A point that eluded both of you is that Medicare has too much of an unfunded liability (read: biggest hole in future budgets, about 70% of projected deficit will come from Medicare). Medicare is a LOT more expensive than this proposed plan, which is revenue neutral or slightly positive in projected savings. [/QUOTE] No way is this going to be revenue neutral or anywhere even close. That is the biggest lie going.
Thanks for the article. Wendell Potter is an insurance company insider who quit after twenty years in the business.
You can't possibly be saying that Health Care Insurers, w/o a public option, will lower premiums out of the kindness of their hearts. However its funded, when you take the profit out of it, its got to at least not raise premiums like having profit in it would. Advocating for Health Care Insurers here would be like advocating for bankers before the bailout w/o the too big too fail poison pill aspect of letting the institutionalized investments all tank. If the insurers tank great ...see ya. Yea, its complicated and I'll bet it still didn't account for teams of lawyers abilities to deconstruct language and come away with loopholes that circumscribe the spirit of the law or at least hold it up in court backlogs. Still better than Insurance middlemen salivating like vultures at the windfalls if they win. Taxpayers will pay more then.
No way is this going to be revenue neutral or anywhere even close. That is the biggest lie going. [/QUOTE] The point was that the MECHANISM AND STRUCTURE are already in place. No need to re-invent that wheel (unless, of course, your REAL objective has little to do with providing medical treatment.)
You nailed it exactly. Except the fact the private insurers are in fact private companies that are for profit. If you take the profit out of it, why be in business? They are going shut down. Look at the profit margins of health insurance companies. Its pretty small. The idea of the public option is to force the health insurers out of business so that in 10 years, the public option is the only option. Of course members of Congress will still have their own cadillac plan, but we won't mention that. Its really easy making rules when you don't have to live by them.