Hood Robin: take from the poor and give to the rich!

There is a common notion in the Republican ideology that they believe the old, disabled, and the poor are costing this country too much money through entitlement spending, but no one has taken the time, Democrat or Republican, to address what the real issue is with entitlement health care spending.

Let’s go back to the source of the problem with Medicare and Medicaid. The problem is not about poor and old people not being able to pay their own way. Cutting these programs are punishing the most needy for the actions of the health-care industry as a whole.

It is a fact that the largest problem with Medical entitlements is the waste, fraud, and abuse, and further this government condones the legal fraud they commit (see my blog entry: Cost vs Price: "Health care providers make profits off the backs of the uninsured!" which explains this in detail).  Is this caused by the beneficiaries? NO. It is the health care providers and insurance companies who are the biggest offenders, but since they are the BIG part of big business, they are privileged and not held accountable for their fraudulent practices. Their industries rely on it in order to continually raise prices and the resulting profits. The problem with spending in these programs is for fictitious costs and price setting not only for health entitlement programs, but also health care industry wide.

It is a really sad state of affairs when our neediest and most destitute portion of Americans are being punished for the behavior of the health care industry. There is something really morally and legally wrong with this picture. In order to remedy our deficit and spending problem, our leaders are seeking to pick on a population that has absolutely no power or resources to do anything about the reduction in their care.  Those in power will seek to impose upon them a punishment in deference to a dishonest, fraudulent, yet profitable industry.

One thing I would like to see legislatively done industry wide is this: before health care providers are paid...

 1.) all bills sent to patients must be itemized along with a lay person's explanation of each entry and enclosed with a stamped and addressed envelope. 

2.) after submitting the bill to a third party payer for reimbursement (Medicare, Medicaid, Insurance companies, etc) each patient will receive a duplicate itemized bill sent to those third parties to corroborate that the itemized bill is correct and accurately describes the procedure and the associated costs.

3.) health care providers will not get reimbursed by third party payers unless or until the bill is corroborated by the patient.

This step would probably curb up to 50% of the fraud and abuse.

I am an uninsured individual and I had a routine mammogram. Something abnormal showed up on the film so I also had to get a sonogram (by the way, I am fine). 

I received 4 different bills for each procedure.  As a lay person, it looked like they kept re-billing me for the procedures.  I made a call to the person who deals with billing questions and found out these were each separate bills from each person involved in each process.  I could understand receiving 2 bills with all the corresponding technicians, radiologists, doctors, etc., from each facility (2), but they had separate bills for each one, which I received at different times.  They were all under the umbrella of the University Health Care system, so actually, it could have all been condensed into one bill.

The person I was talking to said she was hired by the University Health Care system and that her full-time job was to take calls from people who don't understand the billing.  This is wasteful and contributes to the cost of health care.

What happened to the idea of converting paperwork to a more efficient electronic system?

There needs to be more accountability from the providers and insurance industry side.  As it is, there is virtually none. The problem needs to be fixed at the industry level and the legal fraud that is occurring in the health care industry has to STOP, and stop trying to punish those who have no means of defending themselves.  They are the easy target and the path of least resistance!

While You Weren't Looking...

While the national media has been inundated with the antics of the Donald and the Royal Wedding, the House Republicans have been very busy while we have been distracted.

It seems GOP politicians have made the defunding of what they term Obamacare (Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act) their primary focus of late, seeking to dismantle it piece by piece since they couldn't take it down through a complete repeal.A Reuters article posted on NewsDaily.com reported the House of Representatives passed a bill two weeks ago that would remove funding for a prevention and public health fund.  As early as next week another bill to defund grant money for school-based health centers will also be coming up for a vote.

Next week the House also will vote and probably pass a bill that would remove $1.9 billion in grants to states to fund the creation of state insurance exchanges so that individuals could buy affordable health insurance in their respective states.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated that  eliminating grant funds to States would only reduce the deficit by about $1.5 billion per year over the next 9 years, but this would not eliminate the exchanges. The result of this action would shift the creation of exchange marketplaces to the federal government, which could cause an inflation of U.S. costs. Not much cost savings there. It appears to be only a temporary band-aid treatment.

