Long warmed over by the GOP, health care is getting an adrenaline injection:
WASHINGTON, Jan. 18 — A broad coalition of business and consumer groups, doctors, hospitals and drug companies laid out a major proposal on Thursday to provide health coverage to more than half of the nation’s 47 million uninsured by expanding federal benefit programs and offering new tax credits to individuals and families.
“This is a proposal not for mandates but for incentives,” said Dr. Reed V. Tuckson, senior vice president of UnitedHealth Group, one of the nation’s largest insurers. “It’s a careful balance of public and private solutions.”
The proposal, unveiled Thursday after more than two years of work, was endorsed by 16 groups including AARP, the American Hospital Association, the American Medical Association, the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, Johnson & Johnson, Kaiser Permanente, Pfizer and the Chamber of Commerce of the United States. -NYT
I noticed this because I had just written about incentives below, mostly.
SENATOR CLINTON LAUNCHES CAMPAIGN WITH HEALTH CARE INITIATIVE
Mrs. Clinton’s proposed legislation would renew the Children’s Health Insurance Program, which provides money to states to cover Americans under age 18 whose families earn too much money to qualify for Medicaid. The 10-year-old program, which now covers four million children, is to expire this fall. Representative John D. Dingell, Democrat of Michigan, plans to introduce a similar bill.
Mrs. Clinton’s legislation would raise the income eligibility limit so that more children could enroll; in New York, a family of four earning $75,000 would qualify. And the bill would allow any family, as well as employers, to buy insurance.
“They’re trapped between the rising costs and the broken system, and we can help them get out of that trap,” Mrs. Clinton said.
Members of the senator’s staff said they were still working out the cost of the proposal. About 8.3 million Americans under 18 do not have health care, but about 70 percent of them are already eligible for Medicaid or for the program Mrs. Clinton seeks to expand - NYT
BUSH'S SOTU SUGGESTS END TO TAX SUBSIDY ON HIGH-END HEALTH BENEFITS
The basic concept is that employer-provided health insurance, now treated as a fringe benefit exempt from taxation, would no longer be entirely tax-free. Workers could be taxed if their coverage exceeded limits set by the government. But the government would also offer a new tax deduction for people buying health insurance on their own.
“I will propose a tax reform designed to help make basic private insurance more affordable,” Mr. Bush said in his weekly radio address on Saturday, “whether you get it through your job or on your own.” He did not offer specifics, but an administration official provided details of the plan.
...
White House officials say the health tax plan would neither increase spending nor reduce tax revenues. Supporters say it would expand coverage to some of the 47 million uninsured. But critics say it would, in effect, tax people with insurance to provide coverage to those without it.
That would amount to a tectonic shift in the way people get and pay for their health coverage, and historically it has been all but impossible to win Congressional approval for such changes. When President Ronald Reagan made a proposal similar to Mr. Bush’s in 1986, it died in Congress, with Mr. Rangel helping to lead the opposition. - NYT
more to come on these ideas and how to use the tax code efficiently ... but here is one, important starter:
FROM TENESSEE'S TROUBLED EXPERIMENT WITH 'UNIVERSAL' HEALTH CARE COVERAGE:
State legislators should understand that the major problems of health insurance markets stem not from inadequate government regulation, but rather from an outdated set of federal and state tax policies that grew out of social and economic conditions in the 1940s and 1950s. These policies provide unlimited tax relief for persons who get their health insurance through the workplace but deny equal treatment to those who wish to buy health insurance on their own.
Not only are these outdated tax policies inequitable and unfair, but they also profoundly distort the health insurance market. They limit Americans' health insurance options and thus frustrate consumer choice of plans and benefits. They also undermine the opportunity for millions of Americans to find alternative forms of health insurance coverage, such as coverage obtained through their associations, trade and professional groups, and religious and fraternal organizations. - Heritage
