Deep Thot....Well, at least it's deep for me.
Just wondering....
Health insurance providers are concerned that a public option will be in competition with the policies they sell.
There are thousands of different health insurance plans for sale already, competing with one another.
And they're afraid of one more?
HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA
Health insurance providers are concerned that a public option will be in competition with the policies they sell.
There are thousands of different health insurance plans for sale already, competing with one another.
And they're afraid of one more?
HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA
Advertisement
Well I guess the rub there is that they agree to divvy up the markets so they don't compete against one another...and therefore can keep rates high. Josh did a post about it earlier this week or over the past weekend.
That is why they are shaking in their boots about having real competition in their industry where they agreed not to be competitive with one another.
July 2, 2009 1:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
What? You think they're price fixing?
July 2, 2009 5:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Maybe, maybe not. If anything they allow one or two companies control specific markets and the others stay out so they don't actually engage in competition with each other. Is that price fixing by definition?
July 2, 2009 5:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Reminds me of the Mafia.
You get this turf, but you stay out of mine.
Maybe the HMO structure, is a form of Labor racketeering.
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-racketeering.htm
"Labor racketeering not only denies laborers their rights, but also results in economic loss to workers, the industry, and consumers."
Doctors and hospitals will pay for the service of the HMO Boss. Instead of calling it a bribe or extortion, we change the name to Managed Care.
Managed all right. Manage to skim.
Imagine Don Corleone saying" What Senator owes us his allegiance" Do we have anything on them? Make them an offer they can't refuse"
Don Corleone: So, Barzini will move against you first. He'll set up a meeting with someone that you absolutely trust guaranteeing your safety and at that meeting you'll be assassinated.|
Did Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) move against the public option to kill it?
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/23293.html
Don Corleone: [kisses Michael] Listen, whoever comes to you with this Barzini meeting he's the traitor. Don't forget that.
July 2, 2009 7:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yep. Time to tweak the anti-trust laws
July 2, 2009 11:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Amen! Or should I say: A Chicken!
July 3, 2009 2:46 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't have the figures, but there are many regions where one insurer dominates, so that there is no competition. A public option wouldn't be joining a vibrant market, it would just be destroying profitable local monopolies. Ezra Klein over at WaPo's blog has a lot of posts on this kind of stuff...
July 3, 2009 9:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
So, this is perhaps the reason BCBS can do this?
http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/flowerchild/2009/07/deep-thotwell-at-least-its-dee.php#comment-3516572
July 3, 2009 10:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't see this public option situation really making things better in the long run. Even though that may be what they decide to do right now... I'll keep pushing for single payer.
July 2, 2009 2:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have not heard any details of the plan, but I tend to agree with you, Synch. But there's no way in hell they could get single payer through Congress today. Maybe in a few years the tides will have turned.
July 2, 2009 4:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
No I know that they won't pass single payer by the fall. I'm just considering what they are doing a complete sham so I am focused on single payer however long it takes. And I think the tide is us... we are going to have to take a stand and some action to get us... they may just try to make the public option just better enough to dissuade us for a good while. Who knows how long it will take before we figure out what we will really get etc.
July 2, 2009 6:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
I am not abandoning single payer. Never. It is by far the best solution for the health of the people and the health of the people's pocketbook. It just makes fiscal sense. Which is probably why it doesn't make sense to Congress.
I am, however, trying to balance the ultimate sense of single payer with the bare fact that it is off the table. Completely gone from the discussion. So, do I go chasing after the balloon that floated away....even though it is the best balloon in the bunch....do I chase after that one balloon? Or do I instead turn my attention on the other only decent balloon in the bunch and make sure it stays put? Because people are dying right now. They need a way to pay for necessary care right now. They can't wait ten years for me or anyone else to catch that balloon and bring it back.
This situation sucks. I mean it really, truly sucks.
I see the public option as a foot in the door to universal health care. For a lot of people, including me, a public option is their last, best hope.