So let's see what House Republicans have been accomplishing this year so far:

• Extension of Bush Tax Cuts for the rich (passed)
• Voted to extend Patriot Act (Congress passed a 90 day extension that will expire in May)
• voted to block FCC's net neutrality rules (expected to fail in the Senate)
• voted to block funding for IPCC (the definitive research institution for gathering information about the state of the climate)(expected to fail in Senate)
• Voted to Cut Environmental Programs (failed in Senate)
• Voted to cut spending by $61 billion (failed in Senate)
• Voting to repeal the Affordable Health Care Act (failed in Senate)

Hmmm...so far, not so good.

And coming up, more attempts at dismantling Affordable Health Care with an almost certain failure at the Senate/Presidential level.  What have the Republicans done about jobs?

Hey Republicans...where's the jobs?

Profits Pressure Politicians: Profiteering oil industry "extorts" political support through coersion at the pump

Oil companies reported big profits in the first quarter of 2011 with a whopping gusher profit increase of 69% for Exxon and Royal Dutch Shell reporting increased profits of 40%. Public campaign money data reported by the Federal Election Committee revealed the four largest oil companies, ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Chevron and BP, combined gave $285,000 to politicians in the first quarter of 2011.

According to Politico.com, "The top five recipients are Republicans:

Speaker John Boehner: $15,000
Sen. John Barrasso: $12,000
House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy: $10,000
House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton: $10,000
Rep. David McKinley: $8,000"

Amidst these stellar profits, the greed of the oil companies persists and grows when we are seeing almost record gas prices.  Is it just my imagination or did the increase in gas prices really start going crazy about the time politicians started seriously considering cutting subsidies to oil companies?

The Public Campaign Action Fund's national campaigns director David Donnelly stated,

“There’s no real good explanation for why these subsidies are continuing when you look at the size of these profits and the price of gas right now. The only answer is the irrational campaign finance system that leads lawmakers to listen more to donors than to common sense,”

Will GOP politicians still continue to pander to large corporate interests in light of the recent public scrutiny of the Ryan Budget Plan adopted by the Republican House whereby making the rich richer through support for profiteering corporations and stealing services from hard working Americans?  This seems to be the Hood Robin plan of Right Wing politicians.

As always, contact your elected officials to weigh in on this topic.

Find your elected officials here.

Trump: Republicans' Hired Gun? Questions about President Obama's birth certificate answered

This morning, the White House released the long form of President Obama's birth certificate in order to put the issue of his place of birth to rest.

The long form birth certificate states that Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii and confirms his legitimacy as a United States President.  The former short form, the "Certificate of Live Birth", released earlier was in fact a legal document issued by the State of Hawaii for purposes of demonstrating live birth in Hawaii.

The "birther" movement has gained momentum recently due to the efforts of the Donald who made this fake issue a central theme of his delegitimization efforts toward President Obama.  Obama, in a brief appearance this morning said, "We do not have time for this kind of silliness,"  further stating, "I've got better stuff to do"  In a remark to reporters he said he could not constantly walk around with his birth certificate plastered to his forehead to assure the public that he was in fact born in the United States.

Donald Trump, a potential 2012 presidential contender, has been using the question of Obama's birth place as a way of pressuring him to produce the "official" birth certificate.  Upon the response of the White House, a true-to-form egotistical Trump declared he was able to get something done that no-one else has been able to do. In an impromtu press meeting in New Hampshire, he stated he was very proud of himself, “I’m taking great credit.”

“I’ve accomplished something that nobody else has been able to accomplish,” he further said, “I want to look at it, but I hope it’s true so we can get onto much more important matters so the press can stop asking me questions.”

