Someone casually mentioned the other day that the crime rate in Nashville has been down these past few months. This is likely due, I figure, to the fact that people have had less and less money to steal. Sort of the opposite of supply and demand.
Similar reasoning seems to be at play in the health care reform proposal outlined by the President last evening. His plan promises to reduce the number of Americans who have no health insurance coverage. It will accomplish this, apparently, by delaying the creation of an insurance exchange marketplace (with or without a public option) for another four years. During that time the number of uninsured should steadily decline as more and more poor people die off from lack of medical care. Makes sense.
Those fortunate uninsureds who, by the luck of the draw, should live to see the grand opening of that insurance exchange marketplace four years hence, will still have to wrestle with the issue of affordability. Sure, the insurance will be cheaper, but it will not be free. So, what happens to the poor who cannot afford insurance even at reduced rates? Well, just like now, they’re pretty much screwed.
The President says that the government will come to the rescue of the truly poor. If you’re too poor to purchase insurance at the rates offered in the exchange, then the government will assist you with a tax credit in an amount to be determined by your need. All you’ve gotta do is live until you can get your 1040EZ filed and get your tax credit check in the mail.
A tax credit—now that’s the ticket. For sure, that minimum-wage-earning single mom with a couple of kids will be taking her tax credit check and going on a health coverage shopping spree. She won’t be using that tax credit money to add milk to the kids’ Rice Crispies or to buy little Jimmy a coat at the thrift store. Nosiree, she won’t be getting a new water pump on the old Mazda either. She’ll be heading straight to the insurance exchange… on foot.
Last week Mary Ann made the following prediction about what would be going on in the mind of our own Blue Dog congressman this week:
“(I’ll) offer a bill of my own—stick a label like “America’s Responsible Health Care Act” on an empty box and pass it with the help of frustrated and beaten down Democrats and Republicans eager to support fake reforms. When 45 million uninsured Americans scream the next day that they still need coverage, I’ll disdainfully point out that we just passed sweeping reforms, but some people just can’t be satisfied!”
Who knew that the President reads this blog?
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The four year wait was disappointing. If Republicans win back congressional seats in the midterm elections they will kill the creation of the insurance exchange and nothing at all will change. The insurance lobby is more powerful than most people can imagine. If we do not press for immediate creation of the exchange, to include a public insurance option, this exercise in reform will come to nothing.
There was a lot to like in the President’s proposals, but as you point out the proposals do not represent much change for America’s poor.