Congress’ Plan
Government-Dictated
Bureaucratic Health Care
Scroll down for details.
What we need to stop: Congress’ incredibly bad plan for U.S. health care
- Expansion of existing government programs (taxes up)
- More regulators for over 1300 insurance companies (taxes up)
- Result: premiums as high as 50-100% of pre-tax income.
Premium assistance (taxes up) for incomes up to $88,200,
showing that the entire middle class will struggle to pay
the high premiums alone before any medical bills occur.
- Result: premiums as high as 50-100% of pre-tax income.
Premium assistance (taxes up) for incomes up to $88,200,
showing that the entire middle class will struggle to pay
the high premiums alone before any medical bills occur.
- Mandated / dictated / forced purchase of health insurance:
- Choose plan or government assigns you a plan.
- Pay or be fined. Pay fine or face tax evasion & prison.
Conclusion: we need to use common sense and use single-payer.
How You Will Be Impacted by What
Most U.S. Representatives and Most U.S. Senators
are Preparing to Create:
Very Expensive Health Care
| Current System: Complicated, Bureaucratic, Expensive, Partial Coverage |
Congress’ Plan: More Complicated, more Bureaucratic, More Expensive, Partial Coverage |
|
Varying degree of (unknown) benefits – Variations among thousands of plans – Details of coverage are often unknown until the doctor, hospital, or patient calls the insurance company to ask for approval to get health care |
Varying benefits plus defined minimum Minimum = a partial version of the full coverage that single-payer would provide. |
|
Many Payers - Over 1300 health insurance companies and an excessive number of government programs: federal, state, and private (total is difficult to determine) – Result: complex with many costs (below) |
Many Payers with More Control - The 1300 might shrink while their power over health care decisions is likely to increase in the name of cost control; better physician rating when care is denied - Increased privatization of Medicare, as scheduled |
|
Basis: Profits Free-Market Principles - The only free-market high-income country with this basis is the United States – Assuring profits for investors – Result: astonishingly poor health: U.S. life expectancy 30th in the world (50th as per CIA); U.S. rank of 19th of 19 in minimizing deaths due to preventable diseases |
Basis: More Profits and Much Higher Taxes - More business for health insurance companies - Assuring more profits for investors - Dramatic expansion of government in health care - Result: questionable health outcome, more money goes away from health care |
|
Financial, physical and emotional stress - Hardships for millions - Uninsured or underinsured: 78.5 million 42% of 19-64 yr old adults |
Financial, physical and emotional stress - Hardships for millions - Impossible to cover everyone - Continued use of the uniquely American solution that has failed so badly |
|
Insurance plan choices & health care restrictions - Yearly review & decision on which insurance plan(s) - Constant worry about the impact of your choice on the availability of care for your loved one(s) - HMO’s: specific physicians, specific hospitals - Restrictions: out-of-network, pre-existing conditions - Restrictions of care based on ability to pay - Wait Times, including infinite wait times for the uninsured |
Mandated/Dictated/Forced - If you don’t choose, then the government will assign you to a health insurance plan and force you to pay - If you don’t pay the forced premiums, you’ll be fined - If you don’t pay the fine, you could be arrested for tax evasion, which can lead to time in federal prison - Estate recovery: increased use to recover costs - Restrictions, rationing, and wait times still present |
|
Complex with Many Costs – Payment of taxes and expensive health insurance premiums – Expensive co-pays and deductibles – Percentage not covered by insurance – Health care bills after the lifetime limit is exceeded – Interest amount(s) during the payment of medical bills – Our federal and state taxes used to pay for-profit insurers: – Incentives to health insurance companies – Tax benefits to employers who provide health insurance – Medicaid & many other programs in 50 states, many run by for-profit companies |
More Complex, More Costly Health insurance premiums go “through the roof”. Examples of skyrocketing premiums based on the experience already demonstrated in New York state:
|
Very poor efficiency – About 69% estimated efficiency – About 31% spent on administrative functions Managed, influenced, and/or operated by many: – Over 1300 private insurance companies – Multiple federal government programs – Fifty states with their programs – Influence of corporate lobbyists – Large billing staffs in hospitals & physician offices – fund-raisers by friends, co-workers, relatives, charities |
Worse efficiency - Government controls on health insurance companies mean more regulators (higher taxes for all) – Plans for savings expected to be insignificant compared to the dramatic savings of single-payer Special notes: physicians’ low satisfaction will become significantly worse due to more complexity. |
We Need Single-Payer: Improved Medicare for All
non-profit single-payer national health insurance
Residents of other free-market countries pay less than half the cost.
They get quality health care for their entire lives and live longer.
They have the peace of mind of knowing that they and their families get health care and have no major medical bills.
How to Help Get Single-Payer:
go here and join the Million Letters for Health Care Campaign
Be part of our unified voice to the U.S. Congress.
We receive monthly reminders and then print 1 pre-addressed letter, sign it and send it … and/or make a short phone call … to 1 person: our U.S. Representative. We can do this!
Simple, efficient single-payer will support our health and well-being, instead of supporting the wasteful spending of our dollars on excessive government and over 1300 inefficient “middlemen”.
It is the only solution that eliminates the bureaucracy and provides the benefits documented at this web page.
How to Make Calls — Go here for the information to make a short call. The instructions are also at the bottom of page 1 of the associated double-sided handout (pdf).
Additional Information
What Every American Should Know, including “The Mystery” for moreabout U.S. health care
Read more about: “One non-profit, public agency, which is accountable to the people and insulated from the U.S. legislature.” …
“Health Care Meltdown* by Robert H. LeBow, MD, which is revised and updated by C. Rocky White, MD. for the 2007 edition; p. 271.
Bookmark with: