SEARCH
Senate Finance Passes Health Care Reform Bill. Public Option Still AWOL
 |
|
The Senate Finance Committee this afternoon approved what one panel member called “a down payment” on health care reform. By a 14-9 vote, the committee approved a bill that Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) says is ”a down payment and…the start of reforms.”
Joining all 13 Democrats on the committee was Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine).
The committee bill, crafted for the most part by Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), provides important insurance industry reforms and improvements in how health care is delivered and paid for with a focus on quality over quantity.
The committee bill taxes workers’ health care benefits through its tax on certain premiums. It also does not include a public health insurance plan option that would give working families a choice between private insurance and an affordable, quality public option.
Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) says a public insurance option is essential for cutting costs and “will keep the feet of the insurers to the fire.” He said he will fight for that when the bill moves to the floor.
The next step is to merge the bill with the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee legislation that includes a public option and doesn’t tax workers’ health benefits. That could be on the Senate floor later this month. House action likely will come soon after the Senate moves.
Cantwell says she expects opposition from the insurance industry to grow even stronger as reform moves closer to passage. She notes the health insurance industry spent more than $263 million in lobbying in just the first six months of this year.
 |
Become a Fan on Facebook |  |
Follow Us on Twitter |  |
Subscribe to YouTube |  |
Subscribe to Blog RSS | ||||
15 Comments
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
The AFL–CIO has again betrayed any claims of “leadership” in actively supporting this corporate sponsored “health care reform”. The unanimous resolution of the recent AFL-CIO convention in September in support of “Medicare for All” single payer proposals has been completely ignored. The consequences of this betrayal to the working people of this country, organized and unorganized, are going to be devastating.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/oct2009/maxb-o14.shtml
US Senate panel approves Obama-backed health care plan
By Kate Randall
14 October 2009
The US Senate Finance Committee voted Tuesday to approve health care legislation that, if implemented, will slash health care benefits for millions of Americans. The Baucus plan, named for committee chairman Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana, passed in a 14-9 vote.
…
In reality, Obama’s support for the Baucus plan demonstrates that his vision of restructuring health care has nothing in common with a government-run plan, or even a reform of the present system. Rather, the entire Congressional debate over health care has been dictated by the interests of the corporate and financial elite, including the giant health care insurers and pharmaceutical companies.
The result is legislation that will leave millions without health care coverage and slash billions from Medicare and other federal programs. Individuals and families will be mandated to buy insurance or face a penalty, while employers are under no obligation to provide coverage. The bill will also bring into force various mechanisms that will cut costs and ration care.
…
While the Obama administration and Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee sought to dispute these figures, it should be noted that the Baucus bill contains no provisions to restrict what insurance companies can charge. The White House has worked closely throughout the Congressional discussion on health care to assure the insurance industry that any legislation that is drafted meets these conditions.
…
Another Obama campaign promise has also been exposed as a sham—the fight for “universal health care.” One of the most damning features of the Baucus plan is that it would leave about 25 million people—or about 1 in every 12 US residents—with no health care coverage at all.
It is estimated that about a third of these uninsured—or more than 6 million people—would be undocumented immigrants and their children. In particularly cruel fashion, the Obama administration and Congressional Democrats have been at pains to insist that not a penny of federal money should go to insure these individuals.
…
These outlays will in the main be financed by deep cuts to Medicare and other federal programs for the elderly, poor and disabled, which will be slashed by about $400 billion over the next decade.
Medicare payments to health care providers will be reduced by about $200 billion. An additional $113 billion will be axed from Medicare Advantage, the program by which more than 10 million seniors receive Medicare benefits through private health insurance plans.
…
There is no opposition from any section of the political establishment to the cost-cutting model exemplified by the Baucus plan, which has moved one step closer with Tuesday’s Finance Committee vote.
…
Whatever legislation ultimately emerges from these proceedings, and any reconciled bill between the House and Senate, the result will be a more openly and directly class-based health care system, in which the working class receives second-rate care, while the wealthy are ensured the best care that money can buy.
