The Disadvantage of Privatizing Medicare

In 2003, right-wing members of Congress and the White House implemented a stealth plan to ultimately privatize Medicare. Medicare Advantage, as the program is known, moves seniors and the disabled out of traditional, government administered, Medicare and into private health insurance plans.

The problem is these private plans are more costly than the traditional Medicare program, they provide less care, and they threaten the long term financial solvency of the Medicare program. As noted in a recent Des Moines Register editorial, insurance companies are getting their pockets lined, while enrollees in this program wind up paying more for less care.

Congressional investigators have concluded these private plans cost taxpayers more per beneficiary than traditional Medicare, pad the profits of insurance companies and can end up costing those enrolled in the plans more money for some services than if they’d remained in traditional Medicare.

The privatization of Medicare will ultimately lead to substantial increases in health costs to Medicare beneficiaries, substantial cuts in benefits, or a combination of the two. Just as AFSCME and its allies stopped the privatization of Social Security, we must now act to protect Medicare.

In his most recent Huffington Post blog, AFSCME President Gerald McEntee examines the two leading candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination and how they address the issue of health care.

“On this the experts agree – Obama’s plan leaves 15 million people uninsured while Clinton’s plan leaves no patients behind.”

Read the full post.

AFSCME President McEntee’s latest entry on the Huffington Post warns about Bush’s plans to submit a budget to Congress which will slash funding for hospitals, nursing homes, hospices, emergency medical services and home care providers:

“In all the reckless and misguided actions of this failed presidency, few will have consequences as serious as these massive budget cuts, which will reduce medical services for seriously ill Americans and increase medical costs for America’s working families.”

Read the full post.

In spite of grim recession forecasts from leading economists like former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan and tough times ahead for working families, Pres. Bush’s supporters in Congress have once again denied health care to 10 million children from low-income households. For the second time in three months, a vote to override Pres. Bush’s veto of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) has failed.

According to a recent U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee report, when employment growth slows, demand for SCHIP increases. As The Hill reported:

“[A] recession would create an additional strain on federal and state budgets as more people’s incomes fell to make them eligible for federal assistance through Medicaid and SCHIP. Extrapolating from the events of the recession at the beginning of the decade, the committee projected that as many as 1.1 million children would sign up for Medicaid or SCHIP each year a recession held.”

With the current economic slowdown and the increase in unemployment, more families are facing tough times.

As Jeremy Funk of Americans United for Change said:

“There is no better ‘economic stimulus’ they could have offered for the millions of parents who have to ask themselves every time their kids get sick: “Is it bad enough to see a doctor?””

To read more about this latest attack on SCHIP, check out this post at the AFL-CIO blog.

In his most recent entry on the Huffington Post, President Gerald W. McEntee sets the record straight on Sen. Barack Obama’s health care plan, AFSCME’s critique of it, and the labeling of labor unions as “special interests.”

When it comes to health care, our union and the labor movement in general are not a “special interest.” We fight for the general interest. Our campaign for health care for all is about our commitment to a better America, and no one in America should go without the medical care they need as so many in our country do now.

Read the full post.

Here’s a hint: us.

In 2003, the Republican-controlled Congress passed so-called “Medicare Advantage” – a law allowing private insurance companies to provide seniors with a private plan as an alternative to traditional Medicare benefits.

There is only one problem. The Congressional Budget Office subsequently found that private plans are paid an average of 12 percent more, or $1,000 a year, to cover a Medicare beneficiary than traditional plans.

According to AFSCME’s recent testimony to the U.S. House, “Over the next 10 years, these overpayments to insurance companies will cost an additional $160 billion” to taxpayers.

Think about it: $160 billion in subsidies to private insurers. Subsidies that could be used, among other things, to improve prescription drug benefits or expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) so that it covers more children from low-income families. Meanwhile, Medicare participants are forced to pay higher premiums for their coverage.

Even with these windfall subsidies many of these private plans, which claim to be better than traditional Medicare, don’t deliver on their promises. As the independent Government Accountability Office found, Medicare Advantage often doesn’t provide access to providers and is a bad deal for the seniors who need the most care.

This is but one of the reasons why AFSCME opposes Medicare privatization and supports the repeal of these overpayments.

For more information on Medicare Advantage, visit this special section at AFSCME.org.

Today, by a vote of 273 to 156, the House of Representatives failed in its attempt to override President Bush’s recent veto of legislation to renew and expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). Read President McEntee’s statement on the vote. While the vote to override was supported by a large bipartisan majority, supporters of the bill failed to win the two-thirds majority necessary to override a veto.

