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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsObama just launched single-payer in America
SUN NOV 24, 2013 AT 03:36 PM PST
Obama just launched single-payer in America
by Willinois
Did you notice? Did you see what happened when everyone was complaining about a website? Single-payer got started in America.
Vermont is using authority granted under the Affordable Care Act to start a single-payer system. Most Americans still don't know what the phrase "single-payer" even means. It had little support in Congress in 2009 and Senate "Democrats" like Nelson and Lieberman even killed the public option. But, ACA had this sweet little provision that allowed states to set up a single-payer system and now people will see it in action. You know what that means.
Oh I know this is hard to swallow. Obama is third-way! He's dismantling the safetynet! A corporatist! He killed the public option!
Whatever else he is, Obama is a President who acts in a thoughtful, deliberate way that the chicken little headlines of the day often miss. As many predicted, ACA is already leading to the kind of transformative progressive change Obama promised. The progressive movement will be responsible for showing the nation how well single-payer works after the Vermont system goes into effect. When public and non-profit insurance becomes the national norm, we'll know where it began.
HERE:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/11/24/1258135/-Obama-just-launched-single-payer-in-America
The program will be fully operational by 2017, and will be funded through Medicare, Medicaid, federal money for the ACA given to Vermont, and a slight increase in taxes. In exchange, there will be no more premiums, deductibles, copays, hospital bills or anything else aimed at making insurance companies a profit. Further, all hospitals and healthcare providers will now be nonprofit.
This system will provide an instant boost the state economy. This system will provide an instant boost the state economy. On the one side, you have workers that no longer have to worry about paying medical costs or a monthly premium and are able to use that money for other things. On the other side, you have the burden of paying insurance taken off of the employers side, who will be able to use the saved money to provide a better wage and/or reinvest in their company through updated infrastructure and added jobs. It is a win-win solution.
http://www.occupydemocrats.com/vermont-makes-promise-people-video/
spanone
(135,844 posts)MrsKirkley
(180 posts)If apartments weren't so expensive in Vermont, we would move there.
tazkcmo
(7,300 posts)was longer than 2 weeks, I would too! Just joshin' about the two weeks but it gets awful cold and snowy for too long for me.
cui bono
(19,926 posts)Obama didn't even mention single-payer.
Maedhros
(10,007 posts)Obama avoided even discussing Single Payer or Public Option when he began the ACA negotiations.
ConservativeDemocrat
(2,720 posts)And for very good reason.
And yet. Here we are.
- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community
Maedhros
(10,007 posts)and therefore taking the Public Option off the table before negotiations began was eleventh dimensional chess on his part. The insight on this issue belongs to Bernie Sanders.
Response to Maedhros (Reply #33)
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sendero
(28,552 posts)... the writer of the OP article needs to take a chill pill. It will be a cold day in hell before TX, CA, AZ, FL, NC, SC, or any number of other states follow Vermont's lead, hell many would not even take the virtually free Medicaid expansion.
If this is supposed to be the path to single payer well it will be a damn long walk.
magical thyme
(14,881 posts)Change is hard and change is scary. I was as angry as anybody else that he took single-payer off the table before negotiations began. But too many people are afraid of "losing out" with single payer for it to get through congress and past the insurance industry.
Once Obama set the stage for states to do it without ever mentioning it, and then let Vermont institute their own single-payer system.
Now the dominos can begin to fall...
Suddenly the long-game becomes clear. Maybe, just maybe, he had already pre-negotiated with certain senators who clearly favored single payer. Maybe that's why those senators suddenly backed down and supported ACA....hmmmm...
tavalon
(27,985 posts)That walk isn't even close to over yet. And yet, the close is already known. I think this is the same thing.
louis-t
(23,295 posts)The rubes will knock each other over trying to sign up for it.
sendero
(28,552 posts)... well that might work..
... but excuse me if I find comparisons between Bernie Sanders and Rick Perry lacking.
It doesn't MATTER how well whatever Vermont does might WORK, these people don't care about what works they only care about ideology and money. Especially money.
And all the comparisons here to gay marriage miss the mark completely, the people that run the country don't give two shits about any social issue, only about money.
Maraya1969
(22,483 posts)so in the short future. Things like this have a way of falling in on themselves.
dotymed
(5,610 posts)started Single Payer in America.
Give credit where it is due.
BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)As great of a Liberal Socialist as Senator Sanders is, he's just ONE VOTE in a body of one hundred.