President Obama is hoping to put this birther issue to rest and get on with the business at hand, but it appears the Donald has already moved on to another vilification, questioning the validity of Obama's education.  This appears to be the next item on the Republican hit list for Trump to run with.

Pat Buchanan, as a guest on msnbc's Hardball, gave us a hint as to the next step in the Republican agenda to de-legitimize the President in a blatant display of racism (see the video below), which leads this author to believe this strategy on the President's education has already surfaced as another preconceived GOP item on their play list.  Buchanan's assertion was that Obama, in is attendance to Harvard and Columbia, benefited from Affirmative Action and that he should make his grades public, inferring that President Obama did not (or could not) earn his education on merit [because he was black].  The Donald is probably going to make this the next issue and run with it.  If anything, this is a success story for the efforts by Affirmative Action, if in fact Obama was a beneficiary.  If the GOP is going to adopt this issue to further delegitimize the President, it will virtually assure another large turn-out of black voters.

Trump's Manchurian Candidate

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

This is clearly a distraction orchestrated by the Republicans and executed by a circus clown "candidate" who has nothing to lose and a lot to gain from the publicity...or maybe not.

The Corporate Obesity Problem: It's time for a diet

For those of you who would like to see life return to the way it was many years ago, where you owned your little house, could walk to the corner drug store to get your newspaper, bought your meat at the local butcher shop, bought your appliances from Joe’s appliance store, and kids could play outside in safe neighborhoods, these pleasures of life are being annihilated by corporations. The are taking away private entrepreneurship (read: Harms Big Box Retail), and taking away our safe neighborhoods.  When corporations, in meeting their bottom line goals, lower wages and remove programs for the poor, disabled, and aged you will see increasing crime, blight, and suffering.

Corporations are taking over our politicians, government, economy, and country. They have even acquired the power to overturn laws, such as in the case of the Citizen’s United ruling in the Supreme Court allowing corporations to make political contributions for political advertising, and now they are moving into the arena of entitlement programs in order to privatize and ultimately kill off both the programs and the people who rely on those programs. Why?

1.) to make as much profit as possible before they kill off the programs,

2.) to eliminate payroll taxes to the tune of 7.65% (matching funds for FICA and Medicare).

The corporations buy off politicians to accomplish their goals. For example: the Koch Brothers who bought off the Republican politicians in Wisconsin. Why?

1.) to reduce their payroll by eliminating union support for higher wages and salaries.

2.) to reduce and/or eliminate benefits by eliminating union support for benefits.

3.) to eliminate unions in order to take their competing political power off the table.

Everything about corporations are about the bottom-line at the expense of humanity. It reminds me of the conflict between science and spirituality. The mentality of the hard-core science community is that if it cannot be proven, it is not valid or doesn’t exist.  Likewise in the corporate mentality, if it doesn't improve the bottom-line, it is useless and should be eliminated. 

Taxes?  What are those?

Below are a list of the top 10 corporations who either did not pay taxes, not much, or got a refund (compiled by Senator Bernie Sanders, Independent from Vermont):

10. Carnival Cruise Lines:$11 billion in profits, federal income tax rate:1.1 percent.

9. ConocoPhillips: $16 billion in profits from 2007 through 2009, $451 million in tax breaks.

8. Citigroup: $4 billion in profit, paid no federal income taxes.

7. Goldman Sachs:$2.3 billion in 2008 but only paid 1.1 percent in taxes.

6. Valero Energy: $68 billion in sales last year got a $157 million tax refund check from the IRS.

5. Boeing: $124 million refund from the IRS last year.

4. Chevron: $19 million refund from the IRS last year after earning $10 billion in profits in 2009.

3. General Electric: $26 billion in profits over the last five years, paid no federal income tax, $4.1 billion refund.

2. Bank of America: $1.9 billion tax refund last year, profits of $4.4 billion.

1. Exxon Mobil: $19 billion in profits, paid no federal income taxes. $156 million rebate from the IRS.


How do we change corporate behavior?

