No shit, Sherlock.

Since the insurance industry has already doubled my premium rates in the last half dozen years, I don’t doubt they’d be happy to do so again (and again), if they’re not stopped.

Take some action, any action, against the greed heads, including:

http://cpc.grijalva.house.gov/index.cfm?ContentID=161&ParentID=0&SectionID=4&SectionTree=4&lnk=b&ItemID=159

There is a lot of waste that could be cut from our system

Senator Klobuchar was holding forth on this the other night – using the Mayo Clinic model and how much could be saved. can’t remember who’s show it was on although it might of been Dr Nancy – will google around for it as the cost saving figures were quite dramatic

Mayo Clinic prolly not the best example anymore:

The Mayo Clinic, often held up by Obama administration officials as an example of a health provider that keeps costs low and provides quality care, has stopped accepting some Medicaid and Medicare beneficiaries, causing critics to question its viability as a national model for health reform, says the Washington Post.

link

we pay something like 25% more for drugs than any country on Earth. If we could achieve prices similar to Europe we would save around $300 billion of pharmaceuticals alone.

We also pay something like 30% more per person on health care than any other country.

The Blue Cross Blue Shield conclusion is that premiums would increase even faster with reform, unless we do exactly what they want.

Well, at least that’s a change I could believe in.

we pay something like 25% more for drugs than any country on Earth.

Whew. Good thing we don’t leverage the buying power of the American public to negotiate lower prices for those drugs. Merk, Pfizer, Eli Lily –they’d all have to move to France to capture those lower corporate tax rates. And then who would our peasants subsidize?

HR 676: Medicare For All Americans is the only antidote to this sick system.

A few days ago I asked whether the New America Foundation is part of the veal pen.
I guess the answer is yes.

Julie Ravner of NPR and Len Nichols from the NAF on the NewsHour:

Nichols: To be fair, need a level playing field … same rates as insurance companies… coops … Sen. Snowe’s idea is so interesting .. it will be there when you need it. Dean … opt-out … state choice … Carper-Snowe

At least KO is making it clear that since 1946 the health insurance industry has been a true cartel, replete with price fixing. FSM willing people will listen up…

And who will stop them? Obama? Congress? Geithner? No, the American public is just there for the pickings.

My insurance ‘premiums’ have gone up 104% in the past 8 years. Medicare for all — Now! And scotch that silly gift to big pharma……Medicare should be negotiating for lower drug costs always. If Wal-Mart can get lower drug costs, Medicare certainly should be able to get lower drug costs.

I have no doubt they will increase rates as it is now structured. This is an opportunity for the US to get a robust public option simply by accepting the insurance cos self serving bluster and go around them by giving uncovered americans an opportunity to buy into medicare at reasonable rates.

Trash the medical insurance industry thoroughly! Then hire the line workers to do the paper pushing for the Medicare-For-All plan. That will keep them employed … and they aren’t the ones ruining the system anyway. Just toss the executives who have syphoned off the cream from the top right over the edge…..sink or swim.

I know that it really goes against the grain for insurance companies to raise their premiums. So I propose taking this responsibility off them, and lowering costs at the same time, by instituting single payer. The anguish of insurance executives impels us to act to relieve their “suffering.”

WTF? Their first threat to dramatically INCREASE the costs of health care, creating the conditions in which even more Americans will die each year because they do not have access to quality health care, if they don’t get what they want, IS PROOF THAT THEY CAN’T BE TRUSTED TO DO WHAT’S RIGHT FOR THE AMERICAN PEOPLE.

Now what’s this?

How can any of us tolerate such a threat and such a blatant admission on their part that they cannot be trusted?

At least it looks like this bs pushed Reid off his comfortable rocker and got him to start swinging back, unless it’s all performance on all sides.

And then break the AMA hold on medical schools. There are plenty of worthy students who cannot find a slot in medical school because the spaces are so limited. Create more doctors and pay them a fair rate. Yes, they spend years in school and serve a worthy purpose and they should receive a decent wage, but we have too many specialists making too much money.

Maybe this tack will backfire on them. The Dems need to say that without a public option, the insurance companies will have no competition.

Trumka is on MSNBC talking po.

become the new line of attack from the right against reform

So the lefties attack should be accusing the insurers of blackmail. I won’t hold my breath waiting for THAT to happen.

OT oil closed at $75.91/bbl. This is with a worldwide glut and lousy economic conditions. As I have often said, given these factors oil should be trading in the $30-35 range. Almost all of the difference between what oil should be selling at and what it is you can thank your good friends at Goldman Sachs and their manipulations of the futures market for.

Maybe this is not so off topic afterall. You see price gouging seems to be the order of the day. This will keep happening whether in healthcare, commodities, or stocks for as long as big corporations can get away with it or until the system falls apart. Given the conviction and intelligence of our elites, I’m betting on the second of these.

In the medical industry, supply creates its own demand. So educating more docs will only allow them to reference each other for services that you previously didn’t know you required.

Heavy regulation and price controls are the only solution. However, the U.S. is millenia away from that.

