The President sure was firm and his minister of propaganda was right on his quote at an AARP town hall on health care. Linda McMahon, er, Douglass, played the following clip to “clear the air” about the misinformation being distributed by evil right wing bloggers…
Boy, he sure sounded resolute there, didn’t he? I mean, he says it’s true so we can all just rest easy and know that The Great Onetm is on the case! The only problem? He’s wrong, and there’s a good chance he never read the bills at all because it’s not as simple as “stay in your plan if you want.”
In order to “keep your current plan” here’s what has to happen.
1. Your plan may not sign up any new people on or after day one of the first year of the new national plan.
2. The plan cannot change any terms or conditions on or after the start of the new national plan. This includes benefits provided, and so on.
3. The premium on your plan cannot change unless it changes for all members.
4. You must be enrolled in a qualified plan; qualifications to be determined by a Commissioner. To translate, you must be in a plan deemed financially viable by an unelected Government bureaucrat. To verify the sustainability of employer provided plans, tax returns will be investigated for every self-insuring company.
5. The Commissioner will also establish the terms under which a “qualified plan” can function. This includes services verification, and verification of costs and maintenance of sharing differentials.
6. The Commissioner will set a proper “loss ratio” for all insurance plans. Essentially, if you make too much money on your private plan, you’ll be required to return that money to enrollees as a rebate. Failure to do so is not an option.
7. “No plan” is not an option. You must be covered, like it or not. Failure to be covered will result in a penalty as a percentage of your income. In effect, you pay taxes to support the plan, and if you don’t join it, you pay a penalty for not doing so.
Read those 7 items again, and ask yourself: does my plan qualify? Would my insurance company stand up to this stupidity? Or is this a not-so veiled attempt at forcing the insurance companies out of business to remove all options and create a single-payer system?
I’m all for getting health care to those who need it or want it. I’ll pay the extra tax burden to do so. I’ll do it with a smile on my face. Obama’s plan rubs me the wrong way for three reasons.
Firstly, it’s an obvious attempt to run the insurance companies out of business and get people switched into the national plan, rather than the stated goal of simply providing coverage to everyone currently lacking (the infamous 45 million Americans we’re always hearing about).
Secondly, I’m not confident that anyone has thought this through well enough to implement it, has thought out the costs, and can make this work in the current economy. I’m also not confident that it’s being thought about now as it’s rammed down people’s throats in “town halls” where reps take phone calls during questions and sit there preaching while demonizing anyone who dares ask a question.
Thirdly, and most importantly, we’re being lied to on a regular basis by the President, the Congress, and the media on what the plan contains. Linda Douglass essentially got on camera to dispell the “myth” that Barack Obama was in favor of a single-payer system and tossed us this bone and we’re meant to just hear him say it and go “Phew. Nothing to worry about.”
Looking at those conditions set forth above, would your insurer qualify? Would your insurer stay in business? When the gov’t sets the price you charge, the standards you must maintain, the benefits you must offer, and the profit you’re allowed to make, does private industry ever succeed, or even bother participating?
Ponder that the next time The Great Onetm tells you you can keep your plan.