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Under-reported: Small Businesses Would Benefit from Health Insurance Reform

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This diary is cross-posted at Blue Commonwealth

In the 1960s my father-in-law provided health insurance for employees of his small business.  Little did we know how ahead of his time he was.  A survey by the Small Business Majority found that even today only 46% of small business owners provide health insurance, but 76% of them struggle meeting their premiums.  The 54% who do not provide coverage say they cannot afford it.  Let me pause here: The majority of small business owners do not provide health insurance for their employees. It is their employees who most likely are caught in private individual plans which get slammed over and over and which get canceled at the drop of a hat.  Some companies drive up the cost of policies solely to induce “high risk” patients to drop their policies.  It is clear that both individuals and small businesses need both relief and reform.

Meanwhile, the upward trajectory of health care costs for small businesses continues.  In 2009 costs are around 3.42 billion.  MIT economist Jonathan Gruber estimates they will go up to around 7.43 billion in 2018.  One of the most vocal opponents of health insurance reform is the national Chamber of Commerce, which runs particularly troublesome and questionable ads.  They do not get it.  Not only would health insurance reform reduce personnel costs, a real public option would could ultimately produce far greater savings.  With Medicare overhead costing only 4%, private insurance pales in efficiency of delivery.  Further efficiencies in delivery of Medicare services, such as elimination of over-payments to the so-called (fake) Medicare “Advantage” plans and greater effort at fraud reduction will drive home even more savings.  (Proponents of reform failed utterly to explain these over-payments and their ruinous effect on the future of Medicare.  It is the absence of reform which hurts Medicare.)

While most of the conversations about health care have focused on how it will affect individuals, little has been offered regarding the benefits of reform for small business, the primary engine for job growth in a market where larger companies often offshore and downsize.

Here are just a few examples to add to the reform aspects mentioned above:

• Exempts small businesses (<50 employees) from sharing insurance premium costs with employees.  That means 96% of small businesses would not have to pay part of the premium.  

• Reduces costs and increases negotiating leverage by creating exchanges which encourage competition among insurers to the benefit of small business and the self employed.

• Provides individual tax credits on a sliding scale for about 25 uninsured million Americans.

• Implements many cost-containment provisions.

–electronic records,

–paperword simplification,

–changind the way doctors and hospitals are paid (better results not number of procedures and tests),

–new alternative system of statewide not-for-profit coops.

• Beginning in 20010 gives small business tax credits for those small businesses offering insurance.  This should help 3.6 million companies better afford health insurance for their employees.

• Provide new regulatory authority to prevent large, unjustified increases in premiums, as happened recently in both CA and MN.

• Ends discriminatory practices particularly injurious to small businesses and the self employed, such as raising rates based on health status, age, or pre-existing conditions.  

• Reduces the federal deficit by $130 billion over the next 10 years.

Given that there is no employer mandate in the health care bill, I am baffled at the behavior of some supposedly pro-business entities opposing reform.   Their behavior seems more political/partisan than rational.  Although there are shortcomings in this bill (particularly that it doesn’t go far enough in reforming the system or provide a truly public option), hurting small businesses isn’t one of them.  

Coffee Party Poll: 73% Support Health Care Reform With Public Option

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The Coffee Party USA – now with 170,000 Facebook fans, by the way – is out with results from its first straw poll, this one on health care reform.  The results are striking: 73% support health care reform but would strongly prefer that it include a public option, while another 17% support the current health care reform  bill (without a public option). Only 8% of Coffee Party poll respondents outright oppose the current health care reform bill. In sum, we’re starting to see the ideological outlines of “Coffee Party” membership, and at least after the poll on health care reform, it’s looking highly progressive.  

P.S. Needless to say, I presume that a similar poll of “Tea Party” members would come up with wildly different results.

Norfolk City Democratic Committee Vice Chair Slams Nye on Health Care “No” Vote

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To put it mildly, Alexander Palmer — Vice Chair of the Norfolk City Democratic Committee and Vice President of the Norfolk Area Young Democrats — is not pleased with Glenn Nye these days. From Palmer’s Facebook page (with his permission):

Glenn Nye’s campaign rep came to the NCDC last night to basically tell us Nye was voting against health care bill……..you should have heard the grumbles from the committee, he’s alienating his base, hope these moderates he’s mysteriously courting come out and canvass for him, because the activist base is staying home.