He's not the president of the United States. He has no power to veto or sign bills into law, and if the majority of his colleagues in the Senate refuse to even touch something he wants, he'll get nothing done.
Senator Sanders, at best, should get credit for negotiating the Waiver of Innovation for States (if he negotiated that part of the PPACA) which gives the right AND - most importantly - Federal funding for each and every state to "be creative" at implementing a system that's better than the PPACA - single payer - starting 2017.
I know, based your avatar, that you're a Bernie Sanders fan, but let's give the right amount of credit where it's due without exaggeration.
Dawgs
(14,755 posts)BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)dotymed
(5,610 posts)You sure didn't.
BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)I did. You didn't. And you know it.
InAbLuEsTaTe
(24,122 posts)Dustin DeWinde
(193 posts)any credit goes to Obama.
mikekohr
(2,312 posts)but he usually is.
I've been saying that the PPACA set up a back door way for single payer to happen in just this manner. Eventually, after all the bile has been spewed, all the lies exposed, all the hate exhausted, and reality is embraced, that state by state we would move to wards "Single Payer, Medicare for all."
Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)Yippee. And the reason he didn't mention it was that he's a coward and rakes in money from Big Insurance.
Le Taz Hot
(22,271 posts)I'm sure the Vermont State Legislature, the Governor and the thousands of people who worked on Single Payer are not appreciating getting absolutely no credit for its implementation.
ConservativeDemocrat
(2,720 posts)Only in your own little mind is it that Vermont gets no credit for taking this step. No one else said that.
However, the President is the one who made it even possible to take this step. Something the screamers never acknowledge.
Speaking for myself, I love State experimentation. But this may or may not work. It depends on how well they implement it.
Kentucky-care is doing fine as well.
- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community
Wounded Bear
(58,670 posts)that the states would start the Single Payer movement under it.
cali
(114,904 posts)Vermont's state legislature had already voted on single payer.
The legislature started the process of designing a system in 2009, setting up a commission to figure out the steps that would be needed.
In 2010, that commission hired a health care economist to design 3 complete systems, using different models, including the financing:
http://vtdigger.org/...
Here's a fairly in depth story from 2011:
http://www.motherjones.com/...
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/11/24/1258135/-Obama-just-launched-single-payer-in-America#
Wounded Bear
(58,670 posts)Although I will say that 2009 is not exactly long before ACA.
IAE, ACA passed the impetus towards single payer to the states and provided a boost by amping up Medicaid with federal backing. Sane states have benefitted from ACA already. Progressive states (like VT) have gone, and are going, a step farther. I suspect that the move may have had a harder time if ACA had not passed.
I can envision a Canadian model, where the several states all have universal coverage, but use different methods to get there. I believe Hawaii has had UHC for a while.
I suspect it won't be long until corporate America notices people and businesses moving to UHC states at the expense of the more recalcitrant ones and relents a bit. At least I hope. I would not shed a single tear if the health care industry is dismantled in favor of a true health care system.
Kudos to VT for being on the forefront of this.
truedelphi
(32,324 posts)governments left in the USA.
Several years back, we tried to do this in California, and were two votes shy of Single Payer passing. Two new Dems on the state legislature got bought out. (Or somehow decided to vote with all the Republicans because...?? No one seems to know why or how it happened.)
Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)Yes it allows the states to set up their own systems, but the states could already implement various forms of universal health care. Hawaii did so in 1974. Massachusetts did its thing well n advance of the ACA, although it is not single payer.
ConservativeDemocrat
(2,720 posts)- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community
Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)Without a waiver, Vermont would be required to implement private insurance exchanges instead.
ConservativeDemocrat
(2,720 posts)The "waiver" is to get the money the ACA provides without having to implement an exchange.
- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Community
mwrguy
(3,245 posts)Don't deny it.
cui bono
(19,926 posts)Cali_Democrat
(30,439 posts)It was because of the ACA.
That pains you, doesn't it?
cui bono
(19,926 posts)BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)I hardly consider Manny to be a credible source about anything Obama around here.
joshcryer
(62,276 posts)It helps dramatically.
The mandate is just going to force other states to follow Vermont and Oregon's lead on this.
Response to kpete (Original post)
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MNBrewer
(8,462 posts)very obamabot!
Maedhros
(10,007 posts)from the beginning.
Response to Maedhros (Reply #35)
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cui bono
(19,926 posts)polichick
(37,152 posts)No surprise that they'd run with this ball. I hope the other states follow asap!
