Health Care Reform without a Public Option is Awesome!

I'm not too sure this really means anything. (4.00 / 1)

We are the sixth highest income state in the country. We have a very low relative number of people presently uninsured. It would be bizarre indeed if a plan to bring insurance to the millions of uninsured Americans disproportionally benefited New Hampshire or any relatively wealthy state with low numbers of insured. Math just doesn't work that way.

Furthermore the state by state cost benefit analysis is as specious as the phony "donor town" argument is in context of public funding of education in NH.

We are a nation of people, not a collection of 50 nearly contiguous political entities. States wont receive health care any more than towns pay property taxes. It is people that will benefit from the extension of health care to the  uninsured not states. While there may be an argument that the medicaid reimbursement or other similar provisions unfairly benefit or put burdens on individual states, that is not what the analysis quoted is discussing.

The authors themselves repeatedly stress the limitations of their analysis:

we used two very simple metrics

both benefits and costs were assumed to accrue to the state as an entity; redistribution among residents within the state was ignored.

Our measures were crude

and

While the relative degree to which a state wins or loses under reform need not be the determining factor in developing a policy position,

What the analysis does show once again is the extent to which the modern national GOP has used race, xenophobia, and sexual bigotry to convince voters across the south to ignore their own economic interests. I'm not sure that is news.

There are many legitimate criticisms of the limitations of the current proposals, but the fact that they wont disproportionately benefit relatively wealthy states is not one of them.

"But, in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope." Si se puede. Yes we can.  

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by: Paul Twomey @ Thu Jan 07, 2010 at 19:30:19 PM CST

"I am not sure that is news" (4.00 / 1)

It is not news to most of us reading this blog, but I bet it is news to the people who are losing out because they are lied to by their representatives and the media.  That is a major part of the problem we face, we have many, many low information voters in this country.  When you look at NH, we have too many, and in the South the misinformation percentage is staggering.  If we can't solve this problem we have no real hope of making progress.  The richest country in the world has the most misinformed populace.  Sad.

We believe in prosperity & opportunity, strong communities, healthy families, great schools, investing in our future and leading the world by example. We are Democrats; we are the change you're looking for.

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by: bloomingpol @ Fri Jan 08, 2010 at 04:57:04 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Sometimes it's different problem that low information (0.00 / 0)

Plenty of people only hear, and thus think about, one point of view on public policy. I have plenty of friends who pay a whole lot of attention to news, but they never go beyond Fox and the UL so they have a distorted view of reality. (To a lesser extent, that can be true of the left media also, but independent studies are pretty clear that citizens who watch only Fox have by far the highest levels of objective misinformation-- ie they believe in things that just don't have a basis in reality-- such as the Obama is a Kenyan Muslim idiocy).  

"But, in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope." Si se puede. Yes we can.  

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by: Paul Twomey @ Fri Jan 08, 2010 at 07:45:41 AM CST

[ Parent ]

just did some more research (4.00 / 1)

and found this piece from Time.  It says:

"If people think these Cadillac plans are primarily covering wealthy executives, they are mistaken," says Tom Billet, a senior health-benefits consultant for Watson Wyatt, a corporate consulting firm. In reality, many more of the most expensive employer-based health-insurance plans cover people like the families of New Hampshire state employees who, according to the Boston Globe, have policies worth $20,400 per year. (The employee contribution is $60 per month.)

I think the take-home here is that regardless of whether a state "wins" or "loses" (however that's determined), there are so-called "Cadillac" plans that should not be taxed under any circumstances because those who hold the policies are far from being rich (the ones we should be taxing).  Of course, if there were a public option, the people on the "Cadillac plans" could choose a less expensive option that provides the same coverage and be exempted from the tax.  Sigh.

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by: Timmy J @ Thu Jan 07, 2010 at 22:18:10 PM CST

That's very interesting. (0.00 / 0)

My wife's a teacher, and her union just told me that our family's premiums come out to a little over $25,000 a year.

I can count on two hands all the reasons why the excise tax funding model sucks, but can anyone explain why the premiums are so high for state/municipal workers in NH?

Is it the fact that Wellpoint/Cigna have a near monopoly in our state? Or is it something else?

It's entirely too simplistic to suggest that the state just rolls over for the unions (when I know that they don't) or that they throw a dart at a dartboard to determine what price they're willing to pay for coverage.

Regards,
Corporate Dog

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by: Corporate Dog @ Fri Jan 08, 2010 at 13:44:15 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Poorly done article. (4.00 / 2)

Here's what it does:
1. Identify which states will probably gain the most
2. Identify which states will probably contribute most

Here is what it DOES NOT do:

Identify which - if any - states contribute more than they gain.

This drive-by column calls a state a "loser" if it is on the low side of gainers and the high side of contributors. BUT that state could be contributing $100 and getting back $103. I'm happy to "lose" like that all day long.

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by: elwood @ Fri Jan 08, 2010 at 05:34:57 AM CST