The bill would have provided health coverage to a total of ten million low-income children, four million more than are covered by the soon-to-expire law. Two Democrats voted against the bill: Jim Marshall (GA) and Gene Taylor (MS). Forty-four Republicans voted for the bill, as listed below:

Four House members did not vote: Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX), Julia Carson (D-IN), Peter King (R-NY) and Bobby Jindal (R-LA).

Go to this link for the full roll-call vote: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2007/roll982.xml

AFSCME has launched an ad campaign targeting members of Congress who voted against the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP).

Although the bill was passed in Congress, Pres. George Bush vetoed the legislation, showing once more how out of step he is with the country. As a matter of fact, that is exactly what a recent ABC News – Washington Post poll says: 7 out of 10 Americans favor expanding coverage for low income children.

Why are these legislators so intent on following the President off the cliff? We are trying to save them from following this path but, most of all, we are trying to save health care for our children.

See all the ads here.

AFSCME President Gerald W. McEntee reacts to efforts by Bush supporters to discredit 12-year-old Graeme Frost and his family.

The allies of President Bush who back his veto of bipartisan legislation to provide health coverage to children in low-income families took the politics of personal destruction to a new low this week. Front page stories in the Baltimore Sun and New York Times tell the story. They reveal the behind-the-scenes wheels of a smear campaign, based entirely on falsehoods, to destroy the credibility of a Baltimore family that stepped forward to speak out in opposition to the President’s veto.

The parents of 12-year-old Graeme Frost, and his younger sister Gemma, used the Maryland State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) after their children were seriously injured in an automobile accident. After the accident, Graeme lay comatose, with severe brain trauma. His younger sister was in even worse shape. Both parents in the Frost family work, making a combined income of less than $50,000 a year. On that income, they raise four children. But they could not afford private health insurance.

Thanks to SCHIP, Graeme and Gemma got the emergency medical care they needed. They, and their parents, know the SCHIP program works. Graeme said so publicly, at a press conference with Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and in a front page Baltimore Sun story. Later, Senator Harry Reid selected him to give the weekly Democratic Radio Address, and he told a national radio audience about the medical care he received:

Three years ago, my family was in a really bad car accident. I was in a coma for a week and couldn’t eat or stand up or even talk at first. My sister was even worse. I was in the hospital for five-and-a-half months and I needed a big surgery. For a long time after that, I had to go to physical therapy after school to get stronger. But even though I was hurt badly, I was really lucky.

Graeme and his family made a powerful case that SCHIP funding saves lives. So, the President’s allies set out to destroy them. Right wing blogs went into overdrive, questioning the cost of the family’s home, the family income and even the cost of the private school the children attend. Now it turns out, these smears were all unfounded. Yes, Graeme goes to a private school, but his tuition is largely paid through a scholarship.

By targeting a family for speaking the truth about a program the President wants to dismantle, the Bush’s allies crossed the line. Instead of debating this vital program on the merits, they thought they could win by Swift-boating a working-class American family. By mounting a disgusting campaign to smear the Frost family, the President’s backers have gone too far. Their efforts should and will backfire.

President Bush should call this smear campaign off. He should tell Rush Limbaugh, Michelle Malkin and Senator Mitch McConnell to call off their dogs and leave this family alone. The brave Frost family has been through enough and doesn’t deserve this for speaking out about a vital program that helped them. The President’s allies have brought Bush-era gutter politics to a new low.

With the stroke of a pen, Pres. Bush has shattered the hopes of millions of low-income children to get the medical care they need.

By vetoing a bipartisan bill to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) he has turned his back on kids from low-income families who might either lose or never get the health care they deserve. Not only that, but he is ignoring the fact that 7 out of 10 Americans favor expanding coverage for low-income children.

SCHIP provides health coverage to children whose parents do not qualify for Medicaid, but can’t afford private insurance. The vetoed bill would have preserved coverage for 6.6 million kids while allowing an additional 4 million children into the program over the next five years.

Apparently, Pres. Bush thought that was a bad idea even though only two days ago he was proclaiming “Child Health Day” and, in his own words, recognizing “the important role the State Children’s Health Insurance Program has played in helping poor children stay healthy.” Talk about selective memory… and brazen hypocrisy.

As Pres. McEntee said: “If we can find billions to spend on the never-ending war in Iraq, we can find the money to protect the lives and health of low-income American children. President Bush’s veto is callous and immoral. Congress should waste no time in overriding him.”