Response to kpete (Original post)
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NoOneMan
(4,795 posts)Mr Reagan, tell Gorbachev to bring down this wall!
TheDebbieDee
(11,119 posts)Capt. Obvious
(9,002 posts)Phlem
(6,323 posts)I stand corrected!
Way to go Obama!
now let's try not to fast track the TPP.
-p
riverbendviewgal
(4,253 posts)Tommy Douglas was premier of Saskatchewan in the 60s when his province started one payer. It spread through canada shortly after.
A few years ago Tommy Douglas was voted by Canadians as the most important Canadian.
We canadians love our health care.
roamer65
(36,745 posts)His Liberal-NDP coalition government authored up legislation, where the federal government offered 50 percent funding to any other province who followed Saskatchewan's system. That was all it took for it to go national. All the other provinces followed suit.
klook
(12,157 posts)Thanks for the reminder.
When a spark becomes a small flame, that flame can grow into an unstoppable wildfire. When more states go to single-payer, it's not hard to see their economies outstripping those of the Romneycare states.
Whisp
(24,096 posts)as President Obama will be one day for the very same thing.
This is great news.
Go Vermont, go! Show them all how it's done.
Show them all that it was meant to be done this way despite all the moaning and mewling and crying about how Obama sold everyone out and is on the insurance companies side and payroll - when all along he was working for single payer in perhaps the only way it could happen. This way.
Best President Ever.
Do not doubt this man's good intentions.
His mother lay on her deathbed fighting with insurance companies. He saw that. He felt that.
How anyone can possibly accuse him of those terrible things - of not being on his mothers side but on the side of the insurance predators.
Shame on you who thought that and still think that.
ANOIS
(112 posts)I believe that is the connection.
DS--the actor.
Whisp
(24,096 posts)Shirley was Tommy Douglas' daughter.
MADem
(135,425 posts)She played the MATRIARCH in the popular series Wind At My Back....great role, that!!!
His current wife is named Francine Racette.
http://www.tvguide.com/celebrities/donald-sutherland/bio/147781
SidDithers
(44,228 posts)Douglas introduced the earliest version of single-payer hospital insurance in Saskatchewan in 1946.
Sid
LionsTigersRedWings
(108 posts)How long before it spread to the other provinces?
riverbendviewgal
(4,253 posts)Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)Please stop spreading the propaganda.
The Midway Rebel
(2,191 posts)Doing my best Ralph from the Simpsons here!
Beartracks
(12,816 posts)MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)Bernie Sanders inserted a provision that permits waivers. But there's no guarantee.
AFAIK, single payer could have been done before ACA.
msanthrope
(37,549 posts)primer:
Dawgs
(14,755 posts)Your video just proves that it was Congress, and not the President, that wrote the bill.
msanthrope
(37,549 posts)Anything the president writes must be submitted by a member of Congress. In other words the entire fucking bill is inserted by Congresspeople.
President Obama was right..... Once it starts working a lot of bitter people aren't going to want to call it Obamacare.
Dawgs
(14,755 posts)msanthrope
(37,549 posts)I recommend you watching the video all the way through.
Response to MannyGoldstein (Reply #23)
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joshcryer
(62,276 posts)zeemike
(18,998 posts)Well I want to believe I really do...But the reality is that this is one small state and we have 49 more to go and IMO the insurance industry is too strong to let it go any further...they will bring the money to bear and they can defeat it.
And the media will be very helpful, telling us what a big failure Vermont is because of that socialist health care...it will be all over the news.
Like I said I want to believe but right now I am much to cynical for that leap of faith necessary to believe.
mwrguy
(3,245 posts)It's a long game
cui bono
(19,926 posts)for motherfucking sakes.
Where was there any plan of Obama's that said anything about single-payer. Citations please.
uponit7771
(90,347 posts)[img][/img]
Thanks for the laugh!
Bernardo de La Paz
(49,007 posts)tridim
(45,358 posts)Iran, DADT and the Bin Laden operation were just candy land, not chess for motherfucking sakes. Eh Cui Bono?
It is clear that people who don't play chess IRL seldom recognize or even understand political chess.
Response to zeemike (Reply #26)
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BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)...province by province, and for us, state by state.
California is working on a single-payer system as well, but it's expensive. Democrats want to implement the ACA first (to get those dollars to fund single-payer) before they'll begin working on getting the Waiver for State Innovation and begin implementing single-payer. This is California's plan of action.
Voters will be less white, and probably less conservative, and the changing composition of the House of Representatives may allow for passage of single-payer waiver legislation for states, perhaps even with states rights support from a few Republicans.
