BS: US Health Care Reform

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 05:44 PM

Less mail is not necessarily less overhead. Overhead still needs to be paid on physical infrastructure, salaried employees, utility bills, vehicle upkeep, and many other kinds of operating costs. The routes of mail carriers don't get smaller just because they're carrying less mail. In fact, other than hourly wages for some employees, and benefits for fewer employees, most overhead is not reduced by people sending less mail.

As McGrath said, people have the same incentives as anyone who works for corporations of comparable size, which are also bureaucracies.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 05:19 PM

Same motive as any other employee has to do their job. Pride in doing something useful (which might not apply in all jobs, but definitely does with a useful job like a postal service, or medicine), a wage, and the possibility of promotion or the sack.

What's the difference just because the employer is a private company?

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 04:26 PM

Wrong. Less mail is less overhead. As far as less incentive, profit motive comes from INNOVATIONS, as to better the company. What motivation do a Government(G3) employee have to do anything, but to show up???

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 04:17 PM

People are sending less mail. There is less need. That has nothing to do with the viability of the Postal Service and how well it's run.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: DougR
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 04:01 PM

"The postal service is doing just fine." Right, and I'm going to win the lottery Wednesday night. If they are doing so fine, why are they considering cutting out Saturday delivery?

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: heric
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 12:10 PM

That is, I would expect that they would get emergency and acute care. Then I guess the providers have to go after them privately unless and until they can get reimbursement from the public option or Medicaid. I haven't noticed any reporting requirement imposed on health care providers to rat out fee-for-service recipients, but they are probably there or coming eventually.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 11:58 AM

The postal service is doing just fine. Those other programs are no less efficient than private companies are, and they don't have a profit motive for jacking up prices.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: heric
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 11:54 AM

I don't understand that either. I think the "uninsured" in the future (eight years from now) can only be the people who didn't have employer provided insurance, or opted out and didn't then or otherwise enroll in an exchange or the public option. I think they will be covered (receive treatment) under the public option but with penalties, collectible or not. The answer is in a CBO document somewhere.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 11:44 AM

Post office has been going broke for some time, as Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, Veterans Administration, Food Stamps, Welfare, all run inefficiently...Among others

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 11:25 AM

From today's Guardian report ( Obama's health insurance reforms clear first hurdle on way to becoming law:

"...Under its terms, an additional 36 million Americans would be given health coverage. That would leave about 18 million people, about a third of whom are illegal immigrants, without any coverage by 2019..."

So who are the 12 million people who are not illegal aliens who won't be covered?

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 11:05 AM

Rig-
Out of curiosity---if you recognize the existence of a large number of undocumented aliens (we used to call them "sick birds", or ill eagles), and you don't want to provide them with health care, how do you propose that we dispose of all the bodies?

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Riginslinger
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 10:29 AM

Ronald Reagan said whatever popped up on his teleprompter. What he did wasn't much. What happened while he was in office, happened under the direction of somebody, but...

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 09:31 AM

Government is part of the problem....because the government in the USA has merely become an agent of a cartel of rich corporate interests. Thus it is serving them, not the public. An honest government that genuinely served the public could do much good, but a dishonest government that serves special interests is a disaster.

As for Reagan, his "small government" rhetoric differed radically from what he actually did while in office. The USA national debt took 198 years to reach the mark of 1 trillion $...but it only took the next 12 years from the inception of the Reagan administration to reach the incredible total of about 4 trillion dollars! So it was quadrupled by presidents (Reagan and Bush senior) who pretended to be in favor of small government and reduced public spending. It increased further under Bush and is increasing further under Obama.

All of these presidents, whether posing as conservatives or as liberals, are enlarging the government, increasing the national debt, bailing out corrupt banks and giant corporations who have proven utterly fiscally irresponsible, and robbing the public while so doing.

Why? Well, the $ySStem is built to work that way. It's not what the architects of the Constitution intended, mind you, but that's what it has become. The $ySStem functions at the behest of the largest international banks and the largest multinational corporate entities and it does what benefits them.

Needless to say, that does not benefit the general public which is going deeper and deeper into debt year by year.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Greg F.
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 08:39 AM

Guess the old Ronnie Reagan shibboleth of 'Government is the problem, not the solution' still has traction.

Pity.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 12:42 AM

That's not true. The post office runs just fine, and does it for far less money than companies like FedEx and UPS. In fact, whenever private enterprise competes with the government, the government does it at least as well if not better and for a lot less money (with the exception, some of the time, of public schools). Take the private contractors we are paying for in Iraq and Afghanistan, for instance, as compared to the military doing the same jobs.