Although I hate to see people hurt in the process, I am heartened to see the citizenship of countries rising up to reclaim their country from corrupt dictators.  I am also heartened to see citizens of this country rise up against the dictatorship of corporations (the union uprisings and recalls).  It is time to start purging the gluttony of corporations and put it on a diet.

As long as corporations have the stronghold in this country, or even world-wide, it ain’t gonna get better. It will only get worse.  So what do we do to change this pernicious situation that threatens to destroy this country?

1.)  More transparency:  Thanks to Bernie Sanders, we have an illustration of legal corporate thievery through loopholes in the taxation code.

2.)  Become informed through non-partisan media sources in newspapers, on the internet, and/or on TV (that one is hard to find) such as www.opensecrets.org or www.bbc.co.uk.  If you watch partisan news, be sure to watch both sides, then do www.factcheck.org to check the accuracy of what is being said...or just make your own analysis.

3.)  Get the word out.  Talk to people, email people, start a blog, start a movement.

4.)  Contact your elected officials and tell them what you think (find out who they are by clicking here).  Volunteer for your candidates.

5.)  VOTE! VOTE! VOTE!

A friend of mine sent me this YouTube video that says it all.



There you have it.  Let's work together to make this a gentler, kinder country and take back your freedoms and liberties from corporate interests.  The time is NOW!

Who Is Your God? An interactive question with telling answers

"...one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all".  How many of us have stood with our right hands over our hearts and recited the "Pledge of Allegiance?"  What does it really mean to us, if anything at all?

Are we one nation under God?  Whose God?  A God for some and not for others?

Here are some questions you need to ask yourself, and if you are honest, you will find out who your God is and upon whose guidance you follow:

• Is your God one of discrimination, hate, and/or greed?

• Is your God a "me-first" God? 

• Would your God aspire to take away the basic life-sustaining underpinnings so that those who have the most can have more, such as trying to cut programs from Medicare designed to help seniors pay for health care they could not otherwise afford, or slashing programs providing food and medical care for children?

• Would your God help the wealthiest people get wealthier through tax cuts, or subsidizing already profitable oil companies at the rate of $3.1 billion per year while taking away funding for programs designed to help create jobs, making sure all people had access to health care, and providing basic food and necessities for the poor and struggling?

• Would your God let people die for the sake of balancing a budget; such as the state of Arizona who cut off life-saving organ transplants from people who needed them but ended up dying when denied these services so they could save money? 

• Would your God put hardships on people trying to support their families, such as hard working low-income parents who rely on Headstart to not only prepare their children for entering school but also provide help with day-care, whose expense could otherwise drive them into a welfare system because they could not afford to pay?

• Would your God rule out of fear and blackmail so that he and his minions could reap huge profits such as the likes of health insurance companies who continually drive up their prices while perpetually offering less, yet threatening that without them you will either go bankrupt or die, or both, depending on whether you take treatment or not?

So ask yourself:  In what "one nation under God” are you residing, and in whose image and likeness were you made after?  Are you staying true to the image of your God?

Are we indivisible? 

Does the law making body of our country work for the good of all?  What about that party of "NO"?  Did they work for the good of the people?  Did they work at all?  Whose interests did they have in mind?  Did they care that millions of people were out of work?  Did they propose anything that would help people find jobs?  Did extending tax cuts for the wealthy justify cutting programs for job creation and cutting basic programs for the poorest, most downtrodden people in our nation?  Did the party of "NO" care that people were being denied health care because of pre-existing conditions?  Does the Tea Party realize they are making “cutting spending” a bigger priority than the health and welfare of the citizens of this nation?

And what about "with liberty and Justice for all"?

Does the Citizens United ruling by the Supreme Court actually take away (or mute) the free speech of the individuals who can't contribute the same megalithic amount of campaign advertising funds as Corporations, who have now been given permission to hijack the whole election process?  Have Union workers had their right to free speech taken away by the immoral actions of Republican Governors to de-fund, thus diminish the size of unions and union jobs?  Do you really want a government in the business of "demoting and diminishing" employees for the benefit of the Koch Brothers and other large corporate interests who would rather have oppressive business practices along with low wages?  Does liberty and justice mean that in order for you to have freedom it means less government, even if it devastates others?  Who gets the liberty and justice?  Doesn't that also come with responsibility for the "for all" part of that pledge?

