I have to hand it to the health industry, the Private Insurers & Medicine Producers (PIMPs). They've played us all amazingly well.
The PIMPs started with essentially the same playbook as the oil companies, the war companies, & the financial companies, but they've taken it to a whole new level that's as commendable for its ingenuity as it's deplorable for its evilness. The playbook goes something like this:
- always be on the lookout for a serious crisis
- if there's no crisis, create one (e.g., Iraq)
- when a crisis has been created, don't let it go to waste: use it to rob the country blind (e.g., bank bailouts)
- go back to #1
Sound familiar so far?
The PIMPs hit the jackpot with the 2008 elections:
First, the uninsured status of 45 million people was finally raised to a top national priority, to crisis level, by the Dems. While the crisis is real, it quickly became an amazing opportunity for the PIMPs. What luck!
Then, the Medicine Providers (aka PhRMA) bribed the Dems with a promise of campaign contributions and a 2.5% discount on their drugs; that's $8 Billion per year off their sky high prices! ($8B is 2.5% of their yearly loot in the US, which is $326B based on this & this). Plus they threw in another few million for an ad campaign. In exchange, they get to keep overcharging Medicare to the tune of $90 Billion per year. Plus, they get to increase their customer base by up to 17% - worth up to $55 Billion per year - many of whom will be subsidized by the government (45 million new customers with a population base of 304 million is 17%). So, they get an additional $137 Billion per year ($90B + $49B - $8B) in exchange for their generous 2.5% discount! Sweet deal, eh?
Next, the Private Insurers (aka AHIP, including Aetna, United Health, etc.) get into the act to get their cut. Instead of letting the 45 million uninsured get Medicare coverage on the government's dime, they want a cut and insist that the government force everyone to buy insurance from private insurers. But the majority of these people don't have any money to buy insurance, so the government should just pay the private insurers to cover them. At an average of $5000 per person per year {2.5 Trillion in annual healthcare spending * 50% for non-Medicare spending / (304 million population - 45 million uninsured - 45 million on Medicare)}, the uninsured can be worth $225 Billion per year to the insurance industry.
But wait, the private insurers don't really want to cover the seriously sick people, do they? Of course not. They just want to cover the 80% who are healthy for $5000 a piece. What if a Public Option could be turned into the sucker that takes the other 20%, you know, the really sick folks who might actually cost money. Cream skimming the younger, healthier people away from the public option should be no problem for private insurers with targeted marketing & lower prices, made possible by their larger scale & marketing savvy. In fact, they'll keep their prices around 5% lower than the public option consistently to attract the healthy customers without jeopardizing their generous government subsidy payouts. And the real payoff comes later. As the per-person cost of the public option soars (due to its disproportionate share of sick people), so will the government payouts per person, and the private insurers will sit back & reap the benefits, while also raising prices on the other 90% of the population. Any objections? Talk to the IRS, since they'll be the new collections agency for your private insurer. Got sick? They'll just drown you in paperwork & take forever to pay your claims, so you'll rush to switch to the public option asap. According to my (extremely rough) calculations, this will allow the private insurers to get:
- $180 Billion per year from 80% of the 45 Million uninsured immediately. Ka-ching!!!
- Plus, by riding the coattails of the more neutered public option, they will be able to raise rates by at least 5%-25% for the other 90% of the insured public, which should be worth another $125B-$625B per year. Double Ka-ching!!!!
- By keeping their prices slightly lower than the public option the private insurers will get political cover for years to come. Priceless!!!
- Getting their enemies, the progressives, to push through the Trojan Horse public option through the Congress. Simply Orgasmic!!!
And, of course, the 'reform' is designed to cause another crisis in a few years. It really does pay to bribe politicians, doesn't it?
And how do we feel about the Dems, specially the ConservaDems, who have made it all possible? Sadly, even Machiavelli would be impressed!!