Any time private (for profit) enterprise gets involved, the costs go up rather than down, and efficiency is not improved.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 09 Nov 09 - 12:02 AM

I think most everyone can agree that the system we have now, being driven by the insurance conglomerates, is an overpriced scam deluxe, and have driven medical costs to way out of proportion, as to services received, verses services paid for. Right off the top, going through an insurance company, adds a minimum of 30% to the overall cost, just in the paperwork, profit, and price setting..just for starters...however, having a government run program would be as efficient as a twelve pound yo-yo. Virtually everything they have run, runs inefficiently, is cost prohibitive, and turns to shit. Thinking otherwise is just wishful thinking, a pipe dream at best. I wholeheartedly agree, that something needs to be done, but I'm not at all sure, or confident that an over-expensive government program, is the answer...just a short term 'solution',..that will have to be fixed, by another bad idea. History shows this plainly...but then again, history teaches us that man never learns from history!..GfS

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 11:30 PM

It's actually millions of others who are in the same boat. Tens of millions, in fact.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: maire-aine
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 10:51 PM

Moving to Canada sounds great, but I, like hundreds of thousands of others, don't have that luxury. I can't wait for the perfect solution; I need "good enough" now (or at least by 30-Apr-2010). I no longer have an employer, and I'm 3 years away from Medicare.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: heric
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 10:00 PM

It's not just the insurance industry. It's a host of related interests living off the employee benefits infrastructure. And entrenched bureaucrats.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Don Firth
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 04:42 PM

Dennis Kucinich RULES!!

(God, don't I wish!!)

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Riginslinger
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 04:42 PM

"Rep. Anh Cao (R-LA 2nd District), who was born in Saigon in 1967, voted for the bill after being convinced that illegal aliens would not be covered."


                   Wow! They sure snowed him!

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 04:36 PM

Thanks. I know I would love living there. We'll see how it goes. Don't leave the porch light on for us, though. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 04:14 PM

I see, Carol. Well, I hope that the two of you can work out a situation in Canada at some point. It would be good having you here.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 03:33 PM

Half a loaf is better than no bread. It sounds like an absolutely rotten deal, but like the best deal you have a chance of getting, given all the big money and the bought politicians you have against you.

Hard luck - but Good Luck!

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 03:21 PM

JtS, being a Canadian citizen, could move back to Canada any time he wanted to. But I would not be able to go there with him unless he could support me there. That would mean he would need to have a good job. That's not as easy as some might think, especially considering the state of the world's economy right now. Our means of making a living is here in the US at this time. Maybe some day that will change. We'll see.

I don't see this bill as being anywhere near as much of a givaway to the insurance industry as the bill that came out of the Senate Finance Committee. At least this one has a public option, and while it's not the best of all of the possible public options, it's hardly the worst one, either.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: pdq
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 02:55 PM

Actually, HR3200 did get one Republican vote.

Rep. Anh Cao (R-LA 2nd District), who was born in Saigon in 1967, voted for the bill after being convinced that illegal aliens would not be covered.

He was elected last year with barely half the vote, replacing William "Cold Cash" Jefferson.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 02:09 PM

The "cloud-niners", Q, are the people pursuing the conventional viewpoint and doing business as usual. Kucinich appears like a cloud-niner to you merely because one sane man in the Valley of the Mad is always assumed to be insane by the local citizenry.

This so-called health care reform bill is a giant give-away to the private health insurance industry in the USA.

Carol, I understand your particular situation in this and why you feel as you do. What I wonder sometimes, though, is why don't you and Jack move to Canada where you could get mostly free health coverage, and at a very moderate yearly tax rate? Jack is a Canadian citizen, so there's nothing standing in the way of your doing that.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 01:01 PM

The tougher job is still ahead. The Senate is going to be a taller mountain to climb. If the Democrats can't get a vote by late January, the climb is going to be even steeper.

Which is why we need to move quickly and not slow the process down as many Republicans are saying we need to do.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 12:48 PM

The bill is full of bandaids and special interest additions such as no funding for abortions, etc. Some 1500 pages of bumff.
The senate will take a long time to untangle it and integrate with their own bill.
Thirty-eight Democrats joined a united Republican opposition, and came close to derailing the bill (I don't count cloud niners such as Kucinch, all he offers is comic relief when serious consideration is needed).
The Democrats will be very lucky if they get a bill through Congress this session; the next is shaping up to have a majority in opposition. To get the bill through both houses will require compromises, 'reform' of health care in the U. S. is a long way off.

