Time for single payer? Health care costs soar for third year.

[Karmadillo]

Costs soar for a third straight year? How long has Bush been President?

Health care will be an extremely important issue for the Democrats as the election nears. Yes, there will be those who counsel caution and urge the Democrats to go slow so as not to offend those who profit from a system that leaves millions uncovered or undercovered, but why compromise at the beginning? Significant portions of the health care industry will oppose any of the plans the candidates have put forth and will advocate the status quo as the only possible option. Why not start by fighting for the best? If we have to compromise and embrace a gradualist approach, we can always do so later.

As this link describing Dennis Kucinich's single payer proposal reminds us, Bill Clinton failed on this issue by aiming too low:

<edit>

After Clinton's 'Managed Competition' plan failed without coming up for a vote, talk-radio host Jim Hightower asked President Clinton why he hadn't put forward a "simple, straightforward" single-payer plan "instead of all this bureaucracy." Clinton replied, "I thought it would be easier to pass" a bill that left the insurance industry in place. "I guess I was wrong about that."

end

http://www.southbendtribune.com/stories/2003/09/10/business.20030910-sbt-MICH-B7-Health_care_costs_so.sto

Health care costs soar for third year
By THERESA AGOVINO
Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK -- Health care premiums for families in employer-sponsored plans soared 13.9 percent in 2003, the third year of double-digit growth and the biggest spike since 1990, a new study found.

Annual family premiums increased to $9,068 this spring, according to a survey of 2,808 companies by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research and Educational Trust, each a health research organization.

Firms with three to nine workers faced the largest increase with a 16.6 percent surge in premiums. Mid-sized companies with between 200 and 999 workers had the smallest increase with a 12.4 percent growth rate.

The portion of the premium paid by an employee for family coverage grew 12.9 percent to $201 a month, or $2,412 annually, while the amount a single employee paid for a policy rose 7.6 percent to $508 a year, or a little more than $42 a month. Employers paid the remainder of the $3,383 premium for a single coverage.

more...

[gratuitous]

1. Oh, it would be far too expensive!

And, and, you couldn't choose your own doctor! And you'd have to wait for an appointment! Bleaghh!! Bleaghh!!

Now, let me tell you just why another $87 billion for Iraq is such a great deal, and all the benefit you're going to derive from it . . .

[JanMichael]

3. Damn! I was going to say the same thing.

Beat me to it.

Is it time? It's always been time.

[Karmadillo]

4. And research would shrivel up to nothing. It'd be leeches and a shot

of whiskey and nothing else.

[Mairead]

5. But only if we supplied our own whisky!

and we'd have to share the leeches

[Karmadillo]

6. Socialized leeches?!

That's where I draw the line.

[RobertSeattle]

2. Single Payer - Yes!

If it is good enough for the Military and Members of Congress, then of course it would be good enough for the common man...

As my congressman has said, it will unfortunately take a major crisis to get this system fixed.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

7. I had the equivalent of single payer

when I was a grad student at Yale.

One's tuition included choosing a primary physician, getting routine checkups and care for illnesses and accidents, hospitalization and necessary surgery, mental health care (one semester with a private counselor and one semester of group therapy), contraception, and even abortion.

It's ironic that a lot of the Young Republicans who enjoyed this system at Yale (and I never found anyone who didn't like it in my lengthy graduate school career) think that it would somehow be bad for other people to have the same benefits.

One advantage of single payer, a factor that would keep costs down, is that your "insurance pool" would be 280 million people. The larger your pool, the lower your costs, in general, since the serious illness of one member does not adversely affect the financial status of the whole group.

[Karmadillo]

8. Maybe those Young Republicans fear employees with guaranteed

health care might be a little less docile than management might like. Nothing like the threat of losing one's insurance to make one think twice about organizing or speaking out about oppressive working conditions.