Without a strong public option there is little if any hope that much will come from the final bill on health care reform congress is sure to enact. In fact I fear the worse if the insurance companies are left to their own discretion. Its time to tell Senator’s Baucus and Snow to take a hike. When the Republicans were in power they often failed to invite Democratic lawmakers into congressional hearings, yet Democrats can’t wait to kiss their ass and bend over backwards at our expense. Labor needs to stand up strong else workers and retirees are in for another screwing.
This so-called reform is a slap in the face to all of us who work for a living! It is clear that our Congressional misleaders are nothing more than prostitutes for the health insurance industry!
I too supported single payer, Medicare For All! Over 500 trade union organizations did so as well. So why are our “friends” in the Democratic Party again betraying our interests? (See sentence #1)
I once again plead the case for a viable alternative to the choice between Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum! Labor, environmentalists, populists, REAL liberals, civil rights, women, etc we must unite! That’s how it’s done in France, Germany and other nations that have REAL universal healthcare!
“I too supported single payer, Medicare For All!”
Single payer is not the same thing as “Medicare for All.” People can be mad at the AFL-CIO, but they have done a fine job of negotiating our healthcare – and i am not about to hand that over to a whiny cry baby like Harry Reid – or a paid off hack like Max Baucus.
Those Dems spent a little too much time over at the water cooler laughing at Joe the Plumber. They NEED to be paying a little more attention to the hundred of “Joes who already own a business” over at the Pipefitters and Plumbers Union!
With MY plan with Illinois – the only thing that will change for the unions – is how much their members are paying into it – and if we can get it into the bill – they would even get a subsidy for paying the benes in full.
If the state can get this bill on the floor I DESPERATELY need the AFL-CIO there to negotiate. Lawmakers have proven that they cannot negotiate with the health insurance lobby. But the unions have proven time and time again that they CAN. Blue Cross has been very good to my family – THANKS TO THE AFL-CIO
Jerry’s comment reflects the frustration we all feel. Anne Telnos’s cartoon in the Washington Post today implies that most people are aware of the national desire for the public option. The figures I’ve seen of the percentage of Americans who support the public option range from 67-72%. This is more than a simple majority. All union leaders need to continue pushing for the public option. In WV, most people are not insured for rehabilitation costs, so if someone is in an accident that results in brain injury, they do not receive the care that will allow them to function again. It’s not covered. Flu shots are not covered. It’s insane.
It’s fine for politicians to think they need to be flexible and to think they need to compromise. It is not OK for our unions to compromise on this issue. We have to have the public option.
Does anyone know if the tax is indexed for inflation, or is it like the Alternative Minimum Tax that will eventually cath everyone? The devils always in the details……
If (and that’s a big if) a “public option” is included in the final bill, the bill will nonetheless be a piece of junk. It will have been written largely by shills and hacks representing the medical-profits industry.
Score another one for “free market” for-profit “health care”. The rest of us are expected to put our tails between our legs and scuttle off into further retreat.
The die was cast from day one. When HCAN and other organizations signaled a willingness to back away from real reform we lost the battle before it was joined. As a negotiating strategy the early withdrawal has proven to be a stupid, business-unionism ploy to accept anything, then declare victory. In union bargaining that is called a “sweet heart” deal – a sell out. Any rank and file worth its salt would fire such negotiators!
Single payer is the only answer. Those in doubt had better take heed. With or without the sham reform now being offered up, family premiums are expected to increase from an average of $13,375 here in 2009 all the way up to somewhere between $24,180 – $30, 803 by 2019. Good luck at the bargaining table!
Why didn’t labor jump on the single payer bandwagon early on? Well, actually it did. Ranks and file have overwhelmingly supported single payer. About 600 different labor organizations from 39 states representing a huge majority of union members endorsed single payer. For the most part it has been male, pale, and stale “statesmen” that have pursued the go-along to get-along policy. The haughty “know it all” persona exhibited by Congress and others in Washington, D.C. has slimed its way into the councils of labor.