California, Vermont and possibly other states moving to single-payer will put increasing pressure on Congress to grant other state waivers. Once subject to such pressure, Congress could theoretically pass a federal bill to give (improved) Medicare to all, but it is politically far more likely that they will simply let the states set up their own systems, which can then become models for a larger federal program. California, once again, could be the engine driving national change.
http://californiaonecare.org/why-california-can-lead-the-way-to-single-payer-in-the-u-s/
Single-payer will come to the United States - state-by-state.
joshcryer
(62,276 posts)Mandated private insurance with a public option leading to single payer.
We didn't get the public option so we might actually get single payer quicker.
cantbeserious
(13,039 posts)eom
JimDandy
(7,318 posts)Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)most sense, particularly if we were building the system from scratch or had no political realities to deal with.
But we don't live in a dictatorship. He passed about the most progressive legislation he was going to be able to.
NYC_SKP
(68,644 posts)Major Hogwash
(17,656 posts)Darrell Issa is conducting an American, patriotic tour of 4 red states dammit!!!
He's collecting information that he will use later to prove that Ben Gozzi never got a fair hearing.
Is this fair?
Is this equitable?
Issa, a man who went out of his way to be an example to others, a man who acts and thinks like he is the leader of the free world, a man who has worked tirelessly for the healthcare insurance industry . . . never got a dinner.
navarth
(5,927 posts)Whisp
(24,096 posts)jaysunb
(11,856 posts)libdem4life
(13,877 posts)Hopefully Vermont is just the beginning of a very, slippery slope ... which "they" fear. Obama gets the win for doing the best possible in a very difficult national political climate. Vermont can show other states how it's done. (hopefully) And if it does actually prove to boost the state economy, wow. Every state is different, but it always helps to have the first one done and copy and alter the plan as needed.
Also it makes it easier to organize and put on pressure at the state/local level because it's no longer quite as risky and a complete unknown.
For the insurance companies, it's easier to stop a national health plan, at this point, one state at a time, maybe not so much. I'm encouraged.
UtahLib
(3,179 posts)WowSeriously
(343 posts)The ACA prevents them from launching until 2017, so we shall see.
I don't know of any that law prohibited them from launching now, except the ACA.
So maybe the title could just as easily have said "Obama delays single payer in Vermont".
I only put this response out there because the President never championed single payer and dropped the public option like a hot potato. And no chess was involved.
I am thankful for the elimination of preexisting conditions as well as the cap and the junk insurance plans. But the ACA was NEVER about single payer or a public option.
RBInMaine
(13,570 posts)Lydia Leftcoast
(48,217 posts)If he had really wanted a public option, he could have gotten it, since there are more Progressives than Blue Dogs.
WowSeriously
(343 posts)Public Option could have passed with a simple majority, as it was a revenue affecting bill, had the Democrats chosen to do so. This was precisely what the Republicans did with Junior's tax breaks and Medicare Part D(estroy)
Liberal_Stalwart71
(20,450 posts)Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)Not sure why, but they do.
grahamhgreen
(15,741 posts)treestar
(82,383 posts)to be dwelt on by the media.
1StrongBlackMan
(31,849 posts)that the way ObamaCare was built allowed for single-payer to get a trial run (in terms of public support and actual what it could look like on a national scale) ... for any jursidiction brave enough to install one (you know, that "50 incubator of ideas" thing); while fundamentally changing the game for all other jurisdictions that weren't/aren't.
Face it, folks ... social (policy) change comes grindingly slowly; not matter how many magic wands we pretend to have ... first there is the idea; then it's tried in a limited fashion; then all the other jurisdictions point to where the idea is working to adopt it for themselve, once a critical mass of the electorate sees that, and how, it works.
Pick a social (policy) change in Americam and tell me how it didn't happen that way.
BlancheSplanchnik
(20,219 posts)It's agonizing, but it's the truth.
And our scumbag media monopoly will do everything in its power to disinform and stir up angst and scapegoat and set hair on fire.
riqster
(13,986 posts)IronLionZion
(45,457 posts)are willing to do anything to promote single payer at the state level, or just continue to start 101 threads every minute about how national single payer is better than the ACA so we should stop voting for Democrats.
Good for Vermont for leading the way forward yet again. It was a grass roots movement and Democrats in Vermont got it passed and signed into law.
NorthCarolina
(11,197 posts)JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)Scorn however, is renewable and infinite, and as such, it should be applied very "liberally".