Incidentally, Canada health care, often cited in comparison, is not uniform across the country. Alberta Health Care Premiums are about $1200/year and there is strong talk of an increase next year. Many people buy Blue Cross insurance in addition. Drugs are only partly paid for (co-payment) by the province (also part paid by my pension, but pension 'reform' may kill that). Certain new drugs used in cancer treatment, etc., are not included in the Alberta plan; a few cost thousands.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: GUEST
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 12:44 PM

The tougher job is still ahead. The Senate is going to be a taller mountain to climb. If the Democrats can't get a vote by late January, the climb is going to be even steeper. The closer they get to 2010 elections, the more danger that Democrats will lose seats in that election ...especially those who won office in the last election.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 12:39 PM

While I appreciate Dennis' stance on this issue, unlike him, I don't have the luxury of standing my ground for single payer health care. As someone who needs some kind of access to health care now, I need something to pass that will enable me and JtS to get access to health care. It's a life and death issue for us. I'm celebrating the passage of the bill.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Bobert
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 12:35 PM

Yeah, Dennis is completely correct, LH...

The only hope we have is that, like many Dems have said, ya' gotta start somewhere... But I'm not too sure this is a good starting... I guess that the Repubs not voting for it is supposed to make me think that this is progress but I'm not all that sure it is...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 12:10 PM

Well, here's an interesting piece of news. Dennis Kucinich (who is a true progressive) voted against the bill. He explains why below...

Congressman Dennis Kucinich after voting against H.R. 3962 addresses why he voted NO, stating:

"We have been led to believe that we must make our health care choices only within the current structure of a predatory, for-profit insurance system which makes money not providing health care. We cannot fault the insurance companies for being what they are. But we can fault legislation in which the government incentivizes the perpetuation, indeed the strengthening, of the for-profit health insurance industry, the very source of the problem. When health insurance companies deny care or raise premiums, co-pays and deductibles they are simply trying to make a profit. That is our system."

"Clearly, the insurance companies are the problem, not the solution. They are driving up the cost of health care. Because their massive bureaucracy avoids paying bills so effectively, they force hospitals and doctors to hire their own bureaucracy to fight the insurance companies to avoid getting stuck with an unfair share of the bills. The result is that since 1970, the number of physicians has increased by less than 200% while the number of administrators has increased by 3000%. It is no wonder that 31 cents of every health care dollar goes to administrative costs, not toward providing care. Even those with insurance are at risk. The single biggest cause of bankruptcies in the U.S. is health insurance policies that do not cover you when you get sick."

"But instead of working toward the elimination of for-profit insurance, H.R. 3962 would put the government in the role of accelerating the privatization of health care. In H.R. 3962, the government is requiring at least 21 million Americans to buy private health insurance from the very industry that causes costs to be so high, which will result in at least $70 billion in new annual revenue, much of which is coming from taxpayers. This inevitably will lead to even more costs, more subsidies, and higher profits for insurance companies - a bailout under a blue cross."

"By incurring only a new requirement to cover pre-existing conditions, a weakened public option, and a few other important but limited concessions, the health insurance companies are getting quite a deal. The Center for American Progress' blog, Think Progress, states, 'since the President signaled that he is backing away from the public option, health insurance stocks have been on the rise.' Similarly, healthcare stocks rallied when Senator Max Baucus introduced a bill without a public option. Bloomberg reports that Curtis Lane, a prominent health industry investor, predicted a few weeks ago that 'money will start flowing in again' to health insurance stocks after passage of the legislation. Investors.com last month reported that pharmacy benefit managers share prices are hitting all-time highs, with the only industry worry that the Administration would reverse its decision not to negotiate Medicare Part D drug prices, leaving in place a Bush Administration policy."

"During the debate, when the interests of insurance companies would have been effectively challenged, that challenge was turned back. The 'robust public option' which would have offered a modicum of competition to a monopolistic industry was whittled down from an initial potential enrollment of 129 million Americans to 6 million. An amendment which would have protected the rights of states to pursue single-payer health care was stripped from the bill at the request of the Administration. Looking ahead, we cringe at the prospect of even greater favors for insurance companies."

"Recent rises in unemployment indicate a widening separation between the finance economy and the real economy. The finance economy considers the health of Wall Street, rising corporate profits, and banks' hoarding of cash, much of it from taxpayers, as sign of an economic recovery. However in the real economy - in which most Americans live - the recession is not over. Rising unemployment, business failures, bankruptcies and foreclosures are still hammering Main Street."

