Daily News Updates - Health Insurance News

Health Insurance Fear vs. Other Fears, Pt.9 –- Another Introspect

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Wyden, along with Sen. Robert Bennett of Utah, has attracted 12 more colleagues, six Democrats and six Republicans, as co-sponsors. The significance here is that, in order for any viable health insurance/care plan bill to survive Congress, Republican and Democratic Senate votes will be required. Right now, Wyden’s bill seems to be the most viable health insurance/care plan. There are some striking differences between Wyden's plan and Hacker's. One is that Wyden’s plan totally lacks a public insurer; there won't be any competition public and private health insurance sectors. Instead, Wyden’s plan compensates for this absence with a much more radical system integration. To contrast, Hacker's plan creates this new public group market for about 44% of the population to compete against an existing private health insurance/care market with about 41%. The remaining percentage is mostly covered by Medicare and the like. Whether Hacker’s plan succeeds or fails is largely dependant on one of these health insurance/care markets effectively undercutting the other.

Wyden's radically different plan almost completely does away with employer health coverage. While promoting a single group market, it mandates more of a shift rather than anything new. Instead of a transition, this strategy mandates the employer to redirect all government incentives for employee health insurance to into paychecks for the purpose of converting to private driven individual health insurance. Risk pool coverage may become a thing of the past. Wyden does propose a new “state-level” entity called "Health Help Agencies," in individual states. These could mimic Hacker's group market. They would be regulated structures where various insurers compete for business. This may defray the “cherry-picking” strategies of the current individual open market. The intent is to lessen the high premiums and the denials of coverage for pre-existing conditions. With this, everyone would pay the same price but would be required to maintain insurance that was at least as comprehensive as the current Blue Cross-Blue Shield Standard Plan. There would be penalties for those who don't buy in but, also, some subsidized relief for those with low incomes. Medicare would change very little and exist mostly for the elderly.

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