueen]

14. I dont' know why ALL dems don't get this about healthcare. (nt)

[SoCalDem]

7. Not really.. One could make the same claim about almost anything we "buy"

such as gasoline..electricity..phoone service..you name it..

It's all a matter of priorities..

IF we, as a society, just DECIDE that ALL AMERICANS should have health care, we just DO IT, and maybe buy a few less air carriers or bombers..or start a few less wars..

Step ONE..

we FORBID employers from "offering" health care.. That immediately puts everyone in the same "place"..

If "you can keep the plan you have, is you like it", is an alternative, people who are well off financially and HAVE great plans, will exempt themselves from the "pool".. That cannot happen if we are to truly have universal care..

That pits the poorest and sickest who have nothing NOW, against the ones who get to keep their primo plans..and it segregates "their premiums" from the rest of the people.

Employers, now free from having to negotiate and pay for health care, should just GIVE each employee the money they NOW pay for that employee (in the form of company-share of medical)..

ALL those medical plans offered by companies are supposedly figured into their "pay-package" anyway, so just give the employees that same money, as the pay increases they should have gotten all along, anyway.. Whatever the tax rate would have to be raised to pay for universal coverage IF we were ALL in the same plan, would surely be less than what it is now..(Insurance companies & employers would be OUT of the equation)

If the super-rich want to pay out-of-pocket for SUPER-DOOPER care, that's up to them (they will always have better care than the rest of us..just like they have better houses, cars, vacations etc)

Once the employers are removed from health care, you WILL see wages rise..If employees are free to change jobs because they no longer are "health-benefit slaves", they WILL.. and they will also be free to start their own small businesses.

There are many businesses that never get started because people have families and are worried about providing health care.

Healthcare delivery should be run as a non-profit venture. The people delivering the service need to be well paid, but making obscene amounts of money at the expense of sick people is vile, and needs to stop.

[RaleighNCDUer]

3. How about eligibility being

"you're sick, and need help".

For the cost of what we spend in Iraq in a month we could provide free healthcare to every man, woman and child in the US - citizen or not - for a year. If, of course, 30 cents on every dollar wasn't being sucked off by the insurance companies, and another 20 cents on the dollar going to all the other middle-men in the "healthcare industry".

The actual cost of healthcare - the equipment, the drugs, the salaries of the medical staff - only accounts for half of what is paid. The rest pays for paper-shuffling, sales reps, interest on that expenive gadget that the medical center had to take a loan out to buy even though there are 6 others in town that only get used once ever two weeks.

We have potentially the best medical facilities in the world and the best trained staff, but the profit motive is sucking the system dry - why should an apendectomy cost 11,000 dollars, except for the doctor having to cover $450,000 in loans for his training, and $125,000/yr for malpractice insurance, on top of his $125,000 salary?

"Eligibility" is only a factor if we continue with an insurance-based system.

Socialized healthcare is the ONLY option.

[SoCalDem]

8. Can I go to Canada, and just get health care? Nope, I have to be a citizen

Mom does not cook a meal for her family, and let anyone who wanders in, eat it all up..

There HAS to be eligibility..and that HAS to be citizenship..

See why no one talks about it :evilgrin:

[Gormy Cuss]

4. There is no need for a photo ID with universal, single payer coverage.

A medical card, yes. A photo ID or biometric ID, no. There's no reason for it to be treated any differently than my private health insurance ID card, which has only policy # and my ID number within that policy. There's no picture. If that's good enough for the profit-driven insurance world, it ought to be good enough for a national health plan. For that matter, some of the existing public programs don't rely on photo IDs either. Neither Medicare nor Medicaid (at least in the state where I'm familiar) issue photo IDs either. At best a photo ID may be used to establish eligibility in the first place but even without it both public systems have survived just fine without requiring it.

[SoCalDem]

9. That's exactly what I'm talking about..establishing eligibility..

Once it's established, a simple care would suffice, but in the beginning, one MUST be able to prove they are eligible, and there HAS to be a limitation ..citizens only..

[Gormy Cuss]

11. But even to establish eligibility, a photo ID is not required for many such cards now.

That's my point. The country has gone slap-happy with trying to make flashing photo IDs substitute for common sense. No photo ID was needed when my mother applied for Social Security, or Medicare, or Medicaid, or Section 8 for that matter. Birth certificates were the most important documents in all cases.

There doesn't seem to be much concern about illegal immigrants using Medicare, probably because eligibility is universal for legal residents and citizens and if a handful of undocumented seniors are getting services, no big deal. When considering a universal health care plan, it's just not true that everyone will need photo identification to qualify despite the obsessive concerns of a subset of people who think illegal immigrants are behind every problem in this country. Universal means universal. Solving illegal immigration should not be the concern of the national healthcare plan, just as it should not be the burden of the public education system. Both should serve those who show up, period.

[Bridget Burke]

12. Oh--so legal "aliens" would not be eligible?

Odd, since so many of them pay taxes.

Of course, the "illegals" pay taxes, too. Let them die in the streets!

[SoCalDem]

13. and that's why we will never have "universal healthcare"

The devil's in the details.

If healthcare is for citizens of a country, there has to be a cut-and-dried way to establish just who'e eligible and who's not.. It's just that simple...and just that ugly.

The UK has healthcare for all..so does canada..so do most other civilized countries, BUT they restrict coverage to THEIR OWN citizens...not giving it to anyone who shows up..

It's wonderful and downright "lefty" of us all to want it and to debate the ins and outs of how it would work, BUT until the basic premise of who gets it, what makles them eligible, how do we identify the eligibility and who pays for the ineligible, who no doubt would get humanitarian care anyway, it will remain what it is.. plans & talking about the plans..

No one wants to talk about the hard parts..and that's why it's safe to talk about the esoteric facets of the various plans..

[nightrider767]

5. I'm not too worried about the details..

Fact is I sort of cringe when candidates haggle over the wisdom of their plan's details. Let's face it, when universal health care comes through, it's going to be a huge bi-partisan undertaking. No one person's plan is going to stay intact. It's going to be a huge dog-fight and in the end have many compromises.

Barak's or Hillary's plan is no better than a dream.

More importantly is the will and the persuasion to get it done.