BETO O'ROURKE CHOOSES "MEDICARE FOR AMERICA" (NOT MEDICARE FOR ALL)

What does he know that we don't?

Although Medicare for All  has been the rallying cry of most of the progressive Democrats in the presidential race,  Beto chooses another, seemingly more "moderate" plan. What is this "Medicare For America" that Beto should go for it? You can check it out in this link:

Medicare for America -- Beto's Favorite Healthcare plan -- Explained

It's very much influenced by a plan cooked up the Center for American Progress (CAP) last year, and presented in my blog post "Various Flavors of Healthcare Reform" (12/15).  The new plan would allow all who like the insurance offered by their employer the opportunity to keep it. Everyone else -- those who don't like their employer's plans, or who do not have employer-offered insurance, or who have either private insurance, ACA, Medicare or Medicaid, or no health insurance whatsoever -- get Medicare for America. In addition, every new-born automatically gets enrolled in Medicare for America, whose required contributions  are graduated by ability to pay, and whose benefits would be at least equal to the remaining Private Employer's Insurance which would theoretically be strictly regulated, and would cover at least 80% of the expenses incurred by the employee. But any time the employee became dissatisfied with his employer's plan, or any time his employer wanted to move him or her off it, that employee would transfer into Medicare for America.

Thus, so the story goes, as more and more newborns are enrolled into Medicare for America, and more and more currently employed people retire, gradually everyone would be covered by Medicare for America, and Private Health Insurance would just fade away, so to speak. What's not to like?

WELL!

I can't imagine anyone so naive as to suppose that during the decades-long process of conversion to Single-Payer, Private Insurance would go gently into that Good Night. No, it would fight with every dollar at its disposal, and it would exploit the public's dissatisfaction with the new system. And there would be plenty to complain about! For one thing, all the disadvantages of our badly fragmented system would be kept, with the loss of much of the savings in administrative overhead that would have helped pay for Single-Payer, thus raising the costs higher than necessary.  And with the pool of risk essentially halved, the required payments to Medicare for America would be even higher than if  all the population were paying into it. 

Moreover, medical providers, who currently spend a fifth of their time wrestling with Private Insurance, would be denied the relief that Single-Payer would have provided. And since the Private insurance folks could drop coverage for anyone too sick or frail to be profitable (they're doing it now), we'd have a two-tiered system -- one for the rich and healthy, and one everyone else, with costs spiraling out of control.  And within the first two years -- five at the most -- the public would cry out to go back to what it had before -- the Medical Industrial Establishment would make sure of that!

Truly, the only thing Beto's plan has going for it is what he may suppose is the public's unwariness that might lead it to believe two things:

1. This "incremental" approach is a good thing, and
2. Private Insurance can be trusted not to find ways -- even with "strict" regulation -- to game the system to their advantage, and to the disadvantage of everything else.

I should make it clear that even with Single-Payer, there are bound to remain a few private insurance companies, to deal with things NOT covered by Medicare for All -- aesthetic plastic surgery for example.  And there may be others.

But Howard Schultz, the ex-CEO of Starbucks, supposes that the entire Health Insurance Industry would be destroyed. "Destroy a whole industry?" he says, "that's un-American! What will they destroy next -- coffee?"  My point is that the privatization -- indeed the financialization -- of all industries is so in-grown within the body of our American life,  that there is a benefit in making the excision of this toxic mass as surgically swift as possible.  Yes, we must plan for dealing with the displacement of many of the insurance workers -- they count, too!  In this I do NOT include the hugely salaried CEOs and their ilk. They have the resources to take care of themselves. 

They also have the resources to find ways to hold on to their jobs -- at the expense and pain of everyone else.

We must fight them, opposing all their culture of greed. Despite Schultz's protestations, that is NOT the American way.

Dio

PS: If you'd like to leave a comment -- and I encourage you to do so -- simply click on the "number of comments" area, and share your thoughts in the "comment rectangle" that appears.

PPS: We know that there are plenty out there who have stories to tell -- stories of your trying to cope with our dysfunctional healthcare system. Trouble is, we don't know what these stories are! That's where you come in. If you have a story to tell, you can email me at indivisible12401@gmail.com. You can be as anonymous as you like. Thanks!