ERD50
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
There are so many interlocking dependencies with this legislative "process" now. For example, even if the selected negotiators wanted to change the approved Senate bill to remove the Cornhusker Kickback, this or any other change would force the whole thing to go back to the Senate for another vote--where it's likely Senator Brown would be seated denying the Democrats the votes they need to invoke cloture.
Also, I assume that giving that kickback to all would mean running it by the CBO again and seeing the costs go up...
It's a very strange turn of events. And a year wasted. Sometimes the "quick and dirty" method ends up taking a lot longer and produces worse results than the slow, deliberate approach. Like my home improvement projects. . .
Yep, I'm in agreement with some of the earlier posts - scrap this bill and work to pass some small, more easily understood stuff that would help in stages. Many people are skeptical of big government, and this bill got big and complex, and as it grew and more was seen about it, the more skeptical people became. I just don't think it is recoverable (good) - clean slate time.
-Allow ins cos to compete across state lines.
-Break the link between employment and health ins (drop the tax benefits for employers).
-Employers that do offer group ins should be required to offer some high deductible policies. These would be more affordable for people, and should reduce HC costs overall.
-Like Texas Proud said - once you've been in *any* plan for X years, you should be able to retain it as long as you continue to pay. That shouldn't be so hard on ins cos - in fact, they would probably welcome it - more business for them.
-Reduce waste in Medicare/Medicaid.
Education on all of the above. Make sure people understand the risks of dropping their ins and don't make it too convenient to go without (tempting for low income, low asset people - they will get coverage w/o ins).
Those steps would lower costs for all, and reduce the number of people w/o insurance. After reviewing the success/failures and making some fixes where needed, we could then see what it takes to cover additional people that fall between the cracks.
-ERD50