Sens. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., and Chris Dodd, D-Conn., are putting forth a health care reform plan that looks to be the most workable and all-around satisfactory proposal so far, especially because it’s projected to cost just more than $600 billion over 10 years, not the $1 trillion projected for others.
Key features of the Kennedy-Dodd plan are public-option coverage to compete with private insurance and a yearly $750-per-employee fee for businesses not providing health care insurance.
In their letter to the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, the senators said their plan would result in 97 percent of Americans having coverage.
. . . Kennedy and Dodd said the Congressional Budget Office “has carefully reviewed our complete bill, and we are pleased to report that CBO has scored it at $611.4 billion over 10 years, with the new coverage provisions scored at $597 billion. …The completed bill virtually eliminates the dropping of currently covered employees from employer-sponsored health plans.
This new proposal is encouraging. It comes at a time when we were starting to fear health care reform was deteriorating toward a sorry-excuse compromise.
The $750 fee will no doubt raise hackles in the business community, where the 15-year trend has been to reduce or eliminate employee health benefits. We can already hear the anguished cries about how “this will make us uncompetitive!”
Therein lies the nonsense. First, that’s so because if all employers with more than 25 workers must pay the same fees, the domestic playing field is level. Second, it’s so because all our major trading partners provide universal health care, one way or another. So, their health care overhead is already built into their production costs, one way or another.
This solid proposal is the work of Kennedy, who has championed universal health care for decades; and Dodd, who is serving as chairman of the HELP committee in Kennedy’s place. Both are dedicated legislators with long experience. Both have been battle hardened during long stretches of GOP control.
In short, Kennedy and Dodd are highly skilled and have tremendous credibility with fellow Democrats. That will be essential to getting such a genuinely worthwhile plan through the legislative obstacle course that lies ahead.
You can help them by writing your senators in support of the Kennedy-Dodd health care proposal.
Note: The HELP committee is reportedly also building in a $1,000 mandatory fee for those who refuse to buy health insurance. We’ll comment on that in a subsequent post.
Dodd takes a lot of heat from both the “other side” and the liberals, but I’ve seen him speak in person. He is no slouch, he’s not stupid, and he’s not a total asshole. This plan is as good a start as any.
Bee, I got a kick out your accolades. Somewhere between “could slither under a door with no trouble” and “not all that bad, if you’re kind of hard up.” I have a higher opinion of Dodd. For a senator from a state well-stocked with insurance companies and other corporate interests, he’s showing some political bravery. I saw him stand up for some hopeless causes when Republicans controlled everything. He advocated and debated like a trouper when some other Dems seemed to be going through the motions. BTW, Kennedy gave it his best in the same way.
http://www.standtallforamerica.com/ has some good stuff too. I kind of like Wyden and Bennett’s approach, because the way they present it, they suggest it could actually make money in the long run.
I’m just glad there are some people proposing some good ideas on this issue, and I sure hope the left doesn’t drag it’s feet any longer. The rightwingers are obviously not going to go along with much of anything that is suggested. They will do whatever they can to sabotage a universal health care plan, so I think it’s time for the Dems to make a move and go ahead with things.
This sounds like a good plan — more economical, and it still includes the public option. Now all the Democrats have to do is get the bill passed.
Snave, it’s clear that whatever passes will do so in spite of Republicans. For their idea of what to do and how to do it, look back at the prescription drug bill of 2003 — written by pharmaceutical industry lobbyists and rammed through by the GOP majority in Congress. They can’t repeat that with health care reform, so their game is to be the Party of No.
Tom, you put your finger on the hard part. I just read the health care industry has spent more than $1.5 billion on lobbying since 1998, most of it going to Democrats since 2006.