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House Health Reform Bill Would Cover Millions—Affordably
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Today, U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi unveiled a comprehensive reform bill that would guarantee coverage for 96 percent of the U.S. public.
Among other things, the bill, H.R. 3962, includes a public option, expands Medicaid coverage to families who earn up to 150 percent of the federal poverty level, provides help for middle-class families to get coverage and sets tough new rules for insurers, making sure that no one can be denied care or be rejected from coverage because of pre-existing conditions. It’s fairly funded through a combination of employer responsibility, cost savings and a surtax on the extremely wealthy—and does not get its funding from taxes on middle-class workers’ benefits. All that, and it will reduce the deficit in the long term.
It’s the kind of change America voted for last fall. You can read the full bill here.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka praised the House bill and promised that in the weeks to come, working families would fight hard to make sure that real reform passes this year:
Today’s release of a progressive health care reform bill by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi puts America’s working families one big step closer to getting quality and affordable health care, and it’s a model for fair financing.
The inclusion of a public plan option ensures that we reduce skyrocketing health care costs by holding insurance companies accountable and forcing them to compete. The public option also ensures that all Americans can get coverage no matter what.
The bill does not attempt to finance reform on the backs of the working middle class. In addition, the employer responsibility provision ensures a fair share of financing from employers and prevents employers from increasing costs for everyone by dumping people into subsidized programs.
More news from the fight for health care:
- Ron Pollack of the health care advocacy group Families USA says the House bill “sets the gold standard” for coverage and affordability.
- At the Denver Post, Mike Cerbo of the Colorado AFL-CIO has a great op-ed about the urgent need for health care reform as costs rise for working families.
- At Working America‘s blog Main Street, Mitchell Hirsch warns we can’t let health care reform legislation get weakened and watered down. Will we listen to working families and pass the strongest reform bill possible—or will we undermine affordability and coverage to appease a small minority of senators? The stimulus bill could provide lessons.
- Also via our friends at Working America, Doug at Balloon Juice says that as we look at cost curves and vote counts, we also need to remember that real people’s lives are at stake here.
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” House Health Reform Bill Would Cover Millions—Affordably”
IS THIS TRUE? Perhaps if you are a “middle class” college grad
with a six figure income… maybe. But as long as corporate greed dictates maximum profits forever makes this headline questionable!
MILLIONS OF LEGAL “GREEN CARD” WILL BE EXCLUDED FOR THE FIRST FIVE YEARS! MILLIONS OF UNDOCUMENTED WORKERS, MANY WORKING HERE FOR YEARS, WILL NOT BE ALLOWED HEALTH INSURANCE! THIS IS A TERRIBLE ‘REFORM”
DESIGNED TO PROFIT THE GANGSTER CORPORATIONS.
ELIMINATE THE CORPORATE PROFITS! SUPPORT SINGLE-PAYER!
Here is the real story! Single-Payer “Medicare for All” is the
the only AFFORDABLE health care proposal now “on the table”!
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/10/29-9
Published on Thursday, October 29, 2009 by The Rutland Herald (Vermont)
Sanders to Push for Single-Payer Vote in Senate
by Daniel Barlow
MONTPELIER – U.S. Sen. Bernard Sanders will likely make history this year when – for the first time ever – he brings a bill creating a national single-payer health care system to the floor of the Senate for a vote.
As a compromise on a public-option plan that would allow states to opt out gains steam in the U.S. Senate, Sanders, a Vermont independent, continues to focus his attention on a single-payer bill, although he acknowledges that there are not enough votes to pass it.
“That bill will lose,” Sanders said Wednesday morning during a telephone interview. “The question, however, will be how much support it will get.”
Introduced in the early spring, Sanders’ American Health Security Act of 2009 would eliminate the role of private insurance companies in health care and create a public fund that would insure all residents of the United States.
Sanders said his bill would insure the 46 million Americans without coverage and could save upwards of $400 million annually by eliminating insurance overhead and medical bureaucracy.
The system would be paid for through existing sources of government health care spending along with some tax increases, which advocates say would be less than what people pay now in co-pays or out-of-pocket expenses.
Sanders’ bill has received little attention in Washington political circles as this summer’s health-care debate focused more on discredited fears of government death panels and the cost of a public health insurance option, which President Obama favors.
There has never been a vote on a single-payer health care system in either the U.S. Senate or the House, according to Mark Almberg, communications director for the organization Physicians for a National Health Program, a national advocacy organization that supports a single-payer system.
“We do believe that this could be the first time a single-payer bill gets a vote in Congress,” said Almberg, whose organization supports Sanders’ bill.
Almberg agreed that single-payer does not have the votes to pass the U.S. Congress. He said there are about 80 co-sponsors of a similar House bill, but would not hazard a guess as to how many votes for such a plan there are in the Senate.
Knowing that his single-payer bill is likely to fail, Sanders said he also plans to try including a provision in the final health-care bill that would allow states such as Vermont to experiment with a single-payer system on a state level.
If that legislation is approved, it would be welcomed by some lawmakers in Vermont. Sen. Doug Racine, D-Chittenden, a candidate for governor in 2010, said he plans to kick off hearings at the Statehouse in January on exactly what a single-payer system in the Green Mountain State would look like.
Racine said Vermont would need certain waivers from the federal government to conduct a single-payer health care system here – exactly the type of clearance that Sanders’ proposed provision would allow.
“There are lots of different questions that need to be answered,” Racine said. “I think we need to move past the question of whether or not a single-payer system would be good for Vermont and begin looking at how it would work.”
Sanders was hesitant to make predictions of where health care reform will end up in the Senate – his staff has yet to see a final version of the bill and a date for a vote has not been scheduled.
But his expectation is that the final bill will have the required 60 votes to overcome a Republican filibuster to bring it to a final vote, which only requires more than 50 votes to pass.
“I think that, once we get closer to a vote, the American people will look closely at what is in the Senate bill and what is in the House bill,” Sanders said. “I hope that we will see a groundswell of support for health care reform that will force some members to take a stand and allow for a vote.”
Still, Sanders is not too enthusiastic about the public-option opt-out plan pushed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, this week.
“All the American people should be given the option of a public health insurance plan that competes on the market with the private insurance companies,” he said.
And if the states are allowd to opt out, Big Insurance & Big Pharma get another chance to “buy” legislators and governors (think Alabama, Mississipi, Louisiana, with their wing nut govs & legislators), thus leaving the most vulnerable among us without access to affordable health care.
Single Payer is the only FISCAL and MORAL solution to the health care problem.
Read Dr. Margaret Flowers letter here before she was arrested for the second time and will spend time in jail.
http://mobilizeforhealthcare.org/2009/10/29/physicians-and-supporters-arrested-at-carefirst-health-insurance-office-to-call-for-real-health-care-reform/
Pelosi called it “historic” legislation. Pelosi, YOU LIE! You promised before the August recess you would put single payer on the floor for discussion and a vote. Roughly 96% of the uninsured get coverage? That’s historic? Medicare for All; single payer would cover 100% of ALL Americans. And it’s a hell of lot cheaper than this crap passed. It’s time for Congress to start listening to their constituients. If a majority want single payer, then what is the problem? If Congress chooses to listen to the hands that feed them, the insurance industry, I say screw them when they call your local, wanting block walkers, phone bankers. I say screw the AFL-CIO for endorsing this watered down “reform”. We pay dues to you for what? To campaign for the cheapest way out? SHAME ON YOU!