Health care costs – Will they go up or down?
One of the biggest campaign promises President Obama is making right now (yes, this is a campaign) is that health care costs will go down if the Democratic plan is implemented. Time after time, we have heard him say that very thing as he travels across the country, touting this plan as the go to plan for health care reform. So, are we to believe him and fall into line with the Democrats, in hopes that our health care costs will go down? Well, as it turns out, not so much. Consider this information from The Associated Press, via FOX News.
Premiums are likely to keep going up even if the health care bill passes, experts say. If cost controls work as advertised, annual increases would level off with time. But don’t look for a rollback. Instead, the main reason premiums would be more affordable is that new government tax credits would help cover the cost for millions of people. Listening to Obama pitch his plan, you might not realize that’s how it works.
It’s amazing what one can learn from reading the fine print and I have to wonder if that is what the Democrats are hoping for; that we will believe what they are telling us, without reading what is actually in the legislation. While I am not fond of the main stream media, I have to give credit where credit is due. The Associated Press didn’t have to publish this information, but they chose do so. Kudos to them for their efforts.
In reality, it’s going to be hard to determine how this legislation will affect the general population of America, especially considering that we don’t even know what it contains. In light of the fact that the politicians are still negotiating that among themselves, and that it has already morphed and changed it’s details several times, it may be a few days before the bill is in it’s final form. That is, if the Democrats manage to scrounge up the necessary yes votes or they “deem” it passed, without actually voting on it.
When I was in high school, there was one particular subject I had trouble
with. I do math and numbers in my own fashion and can usually come up with the right answer to a problem. When they started throwing algebra at me, I was lost. Still am lost, as a matter of fact. I have said a lot of times that if I had to pass algebra to graduate, I would still be be in high school. It was always confusing to me and to this day, X + Y simply does not compute in my brain. Give me 2 + 2 or 7 x 8 and I can work it from there.
I think that analogy applies to the debate over health care reform and the up or down movement of the related costs. All we have been hearing is what the politicians are wanting us to hear. President Obama and the Democrats have been telling us premiums will be going down and they provide a complicated formula or set of numbers to prove it. What we need to do is go back to the basic numbers and how the legislation in question will affect them. When you do that, the answers do not come out so favorable for most Americans.
I obviously can not quote the entire article in this post. I urge you to read it at FOX News or find the article on another site that carries news from The Associated Press. When you start crunching the basic numbers, you start finding a lot caveats that give us fair warning that all is not as it seems with this legislation. Let’s look at the small portion I have quoted above.
The real reason some people may see their premiums go down is because of the tax credits coming from the federal government. Stop and think for a moment. How are those tax credits going to be paid for? President Obama says he is not going to raise taxes and he doesn’t want to add more to the deficit. Someone needs to inform him that he can not have it both ways. Someone is going to have to pay the piper on this legislation and I can only think of two ways he is going to do that. Either he is going to raise someone’s taxes or he is going to add to the deficit. If he adds to the deficit, who do you think is going to paying that bill?
When all of the fluff is removed, it appears to me that the Democrats are playing fast and loose with the numbers on health care reform. They are telling us to add 2 + 2 but the answer isn’t 4. The American people need to take a hard look at what is going on and realize that something isn’t quite adding up. Better now than after the legislation is enacted and the results start coming in.
I am not going to sit here and pretend that I am some kind of wiz at math because I am not, but I heard the president claim that this plan would lower premiums by 3000%, which meant that the companies could give raises to their employees with the money saved. Is that even possible, was this a mistake? If premiums were lower by 100% wouldn’t that mean that there were no premiums?
Recently a report that I read about claimed that healthcare primiums would rise if this bill became law and Dick Durbin claimed that anyoone who said that healthcare costs would go doen isn’t telling the truth. He claimed that healthcare costs would rise as fast if this bill became law. so who is telling the truth? I don’t know.
As for your question on subsidies, even if the healthcare costs did come down we would be paying higher taxes to subsidize them, so what is the difference? We will be paying one way or the other, that is the bottom line.
Mr. Pink Eyes,
I have no doubt the 3000% statement was a mistake or slip of the tongue, due to the many number of speeches President Obama is giving on the subject. However, his math still does not add up.
I guess they are claiming he meant to say $3,000, that makes allot more sense, I didn’t think my math skills were that bad.
But I still am not sure I believe that number either, there is too much conflicting info to know for sure what is going to happen.
Like I said in the article, I feel like they are using a lot of smoke and mirror math and it’s hard to figure out exactly what is going to happen, if this bill is signed into law. The more complicated it is, the less likely it is that the average American citizen will have a clue what is happening.
“smoke and mirror math” is right. Yes, the direct premium to individuals may go down, but tax and fee increases and government subsidizing along with typical government ineptitude and inefficiency will make actual costs go up.
Look to the USPS as the shining example. People think the cost of a stamp is cheap. But add in the $billions of losses, and those stamps aren’t so cheap. But people don’t often notice this, so it continues. The same would happen with any government involvement in healthcare, except healthcare is a little higher priority than receiving junk mail.
LOUDelf´s last blog ..Great, Let’s Add Illegal Immigrants To Our List Of Bailouts
Not to sound cynical, but every time this man opens his mouth he lies to the public. I mean I know that most politicians will say anything to get elected, but this guy is the benchmark for sleazy politicians. We are witnessing firsthand the Chicago way in Washington. Such a shame.
I wouldn’t believe anything this man says. If he says it will save money, then you can bet the house it going to cost us big time.
John Carey´s last blog ..Political Ethics
When President Obama first took office, I determined that I was going to treat him fairly and honestly, which is much different than how President Bush was treated by the Democrats. I do my best to stay objective about the things Obama is doing and attempting to do, but every day, he makes it harder to do. There is much going on that leads me to believe the American people are in for a very long three years. If he wins reelection in 2012, then we can expect an even greater push for his agenda.
Costs will go up, all around, just as they have, if not worse. Since the New England Journal of Medicine is now stating that approximately 30% of Doctors will quit if ObamaCare passes (Almost 45% if there is a public option), there will be additional stresses to the system. I can’t blame the Doctors for getting out of a bad system, many of them are complaining now. But I think that the government would treat that development as another crisis to exploit, and would grab more power with such a “justification.”
Matt´s last blog ..Lessons for Washington DC from School House Rock
like many liberals, there is much to not like about this but the one thing i can say now is that corporate healthcare is on notice. They can be legislated away and they will come to see that.