"This health care bill continues the redistribution of wealth to Wall Street at the expense of America's manufacturing and service economies which suffer from costs other countries do not have to bear, especially the cost of health care. America continues to stand out among all industrialized nations for its privatized health care system. As a result, we are less competitive in steel, automotive, aerospace and shipping while other countries subsidize their exports in these areas through socializing the cost of health care."

"Notwithstanding the fate of H.R. 3962, America will someday come to recognize the broad social and economic benefits of a not-for-profit, single-payer health care system, which is good for the American people and good for America's businesses, with of course the notable exceptions being insurance and pharmaceuticals."

Please know the struggle for real health care reform will continue. Contribute, we can make a difference.

Thank you.
The Re-Elect Congressman Kucinich Committee

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Bobert
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 11:16 AM

Write yer Senator, Charley... No, better yet, send him a few thousand bucks fir his re-election campaign... That's what the health insurance folks are doing this mornin'...

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Charley Noble
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 10:23 AM

A win for health reform is a win for us all.

On to the Senate!

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Bobert
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 09:19 AM

Now the fun begins as the Senate, where all good bills go to die, takes it up with Harry Reid saying that they mifght not get to it until next year... Next year??? Yikes... Isn't that what happened in '93??? Deja vu, all over again...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Greg F.
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 09:04 AM

Space Aliens willobably like it , too- we need to do something about that.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Riginslinger
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 07:10 AM

And they did it without E-Verify and tort reform. If it gets by the Senate, the trial lawyers and the illegal aliens are going to love this.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 03:09 AM

My representative voted against it. I will remember that the next time he wants my vote in a primary race.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Nov 09 - 01:30 AM

YES!

That's one down.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Sawzaw
Date: 26 Oct 09 - 05:35 PM

"abolish your present system in the USA and copy the Canadian system in every way. You would save 7% of the USA's yearly budget for other things!"

Thestar.com Monday, October 26, 2009 Toronto Edition

Health care, the elephant in the room
Chantal Hébert

In Canada, as in many other industrialized countries, health care is very much the elephant in the government budget room.

Take Ontario. Last week, the province projected a record $24.7 billion shortfall for this fiscal year, with more red ink to come over the next few years. But even if Premier Dalton McGuinty gave the green light to a 5 per cent spending cut in every area except for health and education tomorrow, the government would still save less than $3 billion.

Health-care spending is the biggest item on Ontario's budget list and its costs have already been going up faster than the rate of economic growth since before the recession. Likewise, federal health transfers have been increasing yearly at a much faster pace than the GDP for much of the past decade.

Since 2001, the federal government has transferred $250 billion to the provinces for health care, with another $150 billion to come over the next five years.

By the time the current arrangements run out in five years, the federal health transfer will have almost tripled from what it was in 2000.

Those rapidly rising transfers are the result of successive federal-provincial accords, negotiated after Canada entered an era of big budget surpluses.

Five years ago, Paul Martin and the premiers signed a 10-year health accord designed, at least according to the then-prime minister, to fix medicare for a generation.

With the accord past the halfway mark, many of the reforms the multi-billion-dollar package was supposed to buy are failing to materialize. Home care and basic pharmacare programs remain embryonic in many areas of the country.

The creation of electronic health records remains at best a work in progress. On that score the eHealth Ontario scandal may not be an isolated incident.

In the years to come, the initiatives funded through Martin's health accord are expected to provide fodder for future auditor general reports at both the federal and provincial levels.

With one voice, the Liberals and the Conservatives have promised not to cut social transfers to the provinces to make ends meet federally. But that does not mean a future federal government would allow them to continue to increase at the current pace.

Once the 2004 accord runs out in five years, Stephen Harper's government has promised to allocate health transfers to the provinces on a per capita basis.

Ontario would be the big winner of that reform. But to fulfill Harper's commitment, the federal government of the day will either have to take money out of the envelope of other provinces to reallocate it to the more populous Ontario or else dig deep in its empty pockets to make the health fiscal pie even bigger.

