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9/15/2009
It’s you and I paying for the free lunch

‘It turns out that if you make COBRA cheaper, more people will sign up.” This from Elizabeth Pope, writing for “Health Reform Talk,” a well-informed group, with a liberal bias toward health reform.

Pope analyzes the impact of a stimulus program initiated earlier this year which subsidizes COBRA payments for “certain involuntarily terminated individuals and their families.” COBRA is the federal program that allows employees leaving their jobs to continue to carry their group health insurance – but the only catch is the departing employee must pay the full boat of the premium. Many employees get a real wake-up call when they realize the actual cost of employer premiums that reflect the actual cost of health care. Imagine that. Your health care is not free.

So, until December of this year, a COBRA premium subsidy, courtesy of “the stimulus”, subsidizes 65% of the cost of COBRA premiums for laid-off workers.

Large employers report that COBRA enrollment has doubled since the COBRA premium subsidy was enacted in February 2009, according to a new analysis from Hewitt Associates, a global human resources company.

Hewitt estimates that subsidized COBRA coverage will cost the average worker $3,000 per year, while regular, unsubsidized COBRA coverage costs nearly $9,000 per year.

So Pope’s summary? “It turns out that if you make COBRA cheaper, more people will sign up.”

Well, duh.

But where does this money come from to make COBRA cheaper? It’s NOT free money! It makes me scream when the solution to all of health care’s ills is to have someone else pay for it.

Repeat after me: “There is no such thing as a free lunch.”

Should laid-off employees suffering economically get needed help? Yes, surely.

But what should happen when employees realize just how much health insurance (i.e., health care) costs? We Americans should be screaming about finding ways to become involved in our health care, to make better competitive choices, to reduce the cost of health care!

But no. Instead, we ask for more subsidies, and rejoice when a loss leader flies off the shelves - and health care priced as a loss leader continues to bleed America dry. And it’s you and I that are paying for it. As some wise sage said, nothing is more expensive than when it is free.

Glenn Frankovis shares a postcard he received from Congresswoman Gwen Moore yesterday.

“Five years ago, seniors in America didn’t have drug coverage under Medicare. Today, they do. Medicare Part D is working. Not only are seniors saving an average of $1,200 per year on medicines, but competition among private insurers is holding down costs, saving taxpayers billions of dollars. Now, by passing consensus, bipartisan health care reform, Congress can strengthen and improve Medicare Part D, help close the Medicare donut hole, and save millions of seniors as much as $1,800 more every year.

5 years ago, U.S. taxpayers began paying for drugs for seniors. That wasn’t enough. Now taxpayers, burdened with ever more debt, are going to sweeten the program still further.

It just doesn’t jive. It’s we who are paying for all of this. And experts like Elizabeth Pope (and Gwen Moore? Hmmm.) should get that.

Jo Egelhoff, FoxPolitics.net

COMMENTS

It would appear that the solution is to have no one pay for health care but the recipient. Well let's see. With the erosion of the middle class and disappearing jobs and wages frozen and no relief in sight perhaps health care is only for the upper middle class, what is left of them, and the truly rich. As for the rest of our citizens, Let them have flu! Once many of them succomb to their maladies there will be less of them to leach off the rest of us and far fewer of them to complain and march on Washington. They will enjoy the peace that passes all understanding. In the mean time our elected officials will be the healthiest among us so lets all run for office.

billie (Tue Sep 15 08:15:18 2009)

OR, is the answer to keep using the force of government to pick each others pockets, billie?

Often lost in the shuffle of the health care debate is the fact that almost all government interference has driven the costs up. Want cheaper health care? Change the FDA rules that require an average 12 yrs and $1.2 Billion to bring drugs to market. Allow importation of drugs. At a minimum, allow routine procedures to be handled by lower level practitioners. In short, introduce competition, and the prices will come down. Some want to regulate doctors' salaries down, but this is the bureaucratic, and expensive solution. According to Dr. Ron Paul, MD and US Rep from TX, in a freer market, consumer choices will also lead to many physicians making less, without the bureaucratic overburden of more regulators. (Ron Paul is also well studied on the subject of economics, and has been warning for 4 decades of long term consequences that we now experience.)

Not to mention, in a strong economy, people will have more money to look out for themselves and their less fortunate neighbors. In a weak economy, we continue to dig the hole of debt we are in all the deeper, making our long term prospects poorer.

