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Role Model
March 1, 2007 • Volume 7, Issue 9The spiraling costs of health care and dwindling employer-provided insurance coverage have fueled a renewed nationwide debate over how to reform America’s health care system. As the number of uninsured Americans continues to rise, it has become alarmingly clear that the nation’s current fragmented health care system is inefficient, wasteful and far too costly.
One model of reliable and affordable health care, though, emerges from the debate: Medicare.
Medicare has proven to be a successful private-public partnership that provides sound health care coverage for 43 million older adults and people with disabilities, a population that would otherwise not have access to affordable private insurance.
In a recent Economic Policy Institute report, political scientist Jacob S. Hacker outlines a health care reform proposal that would establish “Health Care for America,” a comprehensive, cost-effective health insurance plan that would compete with private employer-based coverage.
Modeled after the Medicare structure, the Health Care for America plan would essentially extend the opportunity to enroll in Medicare to the millions of Americans who do not have good employer-based insurance or any health insurance at all. It would also allow employers to choose Medicare for their employees if they saw it as a better deal.
This proposal would help unite people with Medicare and younger workers through what Hacker calls “a new social compact” that ensures every American has health security.
Bringing more Americans together into one insurance pool would amplify the already demonstrated efficiency, affordability and quality of Medicare coverage. It would cut out the high administrative expenses of the currently chaotic array of private insurance plans, saving the U.S. some $200 billion each year. It would secure lower prices for health care services through increased purchasing clout. And unlike the private health insurance industry, it would guarantee that all Americans actually have reliable coverage when they need it most: for unexpected and costly medical needs.
Giving all Americans the opportunity to obtain health coverage that works like Medicare would not only significantly improve health security in this country, but also save billions of dollars through reduced waste, lower-cost benefits and better health outcomes.
Our elected leaders can no longer stand by doing nothing while millions of Americans remain without affordable health care coverage. As presidential hopefuls start promoting their ideas for fixing the heath care crisis, the Hacker plan is a good model to use for comparison.
It is long past time to give all Americans the choice of getting coverage through Medicare, and in doing so, guarantee secure, quality health insurance.
Medical Record
“On August 29, 2006, the Census Bureau reported that the number of nonelderly uninsured Americans had increased in 2005 by another 1.3 million people—for a total of 46.1 million uninsured—continuing an upward trend that began in the year 2000…despite the improving economy, the percentage of the population with employer-sponsored insurance nonetheless continued to decline, and the number of the uninsured continued to increase” (“Why Did the Number of Uninsured Continue to Increase in 2005?” Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, October 2006).
“We endorse a fundamental change in U.S. health care—the creation of an NHI [national health insurance] program. Such a program, which in essence would be an expanded and improved version of traditional Medicare, would cover every American for all necessary medical care. An NHI program would save at least $200 billion annually (more than enough to cover all of the uninsured) by eliminating the high overhead and profits of the private, investor-owned insurance industry and reduce spending for marketing and other satellite services” (“Proposal of the Physicians’ Working Group for Single-Payer National Health Insurance,” Journal of the American Medical Association, August 13, 2003).
“Health Care for America represents a different bargain: Medicare beneficiaries and younger workers would be united through a new social compact that extends Medicare-like coverage across the generational divide to ensure health security, improve medical quality, and better control costs” (“Health Care for America,” Economic Policy Institute, January 11, 2007).
***** The Medicare Rights Center (MRC) needs to hear about all the problems with the Medicare Part D benefit, whether they happen to you or someone in your community. With this information, we will be armed with the needed evidence to push for a Medicare-administered drug benefit.
Fast Relief: Part D Monitoring Project
Submit your story at www.medicarerights.org/partdstories.html
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