At least that's what I've learned in this thread.
BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)President Obama and Congressional Democrats were very, very clever about drafting the PPACA that will not only allow states to open their own single-payer system, but more importantly, will provide federal funding to make it happen.
California is set to begin implementation of single-payer starting 2017 when the funding is released to make this expensive start-up possible - something that would have never happened without President Obama's PPACA.
Yet here, this president doesn't get credit for this ingenuous law from some of his most ardent opponents who still call themselves Democrats. Uneffingbelievable.
Dawgs
(14,755 posts)Forget about the Congress that actually wrote it, and people like Bernie demanding that states could create their own system.
Obama gets all of the credit.
BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)then he should get all the CREDIT when it proves to be better than you first surmised, don't you think?
That said, Democrats weren't in any hurry to work on health care reform. Bernie Sanders was powerless to push a bill forward even with slim Dem majorities.
It wasn't until President Obama actually pushed and shoved Congressional Dems to actually do something about our failing health care system and how it failed our citizens that Dems finally, finally, got to working on it. Have you already forgotten?
Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)No, they didn't. Your subject line is preposterous.
BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)You're sounding desperate in your defense of keeping the hate for Obama while trying to portray Bernie Sanders as all powerful.
Get real.
Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)I pointed out that the Canadian sp healthcare came into being without mandatory for profit health care. How can you possibly not connect the two? Has your crush on the president completely killed your ability to think?
JimboBillyBubbaBob
(1,389 posts)...single payer system.
joshcryer
(62,276 posts)So happy. It's going to force the hand of all the blue states quick and the red states are just going to lose their minds.
fadedrose
(10,044 posts)your posts are always interesting
Myrina
(12,296 posts)Cuz, ya' know ... I can.
L0oniX
(31,493 posts)Lasher
(27,597 posts)Last edited Mon Nov 25, 2013, 12:57 PM - Edit history (2)
"Universal health care" was once commonly used to describe what most Americans really want in a health care system. The Vermont model is an example of that. It's now being used to describe the ACA. Now we have to use "single payer" or "single payer universal health care" to describe what's going to be provided in Vermont. This new label doesn't sound as good to the casual observer, does it?
I don't know if this is why Americans still don't know what "single payer" means, but the semantic shell game certainly hasn't promoted comprehension.
nonoxy9
(236 posts)A little confused by the OP's complaints here.
LWolf
(46,179 posts)I'm excited about what is happening in Vermont, and watching to see how it plays out.
To attribute what's going on with Vermont's health care system to Obama is more than a stretch; more than a leap; it's a launch of desperation.
tavalon
(27,985 posts)I was so mad at him for ACA in the beginning but I'm wiping egg out of my eyes. He pulled the marriage equality card. Start the ball rolling and get one of the states to add onto it and who else but Bernie's Vermont. I love his quote. "The quickest route toward a national health care program will be when individual states go forward and demonstrate that universal and non-profit health care works, and that it is the cost-effective and moral thing to do.
President Obama is third way, he is a corporatist. He's just like the Clintons and even like Gore before he understood what the score was. And yet, his legacy may well be that he started Single Payer. And if so, I do not begrudge him that at all. I do hope he shares the accolades with his deserving socialist colleague.
I couldn't see past the problems in the beginning. Now, I can see right past them onto the other shore and that other shore is single payer, Medicare for All. What I wanted.
This is my official apology for being a shit about ACA. Forget 12 dimensional chess. It's a Jenga move.
KittyWampus
(55,894 posts)like minded people can bicker. Bickering is normal amongst families.
I just have to ignore those who only want to be divisive and antagonistic.
zipplewrath
(16,646 posts)Look, I'm not saying it won't happen, but if it does, it won't be states like Vermont that create the trend, it will be states like California. The good part of the Vermont experiment is that they are favorably disposed towards it, so it may actually get a chance to "work out the kinks". But the primary success of single payer will be in the funding/cost control side and Vermont isn't exactly typical of a state structure. And if Vermont DOESN'T get it right, it could be a real problem. This is a state that doesn't have a hospital system of the magnitude of Pennsylvania. If they have to end up shipping alot of patients out of state for various forms of very expensive care, it could get expensive.