No wonder. There are too many pie cards who gained power after entering the movement through a side door, and too few leaders who truly emerged from the ranks.
That’s what happens when union memberships fail to attend meetings or fail to otherwise involve themselves in union matters. Ideologically-challenged and/or unsavory characters are free to ride in on greased rails.
In the next few years many of you will be bargaining for health care. What will you have to give up in order to receive whatever diminishing coverage you might get? That’s the $64,000 question! After you take your butt kicking don’t forget to look back on 2009. Don’t forget to acknowledge that if you had taken action in support of single payer in 2009 you’d be sitting pretty. Then, after a brief moment of grieving roll up your sleeves!
In the words of Joe Hill: “Don’t mourn. Organize!” Health care for all is a human right! Single payer is the answer. Organize to win health care justice! “And if the bosses (or Congress, or pie cards) get in our way we’re going to roll right over them, roll right over them, roll right over them. If the bosses get in our way we’re going to roll right over them, we’re going to roll the UNION on!”
But why wait? It’s not too late to take action now. Congress is betting we haven’t got the guts to stand up for justice. If just 3 million union members in key industries stopped work until justice was won, we’d get single payer! If transport unions, and aerospace, and oil and auto and mining shut down we’d get justice!
In all of history working men and women were never given anything. We have had to take it. We have had to demand justice. Nothing has changed.
Some of the coiffed and manicured suits and ties in labor need to learn that lesson!
The time for labor to act like it represents working class America is long, long overdue!
“If (and that’s a big if) a “public option” is included in the final bill, the bill will nonetheless be a piece of junk.’
THANK YOU RICH!!!
Any healthcare reform that doesnt come with campaign finance reform will be Hillary Halliburton Healthcare! If there is a public option – all the insurance companies will do is dump the sick and high risk people on that the public plan – and who pays for that? US.
I hopw we arent allowed to donate money to campaigns – what has the $59 million that the AFL-CIO alone has given to campaigns since 1990 gotten us – but a STAB in the back!
These health care reform bills are worse than worthless. People who need health care the most will be dumped into a “public option” that will then be overwhelmed and doomed to failure. That will kill any attempt at the needed government administered health care we need.
The only hope for progress now is making sure the amendments that allow states to pass single payer are included in any final bill. The Democrats have squandered their majority because Barfcuss and others are bought off by the insurance industry. EFCA has been totally forgotten and Obama has been AWOL on leading the way for labor law reform. And even if this ‘reform’ of health insurance passes, nothing will change until 2013!!! We need single payer NOW!
I would like to praise the AFL-CIO and other unions for standing strong in favor of the public option. Workers in the age group 50-64 have difficulty finding employment because employers are afraid that their health care costs will increase employee premiums. Older workers need to have the choice to enroll in a government public option and to opt out of employer-based health insurance or they will never be able to get a job.
Also, the public option needs to start in January 2010, not 2103. Older workers don’t have another 4 years to go unemployed or from one temp job to another waiting for Medicare to kick in. The other possibility is to allow persons older than 50 (or everyone in the US) enroll in Medicare as a choice. Many of us in professions not represented by a union are grateful for the unions’ taking a stance that will help us as well as the union workers.
Take the bull by the horns folks. Call your congresspersons and let them know that you feel that this senate finance bill is a pile of dog poop. We just must not allow this to happen!!!!
A friend and PDA activist, a stranger in our town with no family to call on, recently died at age 48 after having been unable for a year to find a personal physician who would take her on for what Medicare pays them, and having been turned away from emergency rooms many times – by staff who could certainly have seen at least as plainly as we could that this was a very sick lady who needed someone to take responsibility for looking into her case. When we finally found a physician who would take her complaints seriously, who examined her and got her admitted to a hospital that same day, she was just 16 days away from death from stage IV cancer.
