Daily News Updates - Health Insurance News

American Health insurance System 201, Pt.6 – The 2 essential questions?

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(1) “Is the health insurance industry happy?” We mentioned those large risk pools earlier. In fact, the health insurance industry doesn’t appreciate having the ‘deck re-shuffled’ when they’re already holding the winning hand. They prefer to just forage through the bowl of M&M’s and pick out all of the red ones. The red ones are the young and the healthy. We’re asking them to ‘mix ‘em all up’ and just grab a hand-full. They rightly contend that, by doing that, all the ‘red ones’ will opt-out because their risk is already low. Then the health insurance industry will be stuck with everything but red, bearing only the unhealthy and risky subscribers.

In order to agree to cover ‘all’ in the large pools, they currently demand that health insurance be made mandatory for all citizens so that the ‘red ones’ aren’t allowed to opt-out. The hard reality is that the health insurance industry is such a huge player (in the gazillions of dollars), as the saying goes: “If Mama ain’t happy…”

(2) “Are the taxpayers happy?” Depends who you ask. Or does it? No, it doesn’t matter who you ask. In reality what matters is, how you ask it. For example, in a CNN News poll, it was projected that, nationally:

• · 66% preferred a system "administered by the government and paid for by taxpayers"
• · 31% wanted to hold on to the current private insurance system that leaves some without coverage. (“Just let ’em die.*)
•  · 64% said ‘yes’, when asked “Do you think the government should provide a national health insurance program for all Americans, even if this would require higher taxes?"

* This was not phrased in the original question. Might it have made a difference in responses if respondents had considered the implication that 22,000 of our fellow citizens die each year for lack of health insurance? Again, to reiterate: “what matters is how you ask it”.

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