In oil markets, price fixing is the order of the day, subject to some fairly wide constraints. In the medical industry, the producer (seller) rules, with almost NO constraints.

Another fear is that “moderate” and other corporatist democrats will use insurance industry FUD as cover to vote for Baucus’s Insurance Profits Protection Act.

The big insurance companies practically wrote the Baucus bill, and they want it adopted by congress and signed by the president with all of its horrible provisions intact.

Jon:
I don’t get the report. A mandate has to be part of reform. But that’s all the report is really saying(to me anyway). Otherwise you have the adverse selection problem. It really doesn’t address any of the other parts of reform. If it did, please let me know.

So the increase in rates will be the democrats fault rather than the insurance industry’s fault. Rightio.

There is mention that CBO has attributed savings of $85 billion from the adoption of the PO plan within an exchange available for those that are eligible. Those eligible mentioned were all those not currently receiving employer provided coverage, that are about 160 million people. The remaning number eligible for the PO would very nearly rival that amount.

This is a sizeable number of potential enrollees into a public plan whose premiums are necessarily much lower. The savings to the system from lower premiums and lower supplemental government subsidies would very likely be greater than $85. Under this scenario it would be interesting to see just what the savings would be.

The insurers also want to be able to charge different rates based on geography. Along with their anti-trust exception, that will likely lead to them carving up the country with different, non-competitive areas for each company.

This is exactly how they used the tea-baggers.

*snerk*

Guvmint employee dependent Blue Shield premium for me has gone from < $10 in 2003 to $85 in 2008, out of pocket has gone from $5/visit in 2003, to $10/visit in 2006 to $15/visit in 2008, non-formulary meds from $15 in 2003 to $35 in 2008.

On average, we already pay twice what other countries are — only we have 50 million uninsured, lots more underinsured, pay far more out-of-pocket than any other nation, and over half of all bankruptcies caused by medical expenses (and most of these from families who actually have insurance).

These fracking parasites won’t be happy until all those numbers up there double again.

And I’d like to know how a family earning $50k a year is supposed to devote 40% of that to health insurance alone (not even counting co-pays and deductibles, should anyone actually NEED to see a doctor).

Bastards.

Two items of insurance lobbiests’/company issued threats that, I feel, are missed for opportunity:
1. These organizations/companies support, with severe sanctions for those who do not comply, total mandated health coverage for all Americans. (I.E. One mandated option/law for all Americans, with policing/enforcement backing/implementation by the Federal Government).

2. They appear to back the original single payer plan as a good idea for all, enforced by the Federal Government.

They are only knit-picking who will get all the money the Federal Goverment mandates and collects in penalties according to the general Federal enforced single payer plan they support. The Government, who may use the money it collects any way it wants, or THEM.

This whole “option”-based bungled debate to date is not about Health Care Reform, but is another argument for a Federal Financial Bailout with no accountability for Insurance Corporations too big to fail, AIG et.al.

Do anti-trust laws against monopolies exist anymore?

Were insurance premiums collected from individuals for health care used to pay lobbiests, studies and advertisements, rather than health care?

Is there no law against taking money for one purpose and using it for another(scams)?

Any up for re-election Representative/Senator who bungles with voter perferences, and who sides with corporation interests vs. voter welfare, should have his post, pension, healthcare, travel expenses, insider priveleges severely curtailed, by voters electing someone different in 2010.

Thank the AHIP/Blue Cross subsidiary for their wonderful idea of One General Insurance plan for all, with Federal Government enforcement. Use this verbal support to mandate a Government Single Payer Medical Coverage plan. And eliminate subsidies paid to Pharma/Insurance Corporations, who are going to raise premiums, with and/or without these subsidies, anyway.

Restrict entry to the specialist professions, keep open entry to GP’s, where the bang for the health buck is biggest. Raise the pay of GP’s to get more GP’s. Nip health problems in the bud, before they become specialist medical problems.

Speaking of which, I’m so glad I moved to Canada, where health costs are not one of my anxieties (I have plenty, but that’s not one of them).

“The real fear for the Democrats should be when more legitimate organizations start to examine the issue.”

I agree. There is no way premiums don’t go up. This has happened in every state that has guaranteed issue, whether or not there is an individual mandate. And the tax on so-called Cadillac insurance is a Pandora’s box which will eventually cost the middle class more than the sales tax, Social Security or Medicare withholdings–yet will not provide any tangible new benefit. The savings were frittered away in Obama’s secret deals. What’s left is just a big middle class tax increase.

This is actually the easiest argument for a strong public option. Anyone opposing it is in favor of higher premium–which couldn’t increase and still compete with a public plan. If a pol can’t sell his constituents when the Health industry provides the evidence, he probably ought to go anyway.

Take some action, and try to form a captive if you can. On average, we already pay twice what other countries are — only we have 50 million uninsured, lots more underinsured, pay far more out-of-pocket than any other nation, and over half of all bankruptcies caused by medical expenses (and most of these from families who actually have insurance).