Sub my name for the example at Alegre’s corner. My company has had three layoffs this year, costs are being cut all over the place, but the one thing I’ve been able to count on is my health plan. We are offered two options: One which has a lower premium but has a large deductible and the patient pays 20% of all costs incurred. The other has a higher premium but lower cost at the doctor. I chose this plan because I always think “what if?” Well this year was my “what if.” If these “cadillac” benefits get taxed $1,000 per employee to continue to offer this plan, I don’t see my company continuing to do so. You know the insurance company will just pass the cost on to us, and up will go our premiums, down will go our services.
Quoting from USA Today:
“Schoolteacher Kinzi Blair [me] makes only $46,000 a year, but she [I] has [have] what many would consider a ‘Cadillac’ health plan, now targeted for a big tax increase by health reformers. She [I] has [have] $10 copays and no deductible [in network]. She [I] gets generic prescription drugs for $10. Her [My] plan covers mental health counseling, organ transplants, acupuncture [haven't used it for any of this stuff]. It covers speech therapy for preschoolers and in vitro fertilization. . . . The Senate Democrats’ bill, unveiled last week, would impose a 40% tax on insurance premiums above $8,500 for an individual and $23,000 for a family. Those thresholds represent the total paid by both employer and employee. Blair’s premiums cost $11,000 so her insurance company would be taxed 40% of the premium that exceeds $8,500 – a total tax of $1,000. . . . The idea is that taxing high-cost health plans would discourage unnecessary health spending and pay for reform out of the health care system itself.”
Can Harry and his fellow Senators please tell me what expenses I’ve incurred in the last couple of months were “unnecessary health spending?”
Blue – I am so happy that you are recovering… and the point that you are making is wonderful! When the government begins to regulate and dictate our health one begins to see the “free market” POV.
You value your life to a certain value – that is, you will pay $X for your cadillac plan (my company just eliminated our cadillac plan in prep for Gov. Healthcare, so I lost a majority of my wonderful coverage and have seen cost of treatment increase 5x). The Government, however values your life much less – reporting that early detection in certain treatable cancers is not worth the cost of coverage to the 1899 unaffected women of 1900 tested…
If I value my life at X, and the gov values my life at Y, shouldn’t I have a choice, a RIGHT to pick the higher of the values? As you stated – what do you consider “unnecessary” when it is your own life?
Continue your recovery! Keep blogging! Cheers!
Steve, you misunderstand. I am a big single payer advocate. I want everyone to have what I have. People like you complain that the government will get in the way of health care decisions and I’ve already seen the ugliness of insurance company bureaucrats and bean counters doing the same. I am fortunate that my company finds it worthwhile and that they are ABLE to offer my plan.
I want everyone in this country, whether they can afford to or not, have this same sort of health care. One that will not bankrupt them if they choose to avail themselves of doctor recommended treatments. You want everyone to be every man/woman/child for themself. I can’t hang with that.
I don’t want insurance to pay for medically unproven therapies (and acupunture does fall into that category – cue the CAM proponents), but the benefit of early detection of cancer is a proven and I am indeed baffled by the new recommendations. And with those recommendations, they fed right into the rightwing mantra of a “government takeover” of health care.
I only wish. The VA is government run health care. Medicare is government paid (taxes rather than premiums) health care. When I was a military wife, I got the best health care at government run institutions where my doctors were not paid per service, but were proud members of the U.S. military. Of course, the rightwingers have pretty much dismantled that system as well, except for our folks in D.C. who can avail themselves of such places as Bethesda Medical Center. If it’s good enough for the President. It’s good enough for me.
So as much as you and I agree wholeheartedly on civil liberties, and we need to continue to stand shoulder to shoulder on that, you and I are miles apart on this issue.