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Retirees Couldn’t Afford McCain’s Health Plan |
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We all know America’s health care system is broken and that reforming it to provide quality, affordable care for all is a top priority for voters this fall and for the new president and Congress in January.
A new study by the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) shows that a key component of John McCain’s health care plan—which would push working families into the private insurance market—falls far, far short of what retirees would need to cover their premiums and out-of-pocket expenses.
Meanwhile, a new coalition launched a call-in campaign to find out how members of Congress will vote on health care in the new session.
McCain’s proposal is centered on high-deductible health savings accounts (HSAs), which provide fewer benefits at higher costs and undermine existing employer-based health care. He also would make health care premiums part of taxable income, essentially creating a new tax for working families.
According to the EBRI study, a man who is age 55 this year would need $132,000 to $261,000 in his HSA when he retires in 2018 to have a 50 percent chance to pay for his premiums and out-of-pocket health care costs in retirement. EBRI calculates a women the same age in 2008 would need even more: $181,000 to $364,000.
Not exactly pocket change for working families.
Click here to read about Barack Obama’s health care plan that is based on a principle essential to successful reform of the health care system—expanding affordable, high-quality care coverage to everyone.
After voters cast their ballots in November, Congress must decide whether to ensure quality health care for all—or to just tinker with the broken system and back the private insurance industry that raised its health insurance premiums by 86 percent between 2000 and 2006.
Health Care for America Now! (HCAN), the coalition of more than 80 labor and community groups, wants to find out what side Congress is on in the health care reform debate, and you can help. (The AFL-CIO is part of the coalition, which was launched last month.)
The coalition has started a “Hey Congress: Which Side Are You On” campaign that allows you to call your lawmaker toll-free. Click here, and when you provide your ZIP code and phone number, HCAN will be able to look up your lawmakers, provide you a list of talking points and then place the call for you.
Jason Rosenbaum on HCAN’s Now! Blog says that after the campaign started Aug. 11:
Hundreds of calls have been made already, and we’ve got unconfirmed reports back that dozens of members of Congress are on our side.
If you’ve taken a moment to call your members of Congress, thank you. The calls only take a minute, but they are already making a big difference. And if you haven’t found time yet, please click here and call your elected officials. While the majority of America supports major health care reform, we still need to demand it from our elected officials.
Jason also reports that the insurance industry is running another one of its phony “listening tours.” The group America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) last month announced its American Health Solution campaign so people can tell the insurance industry how to reform the nation’s health care. Of course, participants are hand-picked, and the “roundtables” are held under the radar and barely publicized to allow the real public to chime in.
Big Insurance’s “listening” session in Detroit was held Wednesday. That day, Jason wrote:
The announcement was sent out an hour ago. The tour stop is today. There is no information on where or when the event will be held.
How can you claim to be listening to the public if you give less than 24 hours’ notice and no indication where your event is?
Whoever actually ends up showing up at the event clearly doesn’t represent the American people, as the only folks with advance notice of this event are folks connected with AHIP and the insurance industry.
As usual, the only people the insurance industry is listening to is themselves.
No surprise there.
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Unbelievable misinformation! How can health insurance premiums be taxable income? They are expenses not income!!! Also, when the individuals reach retirement age, they will still go on Medicare and the money they saved up will help pay for any additional expenses like long term care (which Medicare does not pay for and should be covered) that Medicare does not cover. Get your facts straight so that you don’t scare people so much.
“Health care premiums (as) part of taxable income” has not been part of taxable income all along. Here’s how this works. If you pay for health care through your employer, your premiums are deducted from your pay prior to being taxed. What McCain wants to do is tax your income before the premiums are taken out. Example, say you earn $1000 a week, but pay $50 a week for medical insurance. You will be taxed on an income of $950, not $1000. This does save you money, since $50 x 52, which is $2600 a year, would be the amount you would not have to pay tax on. Now, McCain is saying, well yeah, let’s tax that too.
Oh, and not only is medicare very limited in what they pay out, it limits the services you can receive. I know this first hand. An additional problem is the “Supplemental Insurance” that all people on medicare need to have, particularly for medications. Not only are these plans expensive, difficult to understand, and limited in benefits, the bottom line is, if Medicare will not pay for a service, your supplemental won’t either. I’m sure you’ve also heard of the donut hole. Well, that’s another ugly, hidden truth of these plans.
Bottom line: HEALTH CARE REFORM IS URGENTLY NEEDED! for all our sakes!
