Schwarzenegger proposes requiring every Californian to have health insurance

[Herman Munster]

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-ex-gov8jan09,0,2093608.story?coll=la-home-headlines

SACRAMENTO -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger today proposed upending just about every portion of the healthcare industry in one of the country's most elaborate efforts at holding down medical costs and expanding insurance to those who don't have it.

Schwarzenegger's plan, which he publicly unveiled at noon, would require employers with 10 workers or more to buy insurance for their workers or pay a fee of 4% of their payroll into a program to help provide coverage for the uninsured.

Schwarzenegger would tax doctors 2% of their gross revenue and place a 4% tax on hospitals. He campaigned for reelection on an anti-tax platform, but his administration argues that so many more people would have insurance that medical providers would make more money.

The governor also wants to ban insurers from refusing to offer coverage to some individuals because of their prior medical conditions. Insurers would also have to spend at least 85% of their premium revenues on patient care, a move that would limit the amount companies spend on administrative costs and profits.

In an effort to cover all Californian children, including ones in the state illegally, Schwarzenegger's plan would expand the state's Healthy Families program, providing insurance to children whose parents make less than three times the poverty level. That works out to about $60,000 for a family of four.

And Schwarzenegger said his plan would require every Californian to have health insurance.

"If you can't afford it, the state will help you buy it," he said, "but you must be insured."

Schwarzenegger called the delivery and payment of healthcare in California "disastrous," noting that nearly 1 in 5 residents is uninsured.

"The problem with that is, of course, that the rest of the people who have insurance pay for them," said the governor. "Those that are fortunate enough to have coverage — we are paying a hidden tax."

[baldguy]

1. Flippin' SOCIALIST!

That's wat chew get for electin' a FURINER!

[BayCityProgressive]

2. Actually Doesn't Sound

that bad considering it is coming from a Republican. Of course, the best solution is to nationalize hospitals and provide single payer care but that will NEVER happen.

[baldguy]

4. Maybe I need to use the :sarcasm: tag more.

[Guaranteed]

3. Total bullshit. Not single payer. Read up here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2680079&mesg_id=2680079

[The Gunslinger]

5. Well a state that gets fooled by the Kindergarten Cop

deserves what they get. Elect him once..........bad. Elect him twice.........


Do you really think the state is going to help those who cant afford it. What if you still can't? Do you go to jail? Do you not get medical help? He's just helping to ease the burden of the rich.

[Deja Q]

6. Holy shit.

:applause:

We'll have to see what the net result is before doing the standing ovation.

[Warpy]

7. OK, limiting those profits is good

because they'll probably encourage those companies to pull out of the state, citing unprofitability. However, there will be a period of extreme denial of care first. Anybody who gets sick will have to fight those bastards for everything they get. However, with no insurance companies, or too few of them, the state will be forced to consider single payer.

Has AhNuld said yet how people are expected to PAY for this mandated coverage? Will the companies still be able to charge people with chronic illness sky high premiums in order to discourage them and shunt them off to other plans?

This sounds suspiciously like the Mass. plan, another one from a rich Repug who doesn't have a clue how most of us live.

Anything that keeps insurance companies in the mix is a bad plan. Those bastards will simply boost their profits by denial of care. Any attempt to rein in the ability of their CEOs to live like sultans will cause those companies to decamp from states that try it.

[Guaranteed]

9. "Anything that keeps insurance companies in the mix is a bad plan." Bingo.

They, and their high overhead costs, are the problem.

They spend 30% of the money they take in pushing papers around and figuring out ways to DENY care to people.

[bobbolink]

12. And paying their CEOs outrageous salaries, and high payments to stockholders

Profits don't belong in healthcare!

[Guaranteed]

14. You got it. nt

[RB TexLa]

8. Just what every 20something male wants, to have to pay insurance premiums to

pay for all the health care others use.

[Guaranteed]

10. Sounds an awful lot like Social Security and Medicare, doesn't it? nt

[AZBlue]

21. Yeah, but...

Twenty-somethings get diabetes, STDs, pneumonia, obesity-related diseases and accidental injuries just like the rest of us. And, if they had more preventative medicine earlier on, they would need less care later on. Actually it's not that unfair.

[pinto]

11. Seems a mixed bag and, as always, the details will be the crux. A good start, though,

as Fabian Nunez (D-LA) says farther down in the cited article. fwiw - The state's Healthy Families Program is a good deal for low income families' children. The enrollment process is fairly simple (the state funds enrollment assistance via Public Health and some private health care providers) and the coverage includes preventative care, not just emergency, acute care.