In a surplus era, Ottawa and the provinces bought their way out of the medicare debate. The resumption of that debate at a time when government coffers are empty stands to turn commitments like the recently restated Liberal promise of a national child-care initiative or the various federal and provincial plans to green the Canadian economy into as many empty promises.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: GUEST,heric
Date: 26 Oct 09 - 02:23 PM

Maybe they should fix it and make an appointment to come back and talk to us again in three years, about all the other great things they are capable of.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: GUEST,heric
Date: 26 Oct 09 - 02:18 PM

yeah and all that's the same as it ever was. They've been fixing it for decades but now they will fix it.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Sawzaw
Date: 26 Oct 09 - 02:12 PM

Healthcare system wastes up to $800 billion a year

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. healthcare system is just as wasteful as President Barack Obama says it is, and proposed reforms could be paid for by fixing some of the most obvious inefficiencies, preventing mistakes and fighting fraud, according to a Thomson Reuters report released on Monday.

The U.S. healthcare system wastes between $505 billion and $850 billion every year, the report from Robert Kelley, vice president of healthcare analytics at Thomson Reuters, found.

"America's healthcare system is indeed hemorrhaging billions of dollars, and the opportunities to slow the fiscal bleeding are substantial," the report reads.

"The bad news is that an estimated $700 billion is wasted annually. That's one-third of the nation's healthcare bill," Kelley said in a statement.

"The good news is that by attacking waste we can reduce healthcare costs without adversely affecting the quality of care or access to care."

One example -- a paper-based system that discourages sharing of medical records accounts for 6 percent of annual overspending.

"It is waste when caregivers duplicate tests because results recorded in a patient's record with one provider are not available to another or when medical staff provides inappropriate treatment because relevant history of previous treatment cannot be accessed," the report reads.

Some other findings in the report from Thomson Reuters, the parent company of Reuters:

* Unnecessary care such as the overuse of antibiotics and lab tests to protect against malpractice exposure makes up 37 percent of healthcare waste or $200 to $300 billion a year.

* Fraud makes up 22 percent of healthcare waste, or up to $200 billion a year in fraudulent Medicare claims, kickbacks for referrals for unnecessary services and other scams.

* Administrative inefficiency and redundant paperwork account for 18 percent of healthcare waste.

* Medical mistakes account for $50 billion to $100 billion in unnecessary spending each year, or 11 percent of the total.

* Preventable conditions such as uncontrolled diabetes cost $30 billion to $50 billion a year.

"The average U.S. hospital spends one-quarter of its budget on billing and administration, nearly twice the average in Canada," reads the report, citing dozens of other research papers.

"American physicians spend nearly eight hours per week on paperwork and employ 1.66 clerical workers per doctor, far more than in Canada," it says, quoting a 2003 New England Journal of Medicine paper by Harvard University researcher Dr. Steffie Woolhandler.

Yet primary care doctors are lacking, forcing wasteful use of emergency rooms, for instance, the report reads.

All this could help explain why Americans spend more per capita and the highest percentage of GDP on healthcare than any other OECD country, yet has an unhealthier population with more diabetes, obesity and heart disease and higher rates of neonatal deaths than other developed nations.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Greg F.
Date: 26 Oct 09 - 09:04 AM

The "Conservatives" and others whining about the U.S. national debt & how we can't afford to provide universal health care would do well to remember where the current debt came from: The administration of Georgie & the BuShites.

They have met the enemy, and it is them.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 25 Oct 09 - 07:52 PM

It's two different reports about two different versions of the bill. The old version is the ones the Republicans are quoting the CBO on. The new version is the one that says the bill will reduce the deficit.

Since they're not considering passing the old version, the earlier report from the CBO that the Republicans like to quote is totally irrelevant.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Riginslinger
Date: 25 Oct 09 - 07:35 PM

It's confusing to me: the Republicans say the CBO report says health care reform will be a net loser, and the Democrats say it will save money.

          Driving down the cost of malpractice insurance through tort reform, however, would definately save money.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 25 Oct 09 - 01:31 PM

That, by the way, is the reason they send bills to the CBO for analysis. They send them to the CBO to find out what the flaws are in the bill (financially speaking), and then they make changes to make the bill more acceptable. This is precisely what has happened in the case of this bill (and what I predicted would happen, either earlier in this thread or in another thread), back when the anti-reform people were using the earlier CBO report to support their arguments.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: CarolC
Date: 25 Oct 09 - 01:27 PM

The bill changed between the two times that the CBO evaluated it, and in the first evaluation, quite a few aspects of the bill did not get examined (which is why it came out looking as bad as it did - the aspects that didn't get included in the first examination had a mitigating effect on the total costs).

There is no reason to think that there is anything wrong with their analyses based on the fact that they got two different results.

Subject: RE: BS: US Health Care Reform
From: Riginslinger
Date: 25 Oct 09 - 07:17 AM

It doesn't make sense that the House bill saves money now when it didn't before. There's no way to trust anybody inside the beltway.