Does that mean that those of you on Medicare would be willing to give up that “socialistic” program or would you be willing to have it extended to everyone?  Should all others either be victims of the insurance blackmail scam or die of their own diseases and despair borne of abject poverty?  Would you be willing to pitch in an extra 1% of your income to help your country out of this economic quagmire whether you are suffering from the effects of it or not (by the way, you are or will be suffering from it shortly because of skyrocketing prices).  Did your God teach you to only watch out for yourself?  What if Jesus had done that? 

So let me ask you again....Who is Your God?  Only you can answer that question, and you have to be able to live with your answer.

Amen.

Internet Stickers

If you would like either of these stickers for your email or website, just copy and paste.  You have my permission.

Naught for Aught and No Change at All! GOP’s campaign on “Spending” provides useful arena for Republican Politicians’ agenda.

So it's budget time across the country.  What we hear consistently, and many have bought into, is that our biggest budget issue is one of spending.  Anyone who follows politics and watches TV, regardless network, hears of budget shortfalls and of our nation's grandchildren inheriting the tremendous amount of debt this administration has amassed.

Boy, have we been sold a bill of goods!  If it is said often enough, people start to hear it, say it more and people start to believe it, and if you keep saying it, people own it, even the liberal left wing media!  Shame on you!  But then, they are corporate owned.

First of all, prior to this current budget season, have you really thought much about the budget process, both at state and national levels?  How many of you worried about your grandchildren inheriting the national debt?  Let's get real here.  Most people don't think about the budget at all unless there are programs lost that are near and dear to each individual, but the GOP have finally found a mantra they can make appear real.  After all, with the dollar amounts involved here and how long, if ever, it is going to take to pay back, they can make their case can't they?

Where did all the money go?  "Poof?"

Let's back up a bit.  The cost of the Iraq war was 3 trillion dollars, which was not included in the Bush budget. The war in Afghanistan was initiated, and dramatic tax cuts (TWICE) that mostly benefited the wealthy.  The cost of these tax cuts was $1.8 trillion, and they weren't paid for.  OK, that brings us up to a $4.8 trillion in leftovers just from tax cuts.  I think Clinton's absconding with all the “Ws” on the Whitehouse's typewriters/keyboards left merely a tiny pock in the $127 billion surplus inherited by the G.W. Bush administration.  

In a special series "Economic Recovery Watch” by the CBPP (The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, one of the nation’s premier policy organizations working at the federal and state levels on fiscal policy) CBPP states, "The events and policies that have pushed deficits to these high levels in the near term, however, were largely outside the new Administration’s control. If not for the tax cuts enacted during the presidency of George W. Bush that Congress did not pay for, the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that were initiated during that period, and the effects of the worst economic slump since the Great Depression (including the cost of steps necessary to combat it), we would not be facing these huge deficits in the near term."  The following chart illustrates this:

 Add to all that the $700 billion financial bailout money handed to banks with ribbons and bows by Hank Paulson, Treasury Secretary under Bush, with no conditions or oversight as to how the money was to be used.  The banks used it to pad their bottom line, not to help the economy by making new loans or helping the people who were victims of their sleazy lending practices.

Are we starting to see a trend here?  Hmmmm....tax cuts for the wealthy, non-conditional free money for the banks...."Poof."

What about the 2010 elections?

Were the 2010 elections really a referendum on spending?  Really? To listen to the right-wing politicians right after the election, it was a referendum about Obamacare and Obama policies.  However since the economy is improving, unemployment is down, jobs are up, and some of the new health care initiatives are coming to fruition, the GOP had to find something else they could hang their hat on.  The sad fact is that the “spending” rhetoric of Republican Politicians is an old and worn out one.  They drag it out whenever they can’t come up with something better.