I personally favor a single payer system, but proposal hold promise. Sounds like it's modeled after the Massachusetts system, iirc (?).

[Guaranteed]

13. Calling it a "mixed bag" doesn't recognize what's wrong with our health care

system.

What this does is (instead of figuring out ways to push down the outlandish costs of health care, as single payer does) use taxpayer money to make up the cost that many people can't afford. This is the equivalent, to use a inadvertantly dramatic analogy, of paying the ransom rather than hunting down the kidnapper. It is going to cost our already heavily indebted state a huge amount of money, which will go straight to the private health insurance companies- the only reason Schwarzenegger would do anything like this, with our budget as it is already- without fixing the problem. It merely takes on the increased cost and tags it to future generations to fix.

In other words, it's gutless, shortsighted in its inefficiency AND corrupt.

[EFerrari]

16. CA should require all its governors to be able to add. n/t

[pinto]

19. That's the mixed bag I mean - what are the premiums (not cited), are

there premium caps (not cited) and what's the employer/employee share of premium payments (not cited). I could have been clearer.

I favor a single payer system as well, but if there's not the political will to enact MediCal coverage for all - funded by taxation and insured's co-payments, which I favor, and which is roundly labeled socialized medicine, as if that's a slur - this proposal seems a step in the right direction to increase access to routine health care across the state.

Broader preventative care for children by an increase of the Healthy Families Program and a decrease in the use of hospital emergency rooms for routine health care is better health care. That's the bottom line I'm supporting - even while I bristle at the middleman's cut into health care dollars.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

15. Although I strongly dislike Schwarzenegger, I applaud the fact that at least

someone is trying to address the healthcare issue, whether this particular plan will work or not. We need a major national debate in this country on the sad state of healthcare affordability.

[Guaranteed]

17. He vetoed a well-researched single payer healthcare plan only a few

months ago.

This is a brief (somewhat vague) overview of what it was:

http://www.onecarenow.org/sb840.htm

Check out the site, though, and look at the details. It was legit, and would have even saved our state $8B while covering everyone, including those here illegally.

And, yes, it passed the legislature and went to his desk.

[pinto]

24. Yeah. It was a good bill. I worked to support it but wasn't surprised

at the veto. The state-wide support for this hasn't dissolved with the veto, though. There'll be another go at it.

[LeftCoast]

18. This sounds like the Swiss system

I saw a presentation by a Harvard Prof about this type of system. It really changed my mind about single-payer v. multi-payer. Done right (a HUGE caveat) it can be an excellent system.

[haele]

20. Requiring every Californian to have health insurance?

Without providing single payer universal coverage?

It's like every Californian with a car carries auto insurance, whether or not they're working or make enough to pay rent, basic utilities, and still have enough left over to minimally feed and clothe themselves and their families by the end of the month. right (that's why we have to carry uninsured driver insurance).
What's the minimal amount of care a person should get - because you never know if you're going to be in an accident or develop some disabling disease...so you've got to cover more than just a physical a year and one emergency room visit. And then, of course, you've got to have some sort of dental if you want to remain healthy... I've looked, thinking I might be able to find something better than what an employer was providing.
A basic, bare bones policy for someone outside the Medicare/Medical system that includes dental, a basic pharmacy, and some sort of deductible coverage if you need to see a doctor more than once that year that costs the average Californian around $70 a month. A family of 3 can run around $200 a month - and they'd be praying that nothing happens to anyone, no visits other than the basic physicals, no fertility issues, no stress problems, no mental health issues, no monthly meds... because then you start running around the $400 a month level real quick.
So, does the Governator expect a self-employed contract worker or very small family business be able to cover this new fee? Especially if they're living paycheck to paycheck, contract to contract and don't have the funds to cover it?

Yeah, some of his plan is good, but he's leaving the profit margin burden on the rate payers. Let's see him add something really helpful to his suggestion, like letting the state set basic health standards and negotiate basic rates for services, actually penalizing extreme profits and administrative costs, and getting rid of prescription drug advertisement to the general public.

If "Ed" wants his OTC enzite, that's one thing. If Eli-Lilly wants to convince "Ed" to "ask his doctor" about a prescription for something that they've played patent games (let's change the color! Or add a buffering coat so it can be taken without eating first...) with over the past decade to keep it from becoming generic, that's another. There's a huge scam and waste of patient monies right there...

Haele

[leesa]

22. This sounds expensive...like the mandatory car insurance.

Big pay-off to the insurance industry...and here I thought he was butting heads with the GOP...and turning a new leaf...whatever.

[Telly Savalas]

23. Californians without insurance will be crucified on the Tree of Woe

where they will be encouraged to contemplate the Riddle of Steel.