July 2, 2009 8:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Your balloon analogy seems apt to me as well. Whatever the plan looks like when it emerges from committee, I have no doubt we'll be revisiting this supposed reform of healthcare for the next 20 years, or however long it takes till enough of us demand sweeping reform.
July 2, 2009 8:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree in a sense but I am incredibly suspicious as to how it will actually change things. What is it really going to do. It seems we don't get to have a public option that competes to seriously with private insurance which means what...a more expensive public option than we should have to deal with?
What pisses me off is right now that have congress and the white house so the only reason we won't be getting the healthcare system we want is that the special interests and profiteers of the health industry are going to prevent it.
July 3, 2009 12:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, suspicion is mandatory, Synch.
It is my hope that congress won't go beyond the pale and come up with some ignorantly constructed monstrosity that eats diamonds and shits coal. The model, Medicare, is right in front of them. Needs some tweaks, but, it's there to follow.
The profiteers of the health industry piss me off, too. I mean, I can work myself into a massive snit about them in a hot second. I have nothing against any industry making a reasonable profit....but not when it comes at the price of human life or at the destruction of the quality of that human life. $1200 a month for insurance that can be yanked out from beneath you because you had acne 10 years ago is not insurance. It's theft
July 3, 2009 10:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Simple logic. Why not?
Just once in awhile, simple logic.
July 2, 2009 3:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
If the Capitalists don't want it; we the working and non working class won't get it.
If the people received health care, they may not want to be slaves anymore. To the Capitalists, it’s bad enough to have to support Workers comp, Medicare, unemployment insurance.
Capitalists don’t want a safety net. A safety net stands in the way of their complete control. They prefer to have the population beg the Master for relief.
It’s the same attitude with both Democrats and Republicans; they’ll jawbone about healthcare for eternity, both sides pitting the peasant class against each other, every election cycle. What harm is there? What are you going to do about it?
Each side demonizing the other, “If only we had more money for our campaigns we could provide this or that. If you vote for us WE ….”
The problem is WE, are not the WE they serve.
July 2, 2009 7:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Libertine: Josh's tract, sadly, was highly misleading.
In the US, there is a government system for regulating health insurance. The primary responsibility is at the state level. States regulate the amount of mandates and coverage requirements.
This is the reason why the insurance companies operate as quasi-monopolies: because state regulations are different.
A simple solution would be to create a federal regulation system of health care insurance, with coverage requirements consistent across the country.
This would allow insurance companies compete with one another, which they don't at the moment.
July 2, 2009 7:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is what Hillary was proposing during the primaries, to allow health insurance companies to operate across state lines, btw, which was one of the conclusions from the 1990s reform proposals that everyone ignores in the age of ObamaCare.
July 2, 2009 7:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Any time the state is allowed to collude with a corporation you can be sure neither of them are concerned about the consumer.
July 3, 2009 1:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
ObamaCare? I have never heard that defined, or even mentioned before. What specifically are you referring to? PLEASE be specific! or is that asking too much?
July 2, 2009 9:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
BCNS just asked the insurance board for 30% increase in the rates they charge for individual policy holder (small business-- independent worker) rates here.
Fuckers.
I gave them so much for so little.
They deserve to die.
July 2, 2009 11:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
er, BCBS, as in Blue Cross, Blue Shield
July 2, 2009 11:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
BCBS of Michigan just asked for a 56% raise.
How in the farking hell do they get away with crap like this? It's NUTS!!!
July 3, 2009 10:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is faulty logic. The government can PRINT MONEY to fund its health insurance plan. Health insurers can not just print money.
Yeah, when you have the ability to create money out of thin air, it's hard to compete.
July 3, 2009 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Add to this that the government plan will run with a fixed set of mandates and coverage requirements. Private insurance will have comply with different state-by-state laws.
July 3, 2009 12:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, this is absolutely true, CMN. Health insurers cannot just print money....so instead, they steal it from the consumers.
July 3, 2009 12:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Don't you see though that every dollar the government prints reduces the value of the dollars that you earn?
How is this not stealing money from you too?
July 3, 2009 1:00 PM | Reply | Permalink