The newspaper column we managed to get printed about our friend’s death was followed by many comments from others with similar horror stories to tell. And this in Massachusetts, the state whose “miracle” plan Obama has modeled his proposals after! At best, we can hope the nation will advance … to this; but now even that seems unlikely!
We need to move beyond dealing and trading for the best we can get out of this useless Congress, and organize a great mass movement of people putting themselves on the line to demand a Single Payer solution = and abolition of the health insurance industry. Yes that’s radical, but so was abolishing slavery, winning the right to organize a union or outlawing segregation! All of those once looked impossible – I am old enough to remember when Jim Crow seemed immortal.
In all three cases – Lincoln sending supplies to Fort Sumpter and calling for volunteers to defend the Capital, FDR sending in the National Guard to protect the Flint sit-down strikers – from the Flint police, and Kennedy sending the Justice Department and the FBI into the rural South to protect the voter registration drives – it took the power of the Federal government to break the logjam – but it was thousands of activists, volunteers, ordinary people putting their bodies and lives on the line that made it possible.
To AFL-CIO:
When will the AFL-CIO begin to support Single Payer instead of the Public Option?
I am sure you can see the “robustness” of it eroding away as the Senate Finance committe whittles down the conditons to achieve bi=partisan support. And this week the insurance industry threatening to raise premium rates sky-high over the next 4 years in exchange for any restrictions placed on its profit-making.
Single Payer is THE solution for our health care crisis and everyone knows it. Labor has the most to gain, especially in increased wages if employers had to spend less on benefits, not to speak of job mobiliity and satisfaction.
Your support for President Obama’s position is understandable, but what if the whole PO idea fails to deliver any real fiscal and moral reform and the insurance companies win by a landslide? Then I suspect Obama’s approval rating will drop through the floor and many who stood with him will wonder why they did.
In your own convention recently in Pittsburgh, you passed two resolutions in support of a Single Payer system. I was so excited, I even printed them out, but now I wonder how much they meant if you are still in lock-step support of the Public Option.
It’s well passed time for you to choose the real solution to our health care crisis and lead your members to demand it of our government. I truly believe only with Labor’s support can we accomplish this.
Sincerely yours,
Barbara Commins RN
member CSUEU SEIU Local 2579 Chapter 305
Folks I have news,we will lose this fight again and again because we have no leaders.NONE in the AFL-CIO or in the government,we have been screwed ever since Ronald Regan fired the air tarffic controllers and organized labor sat on it’s hands and did nothing.The AFL-CIO should (but will not)call for a general strike all across this land if our wishes are not met.Do not hold your breath.We are not as powerful as we once were but we could and should show the politicans we are still a force ot be listened to.No business however large can operate without us.
I HOPE THE HOUSE DEMS BLOCK THE PASSAGE OF THE BILL!!! I am DONE with DC (did you see what they did to the UAW with GM?)
Here is the plan I have submitted to the Illinois state legislature, and I have co-sponsors from both parties, including the Illinois House Republican leader. I only remember one sentence from Obama’s speeches: ENOUGH!
That horridly long and complicated screed Congress is calling healthcare reform is a joke. It is just another Wall Street bailout that will further indebt Americans whether it has a public option or not. Countries with the most effective universal healthcare plans administer it privately – and locally. Their populations are also smaller than Illinois. This country is simply too big to micromanage healthcare at the federal level.
States need to take the reigns, and Illinois needs to take the lead. Congressional Democrats cannot even stand up to Congressional Republicans when they have the majority, they won’t stand up to the healthcare lobby lining their pockets with our premiums. And any American who thinks that the Republicans aren’t running a dog and pony show of their own are really kidding themselves. Both parties are playing the American people to either keep or gain seats in the midterm elections. THE END. And any Illinois politician who sits by and does nothing is an accessory to the crime.
