Many of our health insurance clients and prospects are happy enough to wait for the so called Health Care Reform Bill to spastically make its way through Congress, with the hope that as soon as it passes they will be able to piggy back onto the Public Option thus saving money on purchasing an individual health insurance plan.
The fact is that only 1 out of 10 Americans will even be eligible for the plan, and even they will have to qualify. Furthermore, the GAO only expects 6 million Americans total to qualify for the plan at the final count. The insurance exchange as it exists in Massachusetts will not be available to most Americans as they will have to stay with their employer plan.
Only certain categories of people could use the exchange: the self-employed, small businesses, lower-income people who qualify for tax credits to purchase insurance and those who are otherwise unable to find affordable private coverage. (from Politico)
170 Million Americans would have to stay with their current health plan as the Exchange would not be for them. Not to mention that the Public Option won’t even be available until 2013 at the earliest.
The Peter G. Peterson Foundation recently predicted the House bill would add more than $1 trillion to the deficit over the next 20 years
So, at this point armed with this information you might be asking yourself, “why even bother with the public option, why not just expand Medicaid or Medicare?”
And you would be right! There is simply no reason to reinvent another Medicaid. Medicare and Medicaid are slowly bankrupting the nation with administrative costs and fraud.
But the real reason for this nonsensical plan is because Obama promised health reform and needs to deliver to save political face. That’s right, this ridiculous plan that will further rack up deficits for no reason is so Obama and Company can look good.
I am by no means a Republican either and fully support anyone willing to fix this health care system, but it has to be for the right reasons with the right solution. And that solution is only a Single Payer plan. The rich can keep their expensive plans but will still have to pay the same Single Payer tax as everyone else.
- Members of the organization MoveOn.org hold a rally in Nebraska in support of a public option for health insurance. The reform debate has emphasized the public option, but only about 10 percent of the population would be eligible. Photo: AP