…maybe Nye could stop worrying more about his re-election and worry more about the people who elected him to serve them. I’m uninsured, health care is currently out of my reach. In my opinion, he’s part of the problem we have in Washington, he took $125,000 from the health insurance industry, the Chamber of Commerce makes commercials on his behalf, honestly when it counts the most, he votes the same way Riegel or Drake would vote, its disappointing.

Then his campaign rep is going to turn around and ask people to collect petitions for Nye, practically everybody said that if Nye voted their way on health care they would collect some for him, if not, they could forget it. This is only the start of what his campaign can expects from us good Democrats come election time.

Palmer then receives a message from Jonas Courey of the Nye campaign, asking, “Should I thank you in advance for helping elect Scott (Cuccinelli) Rigell? :):)” Palmer replies:

hey, I’m just being honest with you Jonas, I’m in politics for the issues, not the people, if Nye is more interested in re-election than he is principle, than I’d rather have somebody else. I’m tired of career politicians putting their re-election ahead of personal conviction, its the problem with Washington. At least with Rigell we know what we’re getting, its unfortunate about Nye, I thought finally we’d get an ally from the 2nd….that wasn’t that case.

Yeah, it’s getting rough down in the 2nd CD for freshman Rep. Nye. But the thing is, all Glenn Nye has to do in order to turn that situation around is to vote YES on health care reform legislation. If he does, as I’ve said previously, I will do what I can for his reelection. If he doesn’t, well then, let’s just say I’ve got a lot better things to do with my time (dust the house, wash the car, take a nap, etc.).

UPDATE: Palmer adds, “I hope Nye has the courage to do what is right and vote in favor of this legislation, it would mean a lot to me, and thousands of uninsured in the 2nd. Do what’s right Glenn, vote for us!” I agree 100%.

UPDATE #2: This sparked a great deal of discussion both on Facebook and here.  Later in the discussion, Randy Klear wrote:

He said no such thing, Alex. He said that he couldn’t say how Nye was voting at this moment. In November Nye said he voted against the House bill because of insufficient cost controls. Personally I suspect the CBO report today, plus the fact that he’d be committing political suicide with another no vote, will be enough to push him into the yes column.

[…]

He’s a newly hired field director, and he’s not likely to be in the loop when Nye’s own chief of staff and campaign manager probably haven’t been told yet. You are willfully misinterpreting his remarks.

And Diane Kaufman wrote:

I agree with Randy. I invited Jonas to introduce himself to the committee and speak for about 1 minute and then next he was vilified. I understand that everyone is passionate on this issue, and I am glad that they are vocal, but he is NOT in the loop of how the Congressman may or may not be voting. And, Jonas did NOT come to the committee to tell us how Nye would be voting in the health care bill. What I want to know is what’s new? We are all waiting for the vote on the health care bill. That will be news. Letting our congressman know how we feel is not news. We have been doing that for months. On the other hand, Cooch and his decisions are harmful AND news.

And the discussion proceeded from there. Check it all out here, as obviously there are several sides to this story. However, in the end, what I care about – the ONLY thing I care about – is that Glenn Nye votes the right way on health care, and also on other issues important to me like clean energy/climate change and many others. With regard to health care, I guess we’ll find out in less than 72 hours, and then we’ll go from there.

Rachel Maddow: McDonnell, Cooch Turning Virginia Into “Jesse Helms-istan”

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Rachel Maddow calls out Bob McDonell and Ken Kookinelli for their homophobic bigotry, “birtherism” (in Cooch’s case) and overall insanity. According to Maddow, McDonnell and Cooch are turning Virginia into “Jesse Helms-istan.”  Maddow also slams the national media for reporting McDonnell’s and Cooch’s bizarre explanations and behaviors without any critical analysis or journalistic skepticism.  The more this continues, I’d argue we’re looking as much like “Idiocracy” as “Jesse Helms-istan.” But then again, I guess those are really flip sides of the same coin anyway.  

