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What Obama really needs to include in his economic package
What Obama really needs to include in his economic package is a plan for universal healthcare. The lack of universal healthcare is one of the main factors that is weakening America's economy. A large percentage of bankruptsies and foreclosures are due to the fact that people cannot afford to pay the medical bills. I have heard horror stories about people not being able to afford healthcare for ill parents or children. How much money do these middle class people spend on healthcare for their families that could have been used for consumer spending. Also American businesses pay a larger amount of money paying healthcare insurance for their employees that have been best been used for hiring new employess or keeping prices down. It appears to me that the healthcare insurance industry is a vampire sucking the life out of the American economy and the only way to defang it is to have universal healthcare.
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I think the loss of jobs is a bigger factor weakening the economy than universal healthcare.
Obama's plan does not call to mandate insurance. However, Sen Baucus is pushing for it.
I think mandating health care coverage for everyone is a big mistake. Medicare and Medicaid are already broken. According to the Medicare trustees, the program's excess costs over the next 75 years is $36 trillion. Even doubling tax rates wouldn't raise enough revenue to pay for this shortfall
Do you want to double down on the public option?
November 24, 2008 9:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Loss of jobs is a symptom, not a cause.
So the question is, will putting health care in a stimulus package likely to help boost jobs and put the economy in a stable state, or something that will detract from that effort.
Which of course pisses me off, but that's what the Republicans left us.
November 25, 2008 2:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Medicare and Medicaid are already broken.
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According to whom? Those who oppose them?
I take any of those claims with at minimum a grain of salt, as the same sources repeat ad nauseum the lie that Social Security needs to be "fixed" -- though it isn't broken.
November 25, 2008 12:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
Private health insurance is a predatory industry. It profits exclusively from the misfortune of others. Investors seek to scrape funds away from treatment costs while providing nothing in return. Profit is not enhanced by providing more service. It grows when providing less.
As for corporate sponsored healthcare. I would rather my employer not make decisions regarding my healthcare. Their interests are profit, not my health. Also, if I disagree with them, I have no recourse. At least I can hold an elected official accountable for mismanagement. What can I do it that individual holds my career in their hands?
November 25, 2008 4:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Think of health care in terms of "human infrastructure" along with physical infrastructure that needs to be fixed. A national health care plan will also help American businesses stay competitive.
It is better to have a government bureaucrat in charge of negotiating for better prices and paying the bills than an insurance bureaucrat whose sole job is to deny me health care. One is beholden to an elected official and one works for a boss who gives bonuses for denying health care.
Physicians for a national health care program PNHP have a great website, great cartoons, and great talking points. Book one of their speakers to come talk to your local group.
November 25, 2008 6:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
JNagarya - my "sources" are not some right-wing blog, it's the 2008 Annual Report of the Social Security and Medicare Board of Trustees.
http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/TRSUM/index.html
Read it for yourself.
Why do you say Medicare isn't broken? Medicare is already exceeding in expenses what it is receiving in taxes and dedicated revenues. Medicare's reserves are projected to be exhausted by 2017. Unfortunately I plan to still be living in 2017 so I am worried about the future of Medicare. You should be too
November 25, 2008 8:35 PM | Reply | Permalink