"Not Government Run"
Hillary makes a big deal out of how her new plan is not government run.
Frankly, I would prefer it if it were.
If it were government run, at least the costs could be kept down. Clinton's proposal will cause health care costs to continue to increase, because it will pump more money into the system without significantly increasing competitive forces that are what truly keep costs down. She says it increases competition, but it doesn't: there's no significant incentive here to lower prices because you get a tax credit on what you spend anyway, so you have no personal reason to keep your own costs down.
Oh sure, they say they will target the credit to try to keep people price conscious. But what will really happen is that insurers will all just price their care to take as much of the credit as possible.
And as to choice, as already pointed out: you are FORCED to participate. That's the antithesis of choice: you can "choose" to pay or "choose" to go to jail. Calling it the "American Health Choices Plan" is textbook Orwellian Newspeak. It is utterly amazing to me that Democrats are framing it as your patriotic duty to buy health care you don't want or need.
The main role of government in health care should be to increase choice and competition. This decreases both.
I also love this little nugget from her proposal:
"Tax breaks more than offset the increase in revenues" means that the decreased revenue covers the increased revenues, that is, that the increased revenues don't cover the tax breaks. That we will lose money on the deal, even after "soaking the rich."
I don't think that's what she meant (since the next phrase was "making the plan a net tax cut for American taxpayers"), but that's what she is saying in her official proposal.
[Also, she's not factoring in the loss in tax revenue due to lost business that will result from the tax increase. But that's another discussion.]
Frankly, I would prefer it if it were.
If it were government run, at least the costs could be kept down. Clinton's proposal will cause health care costs to continue to increase, because it will pump more money into the system without significantly increasing competitive forces that are what truly keep costs down. She says it increases competition, but it doesn't: there's no significant incentive here to lower prices because you get a tax credit on what you spend anyway, so you have no personal reason to keep your own costs down.
Oh sure, they say they will target the credit to try to keep people price conscious. But what will really happen is that insurers will all just price their care to take as much of the credit as possible.
And as to choice, as already pointed out: you are FORCED to participate. That's the antithesis of choice: you can "choose" to pay or "choose" to go to jail. Calling it the "American Health Choices Plan" is textbook Orwellian Newspeak. It is utterly amazing to me that Democrats are framing it as your patriotic duty to buy health care you don't want or need.
The main role of government in health care should be to increase choice and competition. This decreases both.
I also love this little nugget from her proposal:
... the plan would offer tens of millions of Americans a new tax credit to make premiums affordable. Those tax breaks more than offset the increase in revenues derived from not renewing these provisions of the Bush tax cuts and capping the tax exclusion for health care for the highest income Americans ...
"Tax breaks more than offset the increase in revenues" means that the decreased revenue covers the increased revenues, that is, that the increased revenues don't cover the tax breaks. That we will lose money on the deal, even after "soaking the rich."
I don't think that's what she meant (since the next phrase was "making the plan a net tax cut for American taxpayers"), but that's what she is saying in her official proposal.
[Also, she's not factoring in the loss in tax revenue due to lost business that will result from the tax increase. But that's another discussion.]
"It is the common fate of the indolent to see their rights become a prey to the active. The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt."
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