Obama is not without blame, though.  The referendum was really about his failure to use the power of his 53 percent mandate for change from voters.  Obama made the mistake of thinking the GOP in Congress would be reasonable, make meaningful contributions, and try to work in a bipartisan manner.  I can’t help but think that he, as a political strategist, wasn’t also using his attempts at offering bipartisanship to be used to help frame the campaign for the next election: He tried but the Republican leadership was the obstructionist party of “NO” (which they were).  

Angry far left progressives didn’t turn out to vote and fickle Independent voters swung the election to the right as a knee-jerk reaction.  Republican voters would have voted the way they did anyhow.  It was not a Republican victory, it was a voter protest.  Now they have to pay the price.

Bottom line, the referendum was on Obama’s and Congress’ inaction on pushing through the policies the voters gave them the power to enact, not spending.  Now they have lost some of that power.  It will be a harder battle.

GOP Budget Cuts

The following is a list of the deepest GOP budget cuts of discretionary spending (those with cuts of over $200 million) included in the Continuing Resolutions bill.  I have divided it into categories for you.  LI means it also includes low-income services.

Environmental

Clean Water State Revolving Fund   -$700M  (Program of Environmental Protection Agency - EPA)
Land and Water Conservation Fund   -$348M  (program of EPA)
Drinking Water State Revolving Fund   -$250M  (program of EPA)
Agriculture Research   -$246M  (division of USDA:  among other research programs to ensure agricultural viability, it also provides information to enhance the natural resource base and the environment)
LI -Farm Service Agency   -$201M  (division of USDA: provides conservation programs, farm loan programs for low-income farmers, programs for production of bio-fuels)
Agriculture Research   -$246M  (division of USDA:  among other research programs to ensure agricultural viability, it also provides information to enhance the natural resource base and the environment)
FAA Next Gen   -$234M (increases air travel safety while reducing aviation’s environmental impact)
Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy   -$899M  (speaks for itself)


Law Enforcement

LI -COPS   -$600M  (Community Oriented Policing Services: largely used for American Indian and Alaska Native Communities and/or small or rural communities law enforcement, judiciary assistance, and violence against women)
State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance   -$256M
Treasury Forfeiture Fund   -$338M  (Fund is used for asset forfeiture to disrupt and dismantle criminal enterprises.  Also enhances enforcement against terrorist funding and illegal immigration)

Low-income Assistance 

LI -HUD Community Development Fund   -$530M (housing and economic opportunities for low to middle income people)
LI -Community Services Block Grant   -$405M  (Department of Health and Human Services:  provides States, and Federal and State-recognized Indian Tribes and tribal organizations, or other organizations funds to alleviate the causes and conditions of poverty in communities.)
LI -LIHEAP Contingency fund   -$400M  (Department of Health and Human Services: Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program helps low-income households pay their home heating and cooling bills)
LI -WIC   -$758M  (Division of USDA.  Provides funding to states for food, health care referrals, and nutrition education for pregnant women and women with children up to the age of 5 who are at nutritional risk.)  
LI -International Food Aid grants   -$544M  (Donates agricultural commodities to assist people in poor countries)
LI -CDC   -$755M  (Center for Disease Control: essential public health services)

Other Government Cuts

NASA   -$379M
Internal Revenue Service   -$593M
Department of Treasury   -$268M 
FDA   -$220M  (Food and Drug Administration)


In Conclusion:

These spending cuts proposed by the Republican leaders are not about cutting spending, they are about cutting vital programs for the poor, various non-white ethnic groups, women, children, and independent farmers.  

Here is the test of where allegiances lie:  Does the extension of the Bush tax cuts promote the well-being of those who are in need?  Does it support sustainable environmental practices?  Has it created jobs?  Has it helped the economy?  Does it do anything to make our country better at all?

