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There's an unlimited number of ways the US could offer a public option. It all depends on the objectives.
75% of us are overweight/ obese. Therefore we are more vulnerable to Diabetes and serious complications, Heart Disease, High BP, Stroke, Joint deterioration and some cancers. It should come as no surprise that the US spends more on healthcare than other countries.
We know accumulated working life premiums paid into Medicare by employers, employees and the self- employed, plus premiums paid by the elderly do not cover the costs Medicare reimburses to healthcare providers even though Medicare, by law, pays cost which includes overhead. How could Medicare be expanded to one or more age brackets without incurring incremental losses?
1) You could make a public option available to only those who qualify. By this I mean those who have a waist size in a normal healthy range, women with waist sizes > 35" and men 40" have substantially higher risk for Diabetes, Heart Disease and ensuing complications.
In effect, you could skim the cream off the population and use it to reduce reimbursements to healthcare providers and charge lower premiums to the qualifying masses.
Those who choose not to take responsibility for themselves can continue to rely on private insurance and pay higher premiums or do without.
2) Nearly half of all births are now paid for by Medicaid. In some states the percentage is trending towards 80%. We are approaching the tipping point. Why not have Medicaid pick up the tab for all births and instead of hospital births delivered by MD, why not rely on midwives in birthing centers, unless medically warranted. Those who prefer an MD hospital birth can buy private insurance or pay out of pocket.
3) No reason why Medicare/ Medicaid should continue to pick up the tab for people who decline to take care of themselves. Why should the providers and government care more about a patient than the patient does?
4) Congress needs to authorize Medicare to regulate prescription drug prices as is done in the rest of the developed world. While we are at it, cease allowing Big Pharm direct marketing to end consumers.
5) Medicare is required by law to pay hospital costs, which includes their overhead. Nothing precludes hospitals from adding bells and whistles to the overhead and they do. Overhead could easily be capped.
Get rid of employer provided health insurance and have everyone get their own just like auto, life and homeowner. But make employers, all employers, pay part of the cost otherwise all it is is a pay cut for working people. Employer provided health is not a "benefit". It is part of your compensation. Payroll contributions for an employee share. Institute a VAT and other means to get those who don't work for wages. Nobody rides free.
The US initially paid for WW2 by creating many thousands of private sector loans to raise an enormous amount of money in a very short time. This could only happen in a timely manner via central controls and Fed guarantees. Available taxes were not sufficient, and took more time to lay and then collect. Same with War Bonds.
Borrowing is still borrowing, who pays the I.O.U.? Like I said, loans can be paid back many years into the future, but ultimately it will be paid by the people who pay taxes, it doesn't matter how long it takes.
With Obamacare having issues the talk of a public option is coming back up. Now as I understand it a public option would be a gov't run insurance system that would allow people to choose from it or private health insurance. This is supposed to bring more competition to health insurance. But my question is who is paying for this public option? Since it will be public the money for funding is coming from tax payers right? But if a tax payer has a private plan then aren't they going to be paying twice for healthcare? One payment for their private plan and another payment to fund the public option through their taxes. Should people be paying twice for healthcare like that? Also wouldn't the tax payers with the private plans be funding their private plan's competition(the government's public option)?
Or will things be different from how I'm describing it?
The "public option" would be funded by the people buying it, just like people fund their own private insurance policies now. It would basically be a system where people could purchase a medicare policy.
Borrowing is still borrowing, who pays the I.O.U.? Like I said, loans can be paid back many years into the future, but ultimately it will be paid by the people who pay taxes, it doesn't matter how long it takes.
The difference with sovereign debt is that it will never be paid off. It can be paid down, but in 10 and 25 and 100 years, we will have progressively more debt out there. i.e. more money.
We, the taxpayers. The same people that pay taxes now. Like most things, the burden would fall on the middle and upper income class, while much of the "47%" would get a nearly free ride yet again.
Careful there. That 47% included the disabled and elderly living primarily off of SSDI, Medicare and Medicaid.
The "public option" would be funded by the people buying it, just like people fund their own private insurance policies now. It would basically be a system where people could purchase a medicare policy.
That would be great, but more likely like Medicaid. Lower end, more restrictive, less services and meds covered.
Another possibility might be like a utility. Where the users have more say in costs.
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