The activity that needs to happen going forward is that progressives need to keep their eye on the ball and push towards single payer at all avenues. It needs to be repeated that the current system is unsustainable and that ACA is a transition plan, not an end in and of itself.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024090281
valerief
(53,235 posts)Xithras
(16,191 posts)Prior to the ACA, implementing single payer in California was twice approved by both houses of our state legislature before being rejected by Der Gropenfurher. After the passage of the ACA, State Senator Mark Leno, the author and firebrand behind the act (who, incidentally, was also the author of AB849...the first attempt to legalize gay marriage in any American state) was openly told NOT to attempt reintroduction again, because the state leadership was more focused on implementing Covered California (our state ACA exchange). Our own state party leadership, in spite of TWICE getting single payer approved in both of our state houses, decided that it didn't want a third push for single payer to "undermine" the states Obamacare rollout.
It's unfortunate that our states Democratic leaders don't have the same foresight as Vermont's.
nomorenomore08
(13,324 posts)why the push for single payer in CA can't start up all over again.
Fumesucker
(45,851 posts)On the other hand when there is a chance of it passing the bill won't even come up.
SunSeeker
(51,574 posts)calimary
(81,322 posts)BIG THUMBS UP!!!
adieu
(1,009 posts)imagine the bigger states like NY and CA doing it. The sooner they get that happening, the quicker they will staunch any flow of jobs to the states that don't offer such programs, because it'll be cheaper for employers and "free" for employees. TX's and Rick Perry's plans to steal employment from CA or other states will dry up immediately.
Blue Idaho
(5,049 posts)Let's keep this rolling along - please?
JimboBillyBubbaBob
(1,389 posts)...LOVE IT! A piece at a time.
bvar22
(39,909 posts)But I hope and pray that Vermont will be successful with their efforts in implementing a successful Public Plan.
There are many land mines and hurtles still to go.
The Public Plan has to be self-funding with a very small risk pool,
and there are many sharks swimming in that pool.
It will be like Mom & Pop opening a small store directly competing with WalMart in the same neighborhood.
The Big Boys have $Billions and a great financial incentive to make sure that the Vermont Public Plan fails in its first year by being forced to raise Premiums to a point of not being competitive with the cheap rates offered by the "private" players on the Vermont Exchange who have the deep pockets to sustain losses until the Public Plan is snuffed out.
Are there any estimates yet of how many Vermonters will be eligible to enroll in the Public Plan, and any Rate comparisons?
Good luck to Vermont and Vermonters!
I hope your Public Plan can survive the gauntlet.
ChisolmTrailDem
(9,463 posts)"Everybody in, nobody out" and no premiums or deductibles.
bvar22
(39,909 posts)Between 2014 and 2017 private insurance will be phased out. Under Green Mountain Care (Act 48), as of January 1, 2017 private insurance will cease to be legally available to Vermonters.
http://www.vthealthcarefreedom.org/faq
The State of Vermont has made Private Health Insurance illegal,
and I congratulate them.
I hope this paves the way for the rest of us.
California to follow. Thanks Pres O!
Enrique
(27,461 posts)http://www.pnhp.org/news/2011/june/how-libby-montana-got-medicare-for-all
Yet when Senator Baucus needed a solution to a catastrophic health disaster in Libby, Montana, and surrounding Lincoln County, he turned to the nations single-payer health care system, Medicare, to solve the problem.
Baucus problem was caused by a vermiculite mine that had spread deadly airborne asbestos, killing hundreds and sickening thousands in Libby and northwest Montana. The W.R. Grace Company that owned the mine denied its connection to the massive levels of mesothelioma and asbestosis and dodged responsibility for this environmental and health disaster. When all lawsuits and legal avenues failed, Baucus turned to our countrys single-payer plan, Medicare.
The single-payer plan that Baucus kept off the table is now very much on the table in Libby. Unknown to most of the public, Baucus inserted a section into the health reform bill that covers the suffering people of Libby, not just the former miners but the whole community all covered by Medicare.
They dont have to be 65 years old or more. They dont have to wait until 2014 for the state exchanges. No 10-year rollout its immediate. They dont have to purchase a plan this is not a buy-in to Medicare its free. They dont have to be disabled for two years before they apply. They dont have to go without care for three years until Medicaid expands. They dont have to meet income tests. They dont have to apply for a subsidy. They dont have to pay a fine for failure to buy insurance. They dont have to hope that the market will make a plan affordable. They dont have to hide their pre-existing conditions. They dont have to find a job that provides coverage. Baucus inserted a clause in the Affordable Care Act to make special arrangements for them in Medicare, and he didnt wait for any Congressional Budget Office scoring to do it.
mstinamotorcity2
(1,451 posts)thanks kpete.