There certainly is a special seat in hell for the healthcare industrial complex, but the hottest seats are reserved for the politicians enabling that said complex. Corporations are in business to maximize their shareholders’ profits. In fact, it’s the law – and they are just doing their jobs. Laws passed by lawmakers. Those lawmakers can haul them all in one by one. Doing so to cover up for the fact that those lawmakers are the ones not living up to the oaths they took to serve their constituents. I cannot wait until the day they call in the wrong CEO – one that calls them out instead.
Blue Cross superbly insures seventy five percent of Illinois. Illinois should take the wheeling and dealing right to the horse’s mouth. Would Blue Cross be interested in a state contract insuring 12.9 million Illinois residents and 550,000 illegal immigrants for $100 per person per month? That’s over $1.3 billion a month, and $1 million collects $112 in interest – per day. If Blue Cross doesn’t want it, open the bidding to another company. No citizen would be forced to join. It’s a free country; ignorant Tea Baggers and Town Hallers can continue paying current prices, but their employers will no longer be picking up the tab for their employee’s personal ideology. The state contracted provider could even opt to start a not for profit subsidiary for all government employees, Medicaid/Medicare patients and Veterans – not for profits don’t pay taxes. But if they opt for that, they need to have offices in Illinois that employ Illinois residents.
Employers will only be required to deduct the premiums from gross pay, but any portion of the premiums they pay can be written off, still used as a hiring incentive, and they’d get a small subsidy for paying the premiums in full. Those employing illegal immigrants are subject to the same rules. Every illegal immigrant already enrolled in or applying for Medicaid will be investigated and attached to a breadwinner. That breadwinner’s employer will be heavily fined and have illegal employee and dependant premiums directly garnished by the contracted provider. Medicaid recipients will be mandated to attend a seminar and receive training on how to use their healthcare more effectively. If they don’t, they will lose their aid. Residents who are on unemployment can apply for Medicaid if needed, or have the premiums deducted from their unemployment checks.
Residents pay a $20 co-pay for office visits, $10 for a sporadic prescription and $4 for permanent ones (Wal-Mart already offers this.) Medicaid patients pay no co-pays. There will be no pre-existing and they cannot drop patients. Patients can go to any healthcare provider they choose. This includes basic Veteran care; military service related injuries will continue to be picked up and provided under current Veteran programs.
The real problem with America’s healthcare system is cost. The only way to control costs is to set a budget that forces the healthcare industry to work within that budget. Blue Cross already has an excellent existing system that negotiates with healthcare providers. For example; a neurosurgeon billed Blue Cross over $24,000 for a surgery, but under the contracted amount that doctor had with Blue Cross, Blue Cross paid just over $4100.00 for the procedure. Under the new contract, any fraud, waste or payment disagreements will be between the insurance provider and the healthcare provider, not the naïve patient. This will nip the racket they have going together right in the butt. It will also curb the need for regulations. This is not government regulation, this is a contract. If you don’t take it, someone else will. We are their customers, and it’s high time they started treating us like we are, and it‘s even higher time that our government stopped being their customer service reps. They are OUR customer service reps.
Employers will deduct the premiums and direct deposit them once a month into a designated Illinois bank account. The state will do the same with Medicaid, Medicare and Veteran payments. The provider will get 90 days to pay out claims, so they can collect interest on the $1.3 billion for 90 days. If they are slow to pay, or they are denying claims, the healthcare provider files a grievance with the state and the contract runs the risk of being reneged.
Businesses will flock to Illinois. It will open up a whole new market for covering elective surgery, catastrophic illness coverage for non-medical expenses, nursing home coverage, elderly in home care and more comprehensive dental insurance, just to name a few.
We need two things from the federal government. One: pass “affordable medical malpractice insurance for all.” Doctors don’t need tort reform, they need malpractice insurers who are price gouging them by charging for “projected losses” rather and actual losses to stop doing that. Malpractice insurance providers have also been caught red handed lying about their “losses” too. If Republicans don’t like lawyers giving money to Democrats, then stop claiming campaign finance reform violates free speech.