HCAN’s Richard Kirsch, the group’s executive director, said:
“It is time the insurance industry started putting our health before its profits. We need an American solution to health care that offers quality, affordability, and choice. We need a solution that works for our families and our businesses, and now is the time to make sure the next president and Congress deliver on the promise of quality, affordable health care for all in 2009.”
It is REALLY time to cut the insurance companies from the mix and get real reform in this health care crisis. 18,000 people are dying each year because they had no insurance or could not afford any insurance. The insurance industry makes their profits off those who have insurance, but they decide what procedures/services are covered. Should the insurance industry be involved with getting all people insured? Do you think that they really want to cut costs, make it affordable? They will only deny more procedures. BUT, of course according to HCAN, everyone will be insured! What a crock!!
HR 676 would institute a single payer health care system in the U.S. by expanding a greatly improved Medicare system to every resident.
HR 676 would cover every person in the U. S. for all necessary medical care including prescription drugs, hospital, surgical, outpatient services, primary and preventive care, emergency services, dental, mental health, home health, physical therapy, rehabilitation (including for substance abuse), vision care, chiropractic and long term care.
HR 676 ends deductibles and co-payments. HR 676 would save billions annually by eliminating the high overhead and profits of the private health insurance industry and HMOs.
HR 676 currently has 91 co-sponsors in addition to Conyers.
Co-sponsors and bill text are here:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:h.r.00676:
HR 676 has been endorsed by 453 union organizations in 49 states
including 112 Central Labor Councils and Area Labor Federations and 36 state AFL-CIO’s (KY, PA, CT, OH, DE, ND, WA, SC, WY, VT, FL, WI, WV, SD, NC, MO, MN, ME, AR, MD-DC, TX, IA, AZ, TN, OR, GA, OK, KS, CO, IN, AL, CA, AK, MI, MT & NE).
453 union organizations have endorsed a better solution, HCAN & the National AFL-CIO should jump on board for REAL reform!
Probably the most important thing to remember in deciding on whether or not to include private for-profit insurers in out health care system is that health insurance bears little relationship to providing adequate health care for all. As long as the bottom line is of primary importance, people will suffer while CEOs and stockholders collect. Humana has admitted that their huge rise in profits this year comes from Plan D - taxpayer-funded profits. Rather than wasting 30+ cents of every health care dollar on private insurers, let’s back Rep. John Conyers’ HR676 - single-payer health care for all, fairly and equally. The administrative cost for a Medicare-style program would be about 3 cents out of every dollar. More and more people, health care professionals and lay persons, are getting behind this sensible solution to our problems. It’s a very popular idea. At the city level, the mayors at the annual meeting expressed their unanimous support of single-payer.
I also hasten to add that any claim to regulating the insurance companies are illusory. They are too rich and too powerful to submit to any sort of meaningful government regulation. Let’s leave them out entirely.
Why must the rest of the industrialized world insure everyone in their society at 50-60%of our cost? Anything less than single payer is not going to work because we cannot overcome the private profits and ceo and advertising excesses of the private mareketplace.Is the corruption of our electoral contribution pay to play so entrenched that no politcal party can break its dominance over our ability to act. HR 676 is our starting discussion–we must get there.
I am very disappointed that the AFL-CIO has bought into HCAN, especially given the number of state AFL-CIO’s and locals that have passed resolutions in support of HR 676, Expanded and Improved Medicare for All. The leadership needs to listen to its own rank and file.
Let us not be so willing to concede the interests of the American people to the private health insurance industry. HR 676 is the way to go.
HCAN is doing some good ads, but HCAN’s insistence on including the private insurance companies in any health care reform will cause the reform to fail us.
Insurance companies profit by denying claims, refusing to cover the sickest, and raising the deductibles and copays so high that people cannot afford the care that they need.
We can have the reform that we need, HR 676, expanded and improved medicare for all. This single payer plan already in Congress will provide all of us with all medically necessary care, including dental and prescriptions. We just have to do what the labor movement can best do–stand up on principle and fight for what is right.
Alas, neither canidate is really talking about universal health care. All are talking modifications of current systems, which is a bandaid approach to a crisis in many American families.
What is sad is that many union members and families do not know about alternatives, like HB 676. There are many “proposals” on the table and folks are confused. Politics has confused the issue for many citizens
Soar 11-3 (Saint Louis area retired steelworkers) and others have supported HB 676, but many are dissapointed that this bill is not going anywhere fast. In fact, some are skeptical that this bill will ever see the light of day before the full congress.
What is needed is that the varied unions be informed of what a universal health care bill (like HB 676) would mean to them in detail and have action on the local union (and retiree organization) levels.