Today I ate lunch at the hamburger factory in Victor, Joe and Patty Reeds place. I had a Philly Cheese-steak (I think the best I've ever had), a glass of water and the Jackson Hole News and Guide. It was really a very pleasant experience, that is until I started reading about how our government plans to reduce the deficit by cutting spending on certain things like Medicare and Social Security. But the thing that really upset me, I mean it really made me want to stand up in the middle of the cafe and at the top of my lungs scream foul as loud as I possibly could, was how the GOP plans to save money on medicare. The suggestion is to privatize it, allow the markets and private industry to administer Medicare (for profit) and the government (you and me, Joe taxpayer) reimburse the private markets for their services.
That forced me to pause and think, how could this even be a suggestion and what self respecting congressman would take enough money from the snake oil lobbyist to get this actually put on paper. You see the concept is that the private markets could run Medicare more efficiently, and I'm sure they would but at what cost? Well we don't need to look far to find out what it might look like. 40 million uninsured Americans, health care cost increasing 15% to 25% annually, Enron, Tyco. Global Crossing, Wells Fargo, Bank Of America, General Motors, L.T.C.M, Orange County, the list is nearly endless. Private markets by their nature take risk for profit, they constantly strive to lower cost, improve efficiency and increase profits. Medicare is insurance that all working Americans pay a premium for during their entire working career so that when they reach the age of 62 no wait, 64 or is it 65, oh I'm sorry, really 67? OK 67, when they reach the age of 67 they can be assured that their health needs will be met, and we want to privatize that security?
Nasim Taleb talks about Black Swan events in his book by the same name. "A Black Swan event is an event, positive or negative, that is deemed improbable yet causes massive consequences." Well I think we can eliminate the word positive from that definition when describing the possible outcomes of handing Medicare over to private industry. Part of me thinks ranting about this in a blog is a massive waste of time because who would ever let this occur, people will revolt, make noise...right?
During the last election season (November 2010), polls were conducted all across the country 3 weeks before election day and the question was asked, "Do you know who you will vote for in the US Senate and US House of Representatives races this November?" Shockingly, more than 60% of the respondents didn't even know the names of the candidates in either party. So who is going to make some noise if no-one is paying attention. No-One! And even if someone does, will anybody be in the forest when the tree comes crashing down?
The Philly Cheese-Steak was really quite tasty which is a good thing because if Joe and Patty can sell enough of them before Wellpoint and United Health Group have Carte Blanche authority over Medicare they might be able to pay for their privatized version of Medicare, again.
No comments:
Post a Comment