Secondly; do not block Illinois from reforming our own healthcare. Can we? “Yes We Can.” That’s our Senator in the White House, our Congressman who is his Chief of Staff. Our Senator is the Senate Majority Whip. Our former Congressman was also the Speaker of the House. We sent them to Washington to lead, and if they cannot do it, the least they can do is give us an opportunity to lead our own state and seal our own fate. Oligarchy and fascism doesn’t work for Illinois; sorry.
Getting this done is easier than you think. Enlist the labor unions, and Chicago is in. Enlist the Republicans, and downstate is in. Don’t you see what this plan is? It is basically a single payer plan that has every Republican goody in the bag: states rights, free market competition, a balanced state budget, enormous tax payer savings – and it privatizes Medicare and Medicaid payments. This healthcare plan will pull Illinois out of debt, put us back on the map and insure every resident, legal or not. It will not only keeping the private insurance companies in business – but it will expand their business. They get all the Medicare and Medicaid patients, and reduced costs make it possible for customers to buy more insurance.
And the best part? Because Illinois is saving the federal government so much money, they should be picking up the whole tab for Medicare and Medicaid – and the subsidies to employers. Any state who complains will be called out for what they are getting from the feds.
With Obama in the White House, Chicago Democrats have taken a lot of mud slinging. I cannot speak for the politicians, but as a Chicago Democrat, I can speak for me. We are Sean Connery in the “Untouchables.” We will walk the beat before we sell out, but we will also cut corners to aggressively go after the ones who would, and have, sold out for their own gain – party irrelevant.
The Democrats in Washington are currently pretending to play Kevin Costner – especially Obama. He was an Ivy League graduate with a name for himself and his sky was the limit. Where did he come to learn the ropes? He came to Chicago. You don’t buy that whole “I wanted to help people” crap, do you? We elect leaders – in both parties – and he knew it. If he was a junior Senator from Hawaii – he’d still be a junior Senator from Hawaii. Chicago, just like Connery in the movie, sat Obama down in our church and cut him off when he tried this whole “we’ll get them the noble way” mantra.
Remember Connery cutting Costner off, telling him “cut all that bullshit – what are you prepared to do? They bring a knife – you bring a gun; they put one yours in the hospital – you put one of theirs in the fucking morgue. THAT’S the CHICAGO way.”
Linda, Tom, and Kay – what are you prepared to do? If you don’t have the political will and guts to take on the federal government – that I might add is only there because Illinois residents voted for them – and you – and the healthcare lobby – then please don’t run for office. You do not work for the healthcare lobby or D.C.- you work for Illinois residents. You are public servants, and because so many politicians got away from that, because they took money from fascist corporations that have in turned extorted them, my life savings that I put down on my home is gone – the mortgage melt down stole it. My husbands pension is gone- Wall Street investors stole it. My family union business will go out of business because our competitors took all the money they saved paying their employees peanuts, and used it to lobby politicians into government subsidizing the healthcare, housing, food and educations of their employees and their dependants.
My father in law chooses to pay union scale pay and benefits. He has not asked the government for a dime, but because after he does all of the above, there is no money left to pay off the politicians, so he gets punished for that by losing business. He gets called a Communist, a Socialist, unpatriotic -un-American? He is none of those things, but even if he was – it’s a hell of a lot better than being a fascist.
I don’t mean to be so forward or insulting, but if you don’t act now, and Congress passes a bill – any bill – the states will forfeit all our rights to regulate and man our own health. I don’t want any of those people – Democrat or Republican – voting on anything pertaining to my or my family’s healthcare. I want my STATE REPS and the LABOR UNIONS in the drivers’ seat for MY family. If you want me to beg, I will. All those letters I have written to papers – warning what will happen to us on any particular issue – everything I said has come true. I have four children, one who just had a brain tumor removed. Please don’t let it go too far before I have to say “I told you so” about this too.