Yes, despite the insurance industry claiming that they spend 87 cents of every dollar on care, a Senate analysis paints a much different portrait:
But a new Senate analysis suggests that for-profit insurance companies are spending much less than that, especially for policies sold to individuals and small businesses. Instead, as little as 66 cents of each dollar paid in premiums goes toward doctor and hospital bills, while the rest covers administrative expenses, marketing and company profits, according to the analysis.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
Well, at least Jay Rockefeller did not seem amused:
The insurers "need to tell us how they are spending their customers’ money," Mr. Rockefeller said in a statement he released on Monday along with the committee’s analysis. "Are they spending it to make people well when they are sick and keep them healthy?" he asked. "Or is the money they charge going to profits, to executive salaries, and to figuring out how to deny care to people when they really need it?"
But does this really surprise any of us?? Insurance companies have been a large part of the problem with their sky-high premiums, denial of care, and failure to pay benefits. This is why we needed single-payer or a very strong public option. We should all be asking, if this is the best we can do:
Because face it folks everyone knows that the insurance companies have not one thing to fear from this public option:
In a report sent to investors earlier this week, a Wall Street analyst, Richard Evans, concludes that the health insurance industry should probably not worry much about the prospect of a government-run health plan — at least not as it now is taking shape in Congress.
As things stands now, Mr. Evans notes, the proposed legislation does not call for the new government-run plan, or public option, to be able to demand the same low prices that Medicare gets from doctors and hospitals. Private insurers have argued that Medicare-pegged rates would give the public option an unfair advantage over their plans.
http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.c...
This mandated coverage without the strongest possible public option is a bad idea. As an uninsured American with a pre-existing condition it scares me very badly. Sure, they will not be able to deny me coverage but without the public option I will still not be able to afford it, subsidy or no.
The way I see things boiling down we are indeed going to be presented with a mandate to be covered without a viable public option for those of us want one, and eventually would be forced to rely on one. It appears to me that this whole process which was supposed to be about helping the poor and sick who could not afford coverage attain it. Instead, it is turning into yet again finding a way to give a huge windfall to a segment of Corporate America.
If this is the best we can do, and the final legislation is a lot like it is sounding like it will be, then I honestly feel like I will oppose it and hope that as many Progressives as possible will join me.
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