Commentary By Ron Beasley
In Poll, Wide Support for Government-Run Health
Americans overwhelmingly support substantial changes to the health care system and are strongly behind one of the most contentious proposals Congress is considering, a government-run insurance plan to compete with private insurers, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.
This is the second poll in the last few days that showed overwhelming support for a public plan. The NBC/WSJ poll showed that 76% thought the inclusion of a public plan was very important. And note that even half of the Republicans support a public plan.
Lawmakers will have to decide if the will of the people or the money from the health insurance oligarchs will make reelection more likely. These numbers won't have any impact on the conservatives but moderate Republicans and Democrats should take note.
Interesting poll results, but what would be more interesting is to poll WHY people think goverment insurance would be an improvement.
ReplyDeleteVery few seem to understand the issues.
If the desire is to have universal coverage regardless of employment status, then, yes, a system based on the Canadian, Australian or various plans in Europe would deliver what they want.
However, I don't see Obama offerring this.
Instead, we get some vague theories about lower costs.
I work in the healthcare insurance industry and I am sympathetic to socialized medicine (I like the Australian model), but I will tell you that the cost of coverage will be about the same regardless of whether the premium is being collected by a private company or by Uncle Sam.
Why? Because, despite Michael Moore types' harping on the outlier 30% admin cost, etc, etc in the private sector versus some (erroneously/disingenuously presented) much lower figure for Medicare (much of Medicare is administered by private companies who absorb admin costs that are not included in the typically quoted Medicare figure) private companies, whether for profit or not, are typically operating at medical loss ratios of 85% to 95%. That means that 85% to 95% of revenues are paid out to providers as benefits for the members.
Medical loss ratios are increasing.
The bill, coming from providers is increasing. Medical services cost a lot of money and the cost is going up annually. Medical advancements mean that more people can be treated be a greater variety of conditions. This is a double edged sword. Improvements in health care represent an obviously positive development, but there is little cost benefit analysis being applied and....well......money doesn't grow on trees. When private companies attempt the CBA, physicians and developers and suppliers scream to the media that the evil insurance companies want to deny care to those in need. Michael Moore picks up on this and the public revolts. The insurance companies back down and premiums go up.
Will politicians running a goverment plan have the cajones to stand up and do the CBA and deny those treatments where marginal cost does not equal marginal benefit? Ha......I, for one, strongly doubt it. Probably quite the opposite would occur in the US political system.
So again I ask, other than continuous womb to tomb coverage (a very good thing) is there anything else folks think that a US govt plan would deliver better than the current system?