CBO: Healthcare Reform Bill Cuts Deficit $130 Billion Over First 10 Years

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The crucial Congressional Budget Office “score” of President Obama’s healthcare reform bill is out, and it looks like good news.

1. CUTS THE DEFICIT Cuts the deficit by $130 billion in the first ten years (2010 – 2019). Cuts the deficit by $1.2 trillion in the second ten years. 2. REINS IN WASTEFUL MEDICARE COSTS AND EXTENDS THE SOLVENCY OF MEDICARE; CLOSES THE PRESCRIPTION DRUG DONUT HOLE Reduces annual growth in Medicare expenditures by 1.4 percentage points per year-while improving benefits and lowering costs for seniors. Extends Medicare’s solvency by at least 9 years. 3. EXPANDS AND IMPROVES HEALTH COVERAGE FOR MIDDLE CLASS FAMILIES Expands health insurance coverage to 32 million Americans Helps guarantee that 95 percent of Americans will be covered. 4. IS FULLY PAID FOR Is fully paid for – costs $940 billion over a decade. (Americans spend nearly $2.5 trillion each year on health care now and nearly two-thirds of the bill’s cost is paid for by reducing health care costs).

So much for the Republican/Tea Party “argument” that this bill “costs too much.” In fact, it reduces the budget deficit significantly, according to the non-partisan CBO.  Now, on to passage, hopefully in about 72 hours!

New Study: Health Care Reform Reduces Abortion Rates

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So much for that argument.

A study published in the latest New England Journal of Medicine shows that abortion rates declined during the first two years that Massachusetts implemented a near-universal health coverage program much like the nationwide plan currently before Congress.

[…]

The study on abortion rates released Wednesday could bolster that argument. It shows that the number of abortions in Massachusetts declined by 1.5 percent during the first two years of the new health care program (2007-2009) and the decline was 7.4 percent among teenagers — even though the percentage of non-elderly people receiving coverage went up nearly 6 percent.

The study also points out that the abortion decrease occurred “despite public and private funding of abortion that is substantially more liberal than the provisions of the federal legislation currently under consideration by Congress.” Massachusetts is one of 17 states where the state government finances abortions under Medicaid that the federal government cannot pay for.

In related news, “On Wednesday, a group representing 59,000 Catholic nuns plus more than 50 heads of religious congregations issued a strong statement urging ‘a life-affirming ‘yes’ vote’ in support of the Senate bill.” In short, the nuns’ organization ” believes the bill as written guarantees that there will be no federal funding for abortion and does not need to be ‘corrected.'”

As I said, so much for the “pro-life” argument that there’s anything about current health care reform legislation that will result in more abortions. There isn’t.

P.S. The New England Journal of Medicine study is here.

Vote Eugene Delgottago!

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I strongly encourage everyone to go vote in the Loudoun Times poll, “If the members of Loudoun’s Board of Supervisors were all up for re-election today, who would you want voted out of office?” Make sure you vote for super-bigot Eugene Delgottago…er, Delgaudio. Thanks.

Mary Lee Cerillo: Photos and Report From Connolly’s St. Patrick’s Day Party

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From Mary Lee Cerillo, excellent photos as always!

One thousand people attended the Gerry Connolly annual St. Patrick’s Day event in Fairfax tonight. Congressman Connolly officially announced that he will be running for reelection this November.  He also discussed his views on health care reform including being against insurance companies discriminating against people with preexisting conditions, rescinding health care benefits when a member becomes ill, and putting yearly and lifetime caps on peoples’ benefits.  Connolly believes that he needs to represent the American people and their needs rather than cater to large insurance companies and their profits. I am hopeful that health care reform will be voted on this weekend and will for once and for all get passed. As a clinical social worker I watch on a daily basis people losing their jobs and health care or being discriminated against.

As far as the party is concerned, a fun time was had by all and it was good to once again be with like minded progressive Democrats who believe in doing the right thing for our country.