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I live in Washington State, where I grew up, but I've also lived in Scotland,* England,** and France.*** My formal education was in language, economics, and law. I've worked as a roofer, translator, paralegal, prewf... pruef... proofreader, editor, and computer jack of all trades. I'm a left-leaning social-democrat who used to vote for Democrats as the lesser evil. I now support Socialist Alternative, locally, and the Green Party, nationally. I probably owe most of my political and media de-indoctrination to involvement in advocacy for Expanded and Improved Medicare for All. (Well, that and a never-ending stream of "progressive" Democratic Judas goats. They've been pretty hard to miss, lately.) Apart from that, I like my brother, my friends, little kids, bicycles, Canadian French and Scottish English, good food, open-source software, user-serviceable and -repairable stuff, movies, The Wire, Marcel Pagnol and John le Carre novels, and a Song of Ice and Fire. * I kin say it's a braw bricht moonlicht nicht, so I'm a'richt. ** I'm sorry, but did you mean to say "SHEDule"? And when you say you want to "table" the matter, did you mean that in the *proper* sense of the word or in the *American* sense? *** Ah! Ze sharmeeng creatyure! She eez playeeng 'ard to get, non? (Or, if you don't like Pepe Le Pew, you can substitute that Simpsons episode where Lisa takes a taxi to the wrong school and rushes to what she thought was her science classroom only to discover that it's a French class. All the kids laugh at her, the teacher admonishes them to do it in French, and instead of going "Ha ha ha ha ha!" they go "Hon hon hon hon hon!" And if you are French or a French-speaking Francophile and don't think any of this is remotely funny, "Of what am I mixing myself, me?")
OpEd News Member for 775 week(s) and 3 day(s)
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Health Care for All: Why We Need a New Prescription SHARE
US health care will not be fundamentally different under ACA. We will still be using the same fragmented, dysfunctional financing system. We will be bringing 17 million more people under the umbrella but will be leaving 31 million without coverage, and those *with* coverage are more likely to face excessive out-of-pocket costs should they need health care because of the gradual transition to underinsurance as the new norm. Patients are also are seeing reduced choice in providers due to greater use of tightly restricted provider networks. If we had a single payer, improved-Medicare-for-all program, underinsurance would be eliminated, and the number of uninsured would not be 48 million; it would not be 31 million; it would be zero!
A Limit on Consumer Costs Is Delayed in Health Care Law SHARE
The limit on out-of-pocket costs, including deductibles and co-payments, was not supposed to exceed $6,350 for an individual and $12,700 for a family. But under a little-noticed ruling, federal officials have granted a one-year grace period to some insurers, allowing them to set higher limits, or no limit at all on some costs, in 2014.
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As a result, a consumer may be required to pay $6,350 for doctors' services and hospital care, and an additional $6,350 for prescription drugs under a plan administered by a pharmacy benefit manager.
Some consumers may have to pay even more, as some group health plans will not be required to impose any limit on a patient's out-of-pocket costs for drugs next year. If a drug plan does not currently have a limit on out-of-pocket costs, it will not have to impose one for 2014, federal officials said Monday.
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"Medicare for All' would cover everyone, save billions in first year: new study SHARE
Upgrading the nation's Medicare program and expanding it to cover people of all ages would yield over a half-trillion dollars in efficiency savings in its first year of operation, enough to pay for high-quality, comprehensive health benefits for all residents of the United States at a lower cost to most individuals, families and businesses.
That's the chief finding of a new fiscal study by Gerald Friedman, a professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. There would even be money left over to help pay down the national debt, he said.
