A cooperative (also co-operative or coöperative; often referred to as a co-op or coop) is defined by the International Co-operative Alliance's Statement on the Co-operative Identity as an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social, and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly-owned and democratically-controlled enterprise[1]. It is a business organization owned and operated by a group of individuals for their mutual benefit.[2] A cooperative may also be defined as a business owned and controlled equally by the people who use its services or who work at it. Cooperative enterprises are the focus of study in the field of cooperative economics.
How will the government be involved? Is a co-op just another name for a public option? Is this just an attempt by Congress to sell us another bill of goods?
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
ObamaCare
The Democrats' most recent answer to the question of how they will pay for their trillion-dollar healt-care reform was just announced by Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel. He wants to impose a surtax on incomes over $280,000, which would be a staggering blow to small businesses that create most jobs.
Another option floated by the Democrats is to tax employer-sponsored health coverage. Obama-supporter and union boss James P. Hoffa (name sound familiar?)calls this "a bitter pill for middle-class wage earners," and has vowed to fight it.
The real purposeof Obama's health care "reform" is to seize control of another major industry (health care) and move rapidly into Socialism. This is a big move because health care accounts for one dollar in every six spent in this country. The Democrats' plan involves mandates to force individuals to buy insurance, employers to provide insurance, and private insurance to offer an expensive list of benefits. If Obama is serious about allowing private plans to continue, he needs to back off. When the government dictates, there is little left that can be called private.
Instead of allowing insurance to compete by offering different benefit packages, the Democrats are considering insurance mandates to cover exotic benefits that individuals may want to buy such as in-vitro fertilization, hair transplants, rehab services, hearing aids, sex-change operations, prescription drugs, abortions, mental health, and substance abuse programs. If wanted to design the most expensive health care system in the world all over again at twice the cost, this is it.
The Democrats intend to prohibit low-cost policies for catastrophic are. This is the one option that keeps current health care affordable for some families. But that's okay; throw the baby out with the bath water. They want to bar you from buying cheap insurance in other states.
The Democrats intend to impose community rating on a federal level, which means all customers regardless of age, obesity, smoking, or other lifestyle differences. How many want to pay for your neighbors smoking-induced emphysema or lung cancer? How many want to pay for those 40% of Americans who run up billions in medical are cost because of their gluttony? This forces young people and those who choose a healthier lifestyle to subsidize older patients and those who are are the cause of America's epidemic of obesity. Is this the right kind of incentive for a healthy lifestyle?
The Democrats intend to launch a government-subsidized "public option" to compete with private insurance. Public competition with private business used to be anathema in this country. No private company can compete successfully under those circumstances so Obama's plan is clear: drive them out of business. That gives all of his promises about people being able to retain their private plans a hollow ring. This is just a milepost on the way to the single-payer government run plan the neolibs want.
Obama promised that if you like your current insurance plan you can keep it. Hard to do if the company is forced out of business! Your employer could cancel his company's paid insurance because only the government plan would enable him to take advantage of taxpayer subsidies. Scrub another private insurer.
The CBO estimates that the bill worked on by the Senate Finance Committee will cost $1.6 trillion. A private consulting group, Health Systems Innovation Network, estimates the cost of this bill at $4 trillion. Personally, against the backdrop of a ton of failed government cost and revenue estimates, I would opt for the higher estimate just to be on the safe side. Remember you read it here.
More people will buy insurance after the government subsidy rises to those with incomes five times the poverty rate, or $110,000 for a family of four. How many out there are earning that much? In LBJ's day, the focus was on the poverty level itself, now we have begun to multipliers of 2, 3, 4 and 5 times the poverty level making poverty level utterly meaningless.
Another option floated by the Democrats is to tax employer-sponsored health coverage. Obama-supporter and union boss James P. Hoffa (name sound familiar?)calls this "a bitter pill for middle-class wage earners," and has vowed to fight it.
The real purposeof Obama's health care "reform" is to seize control of another major industry (health care) and move rapidly into Socialism. This is a big move because health care accounts for one dollar in every six spent in this country. The Democrats' plan involves mandates to force individuals to buy insurance, employers to provide insurance, and private insurance to offer an expensive list of benefits. If Obama is serious about allowing private plans to continue, he needs to back off. When the government dictates, there is little left that can be called private.
Instead of allowing insurance to compete by offering different benefit packages, the Democrats are considering insurance mandates to cover exotic benefits that individuals may want to buy such as in-vitro fertilization, hair transplants, rehab services, hearing aids, sex-change operations, prescription drugs, abortions, mental health, and substance abuse programs. If wanted to design the most expensive health care system in the world all over again at twice the cost, this is it.
The Democrats intend to prohibit low-cost policies for catastrophic are. This is the one option that keeps current health care affordable for some families. But that's okay; throw the baby out with the bath water. They want to bar you from buying cheap insurance in other states.
The Democrats intend to impose community rating on a federal level, which means all customers regardless of age, obesity, smoking, or other lifestyle differences. How many want to pay for your neighbors smoking-induced emphysema or lung cancer? How many want to pay for those 40% of Americans who run up billions in medical are cost because of their gluttony? This forces young people and those who choose a healthier lifestyle to subsidize older patients and those who are are the cause of America's epidemic of obesity. Is this the right kind of incentive for a healthy lifestyle?
The Democrats intend to launch a government-subsidized "public option" to compete with private insurance. Public competition with private business used to be anathema in this country. No private company can compete successfully under those circumstances so Obama's plan is clear: drive them out of business. That gives all of his promises about people being able to retain their private plans a hollow ring. This is just a milepost on the way to the single-payer government run plan the neolibs want.