Let’s see, if there are no opportunities for the poor, then the rich can get richer and no one will have the power to compete with them.  Sustainable environmental practices are expensive and will cut into their profits.  The Bush tax cuts enacted in 2003, the same ones we have now, had negligible growth impact.  After the Wall Street debacle, jobs were lost.  What makes anyone think that at the same corporate tax rate now, jobs are all of a sudden going to burst forth from mega corporations?   Corporations use this money to line their stockholder’s pockets and pay outrageous bonuses, while laying off employees in droves.  Further, the tax cuts for the wealthy are no longer tax cuts, they are the status quo.  Nothing is going to change any time soon as a result, however, if Congress repeals the tax cuts for the wealthy, there wouldn’t be such far reaching budget deficit issues.  Problem solved.

So, in a nutshell, if the Bush tax cuts resulted in something to make this a better place for the citizens of this country, to help the helpless, to make our communities safer, to heal the environment, to help resolve racism, to treat the sick, I would be all for it.  But guess what?  “Poof….”


Find your elected officials
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/dbq/officials

Federal Health Care: Suggestions to make it better.

There was a time in my life where I was so broke that $5.00 was a windfall.  After paying for the most basic survival expenses, I had no money left over, so the issue of purchasing health insurance was definitely out of my reach, and I was making too much money to receive MediCal (the California version of MediCaid).  There were other times when, through my employment, I did have health care.  I have to admit, there was an element of less stress knowing that I was covered.

Although I basically am an Obama fan there are some things on which I disagree with him.  One of them is his version of health care that still panders to insurance companies.  Personally, I would prefer universal health care but it is not likely to happen any time soon.  Having been in real estate, I know that most commercial loans are provided by insurance companies so the impact of reducing or eliminating health care insurance companies from the equation would be more far reaching than most of us are aware of, not that I would be displeased if this happened...but I digress.

I like the parts of the recent Health Care bill where patients have rights, no pre-existing conditions, no being dropped from plans, no one can be denied, and all the other basic changes on behalf of the citizens of the country.  Where I think there is a disconnect is mandating that all people must be insured.

The health care laws are made by people who make a pretty good living and for whom $500 to $1,000 per month is a reasonable price tag for insurance.  What about the people who are hardworking but have no or very little money left over?  This amount is a complete hardship.  I do understand why the mandates make sense in that to make things more competitive (and supposedly reduce prices) all people have to be in the game.  We have not had any guarantees thus far that prices will come down, in fact the insurance companies are doing everything they can to circumvent what they consider to be new lower-profit regulations, such as dropping new policies for children.  They have also been pre-emptively raising prices based on what?? 

There are some real flaws in the new health care law, however, I will ultimately back it up if I have to.  In my book, it has opened the doors to revising how health care is done in this country, which no President has ever accomplished before.  As far as I am concerned, repealing it is not an option, but we can all work to think of ways to make it better.  I believe if you want to complain, help be a part of the solution.

So how can the national health care plan be resolved to be more beneficial than detrimental?  I hope we can get a lot of discussion and suggestions because WE are the people who are affected, so WE know what we need.  The politicians use horrible health care related stories to highlight the need for health care reform, and while these people have been through hell, we really need to start focusing on what the average population needs and what is fair.

Solutions

To me, a much easier way of delivering health care insurance at the federal level would be to make insurance companies sell inexpensive catastrophic (high deductible) policies with the actual deductible to be on a sliding scale according to income and/or family size.  The more income a person has, the amount of the deductible becomes greater.  If people wanted more comprehensive coverage, they could buy it.  Quite simple, actually.  With the routine health care being provided already in the current bill, generally the out of pocket for patients would be if there was a catastrophic situation.

There are some states, localities, and health care facilities who actually charge patients the actual cost of their treatments if they are self-pay (see COST VS. PRICE: Health care providers make profits off the backs of the uninsured!).  In my experience I have been grateful to have had these resources.  I discovered I really didn't need insurance for my everyday needs.  Using the convenient care and hospital outpatient facilities were far less expensive than using a private doctor and/or paying expensive insurance premiums.