Ken Van Doren (Tue Sep 15 08:44:20 2009)

As we move forward in this process there will be things people don't agree with and are afraid of. Massive change makes that happen. Understand that a dog house can be built a thousand different ways and still be a dog house and cost the same or less. Let's not stop at educating employees on how much their health care costs. Let's give them a full paycheck no taxes withheld and than have them pay out the total of taxes owed. Might be too much all at once to absorb.

Mike (Tue Sep 15 08:53:08 2009)

So what's so terribly wrong with subsidizing health care, especially for our citizens in times of financial distress? We subsidize farmers to not produce products. We subsidize foreign governments not to oppose our policies. We subsidize the military to police the world. We subsidize banks to forgive poor management. We subsidize elected officials in their personal travel and re-election efforts. The list of government "subsidies" is very long. There are far less important uses for tax dollars than helping the less fortunate in times of crisis. Perhaps we should highight and debate the value of current tax expenditures rather than pick on health care simply because its new.

Dennis (Tue Sep 15 09:00:20 2009)

What's wrong is the idea that ANY private business should be subsidized AT ALL. Did you know even the ROCKEFELLERS get large farm subsidies, because they own so many acres? Now, doesn't something seem WRONG about that? Doesn't it seem wrong that the taxpayers end up paying for the risks that wealthy banks, insurance companies, etc. took? This is what happens when the mindset is that "the govt ought to help."

Everyone ought to read "Not Yours to Give" by David Crockett. He explains that the govt has NO RIGHT to take tax money from people, to give to other people. In his day, as in ours, members of Congress were among the most wealthy in society. He challenged them, that if they felt so strongly about helping victims of disaster, they should put forth THEIR OWN money, which they could easily afford; AND he'd be the first to contribute.

However, these rich men chose not to do with their own money, what they expected poor taxpayers to do...and so it continues, except today, there is the EXPECTATION that "the govt" (really the taxpayers) will help out. At least in Crockett's time, they had enough sense of honor not to plunder taxpayers, and the disaster victims were helped by private charity.

emily matthews (Tue Sep 15 13:58:57 2009)

I just have to weigh in on this. There isn't any free lunch. One way or the other we pay. We are paying now and we will pay in the future. What gripes my back side is paying for the free loaders.

Agree, disagree, at least the President has brought this sleeping giant to the center of the room and made everybody sit up and pay attention.

I'm not smart enough to say my answer is right and his answer is wrong, though mostly, I believ this to be true.

I can't stand what's happened to civil discourse in our political system. It has broken down completely, at least to my mind brought to ruin by the extreme left who seems to be running congress right now.

True conservatives have abdicated their principals to the sniveling RINOS and genuine liberals (once a noble breed) to the lunitic fringe.

Our healthcare system is out of control.
My 87 year old parents (yes I know this is anecdotal, but the plural of anecdote is data!) pay out over $2000 a month to remain alive.

Thank the good Lord (or deity of your choice) they can afford it. But there are too many who give up eating, or taking the proper dosage of their medicine so they can eat, or do without and die.

This cannot stand. Not in what is arguably the greatest nation on earth.
And like the poor soul in Oregon with cancer that was told the state would pay for assisted suicide but not the medication to keep her alive, we can't have the government making those decisions. (yes, she's dead now)

Well, then what are we to do? I'm not that smart. But we elect (hopefully) from the best and the brightest and send them to Washinton to do our bidding.

If they don't and we don't throw their sorry asses out, then we have no one to blame but ourselves. And we keep sending the same idiots back, again and agin.

Like Einstein said, "only a fool does the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result".

We have not had the proper debate, as yet, as to what we believe to be a "right" yet. Once (and only after that) we do have such a debate then we can move forward.

Just remember that with rights come responsibilities. Heaven help us all and save us from ourselves.

steve wells (Tue Sep 15 23:21:17 2009)

Mike, if you look at the long list you started and the associated costs, you may have part of the answer about what is wrong. Once you admit that anyone has a right to what another has earned, where does it stop? (HINT: WE ARE BANKRUPT!!)

Also, to the article Emily mentioned, let me add the greatest short book on politics, economics, and ethics ever written: "The Law" by Frederic Bastiat. 62 short pages, but a mountain of wisdom and logic. www.bastiat.org Read it free online

Ken Van Doren (Wed Sep 16 11:46:01 2009)

"Joker posters are demeaning and yes, disrespectful"

When one compares the philosophy of The Joker (see Dark Knight) to Obama's "kill the survivors of abortion" stance, that characterization of Obama is just as accurate as the term "LIAR."

In fact, the poster is a reminder to respect Obama's murderous viewpoint.

And to fear it.

dad29 (Wed Sep 16 11:50:47 2009)

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