Obama promised that if you like your current insurance plan you can keep it. Hard to do if the company is forced out of business! Your employer could cancel his company's paid insurance because only the government plan would enable him to take advantage of taxpayer subsidies. Scrub another private insurer.
The CBO estimates that the bill worked on by the Senate Finance Committee will cost $1.6 trillion. A private consulting group, Health Systems Innovation Network, estimates the cost of this bill at $4 trillion. Personally, against the backdrop of a ton of failed government cost and revenue estimates, I would opt for the higher estimate just to be on the safe side. Remember you read it here.
More people will buy insurance after the government subsidy rises to those with incomes five times the poverty rate, or $110,000 for a family of four. How many out there are earning that much? In LBJ's day, the focus was on the poverty level itself, now we have begun to multipliers of 2, 3, 4 and 5 times the poverty level making poverty level utterly meaningless.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Obamacare
As a measure of the government’s ability to finance and manage the programs it enacts, the following facts about Social Security and Medicare are revealing and prophetic. The nation’s capital stock would have to be $106.4 trillion larger today to generate enough income to pay all of the Social Security and Medicare
benefits that have been promised, over and above future payroll taxes. But according to the Federal Reserve, the nation’s total private net worth is only $51.5 trillion. An 81% increase in income taxes would be needed to cover this problem.
Now a new trillion dollar health care program is being rushed through Congress without adequate study. The 1000 page House version, on p. 16, would prohibit any new purchases of private insurance and any changes from one carrier to another. This provision sounds the deathknell for private plans. Such plans cannot survive without new members as the old ones fade away.
Sections 242, 1702 and 1714 would allow illegal aliens to participate at taxpayer expense. Isn't that wonderful! We can't even afford to pay for our own health care costs but that does not deter the Neolibs from adding more beneficiaries, like they did in social security. Ask Congress to eliminate these provisions, reduce the scope of the program, and s-l-o-w d-o-w-n. Everyone who applies for any new program should be required provide foolproof evidence that they are in this country legally. We could use E-verify for this purpose if Congress and the Administration would get off the time and require its use across the board in both public and private applications.
As in the earlier Social Security and Medicare estimates, neither the revenue nor the cost estimates are credible. Likewise, the ephemeral cost savings are certain instead to turn into yet another increase in the national debt. The CBO has said that the program proposed will actually increase the cost of health care. Now that statement is credible. How can you add 30 million uninsured and those with pre-existing conditions and expect the cost to go down. Never happen, GI!
Isn't it time we figured out how to pay for the programs already on the books before we indulge in a rush to enact another underfunded entitlement program? If Obama wants to tax the rich, why not begin by removing the cap on taxable earning for social security purposes while freeze the maximum benefit at the present level as adjusted for inflation? Why not take a more modest approach to health care reform and as doctors, insurance companies and drug companies to voluntarily reduce costs by some prescribed amount or percentage and give assurances that costs will not be allowed to increase at a rate greater than the overall inflation rate for the next ten years. Many already have pro bono programs for those who cannot afford their medications and Wal-Mart has introduced prescriptions for as little as $4. Maybe we need more pro bono volunteers to help the uninsured and those with pre-existing conditions but with the requirement that they have to demonstrate what they are doing to improve their own diets, exercise routine, and general health.
Already mortgaged to the hilt, America’s future is headed toward another underfunded program we cannot afford. Good cost estimates get overruled by political appointees if they don’t support their favorite programs. I know. I was a government cost analyst.
benefits that have been promised, over and above future payroll taxes. But according to the Federal Reserve, the nation’s total private net worth is only $51.5 trillion. An 81% increase in income taxes would be needed to cover this problem.
Now a new trillion dollar health care program is being rushed through Congress without adequate study. The 1000 page House version, on p. 16, would prohibit any new purchases of private insurance and any changes from one carrier to another. This provision sounds the deathknell for private plans. Such plans cannot survive without new members as the old ones fade away.
Sections 242, 1702 and 1714 would allow illegal aliens to participate at taxpayer expense. Isn't that wonderful! We can't even afford to pay for our own health care costs but that does not deter the Neolibs from adding more beneficiaries, like they did in social security. Ask Congress to eliminate these provisions, reduce the scope of the program, and s-l-o-w d-o-w-n. Everyone who applies for any new program should be required provide foolproof evidence that they are in this country legally. We could use E-verify for this purpose if Congress and the Administration would get off the time and require its use across the board in both public and private applications.
As in the earlier Social Security and Medicare estimates, neither the revenue nor the cost estimates are credible. Likewise, the ephemeral cost savings are certain instead to turn into yet another increase in the national debt. The CBO has said that the program proposed will actually increase the cost of health care. Now that statement is credible. How can you add 30 million uninsured and those with pre-existing conditions and expect the cost to go down. Never happen, GI!
Isn't it time we figured out how to pay for the programs already on the books before we indulge in a rush to enact another underfunded entitlement program? If Obama wants to tax the rich, why not begin by removing the cap on taxable earning for social security purposes while freeze the maximum benefit at the present level as adjusted for inflation? Why not take a more modest approach to health care reform and as doctors, insurance companies and drug companies to voluntarily reduce costs by some prescribed amount or percentage and give assurances that costs will not be allowed to increase at a rate greater than the overall inflation rate for the next ten years. Many already have pro bono programs for those who cannot afford their medications and Wal-Mart has introduced prescriptions for as little as $4. Maybe we need more pro bono volunteers to help the uninsured and those with pre-existing conditions but with the requirement that they have to demonstrate what they are doing to improve their own diets, exercise routine, and general health.
Already mortgaged to the hilt, America’s future is headed toward another underfunded program we cannot afford. Good cost estimates get overruled by political appointees if they don’t support their favorite programs. I know. I was a government cost analyst.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