I think if states were to have a program where medical providers were mandated to provide health care for uninsured patients at or near their actual costs (building in a little for profit is ok), they should be able to opt out from the Federal Health Care Mandate.  If the states don't, the mandate is in place with the mandated catastrophic affordable policies or private policies provided by employers and those that want to purchase them.  This should take care of it in my opinion.

What are your suggestions?  Do you have any ideas as to how to make the Federal Health Care Bill better?  If your solution is to repeal the Federal Health Care Bill, please also explain how this will make things better, not just for you, but for the citizens of this nation.  More ideas are better than just a few from the lawmakers with their special interests.  If I get enough ideas, I will send them along to Washington.

COST VS. PRICE: Health care providers make profits off the backs of the uninsured!

My husband and I got married in 1999.  His profession is as a programmer/analyst for health care billing software for hospitals.  When a patient is admitted to the hospital, this program keeps track of all the information about them from the day they were admitted to the day they leave, then it generates a bill to the appropriate insurance companies for reimbursement.  He knows the ins and outs of health care medical billing.

There came a point where I was no longer insured and some friends of mine told me where I could get a reduction in the bill for any labs I had done, so this is where I went to get a blood test.  I told them I was self-pay and later I got a bill for $525.00.  I called the  lab and asked them if this was the self-pay price, how much does the actual procedure cost?   They realized they had mistakenly sent me the "insured payer" invoice.  They corrected it,  re-billed me, and I only paid $37.00.

I asked my husband why there was such a discrepancy between the cost to the insurance company and the cost to self-payers.  He explained to me that the health care providers make agreements with insurance companies to accept only a percentage of the total bill as reimbursement.  In order to recover their costs, they pump up the bill.  I was billed the actual cost as a self-payer.  I was glad I didn't have to pay the $525.00 but something just didn't sit right with me about the whole situation.

When President Obama started running for President and started campaigning about the continually rising cost of health care I started putting two and two together.  Why was the  cost of health care going up?  Sure there were new advances in technology and some doctors and hospitals periodically got new equipment, but basically, health care practices were business as usual.

Cost vs Price

I finally figured out that the cost of health care has nothing to do with price other than  for computing what to bill the insurance companies.  The cost of my blood test was $37.00.   The price was $525.00. In order for health care providers to get reimbursed for the cost,  they must inflate the bill until the percentage they get reimbursed matches the cost.  This  practice then sets the PRICE for that procedure (or whatever it was billed for).

So what?  My insurance will cover it.

This seems to be the way the insured see their coverage, and it is a valid perception, but here is the reality.  Have you seen your premiums go up and were told it was because the costs of health care have gone up?  WRONG.  The price of health care has gone up.  Who raised the price?...the health care providers in tandem with insurance companies. As these practices continue, you will see your insurance premiums go up.

The Uninsured

In my own past experience, I have found that private practitioners as well as many hospitals do not give self-paying individuals any discount.  The health care professionals will tell you they have to do this in order to get enough money to cover losses from non-paying patients.  In my very unofficial research about non-paying patients, I have averaged the information I have found represent about 7% of all patients, which roughly translates to about 7% loss in profits.  I am sure there are regional differences for more or less.

They bill the uninsured the same as they bill the insurance company, so the uninsured are paying the PRICE, not the COST of their health care (remember Price vs Cost?).  If my blood test had not been discounted and I had to pay $525.00, as would be the case in many places, that is a 97% mark-up to cover 7%  of profit lost for non-payers.  Talk about funny math!  And remember, they can write off these "losses" as well.

All this seems like legal fraud to me.                              

One final note: My husband and I moved to Missouri and I have found the cost of health care here for the uninsured is quite reasonable through the University Health Care System, but this does not occur in places where these kinds of facilities are not available.  This scenario concerning price vs cost does not happen everywhere, but it happens enough to drive health care prices up.  Think about it.

What is your opinion?  I would like to know.  And what are the solutions?