Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

Rep Jayapal and Sen Sanders Have Introduced Medicare For All Bills: Part 2

Part 2 discusses why we must have the government issue payments to hospitals, clinics, etc. and also set the budgets for hospitals and this is how they are paid rather than billing multiple insurers and also patients. There is also only one payer. The later part is what I have been pounding on repeatedly. Forget […]

Rep Jayapal and Sen Sanders’ Have Introduced Medicare for All Bills: Part 1

I have exchanged emails with Kip Sullivan several times and believe he has the clearest explanation on Single Payer. I have found him to be a good source for the two Single Payer bills in Congress today. Unfortunately, it is a long explanation and it can not be summed up on one page or in […]

Focusing on Congressional Efforts to Control Healthcare Pricing, They Do Not

Perhaps, I am on the wrong side of the argument on how to control healthcare costs of which one proposed solution is a part of the latest budget bill passed in a bipartisan effort in Congress on December 19, 2019. Others may disagree with me on my thoughts. What was passed was superficial and will […]

Joe Biden: “How Are We to Pay for Single Payer Healthcare Alias Medicare for All?”

Joe knows the answer to this question and he is baiting the other candidates. Joe has a history of supporting big business interests as witnessed by his aggressive support of the banking industry with bankruptcy laws favoring banking against the needs of citizens and with a special intended harshness when it comes to student loans. […]

Does Single Payer Pay for Itself?

by ProGrowthLiberal (originally published at Econospeak) Does Single Payer Pay for Itself? Was this the message of the title of the latest from Dean Baker: The economies of a single system can be viewed as analogous to the Social Security system, which has administrative costs that are less than 1/20th as much as privatized systems […]

Breaking The Healthcare Cost Curve…Maryland

 by Run75441 Breaking The Healthcare Cost Curve Re-posted from 2/20/2010 Quite a bit of the commentary has been written on the question of how-to-rein-in rising healthcare costs and to slow costs to less than the rate of inflation. Massachusetts has been able to provide healthcare to its citizens but still struggles with keeping healthcare insurance […]

Still fixing the fixed, fixed healthcare system

by Daniel Becker I posted in 7/2009 on the issue of fixing our healthcare system based on the Massachusetts model. The first was Massachusetts is fixing the fixed healthcare system.   The second was a followup to the first:  Fixing the fixing. Healthcare Deja vu. The issue was that we are dancing around. All the proposals […]

Heath Care Reform– Looking at the Glass Half-Full

Rdan (Run 75441…h/t) Maggie Mahar writes an essay that is now cross posted at Angry Bear with the author’s permission: Health Beat, a Project of the Century Foundation;November 4, 2009 Heath Care Reform– Looking at the Glass Half-Full What Has Been Accomplished; What Still Must Be Done These days, many progressives are expressing deep disappointment […]

Health Care billing examples. The "public option" can’t work.

by Divorced one like Bush For your consideration here are some real numbers from a Medicare Advantage policy via United Health Care Cat Scan billed $1042.00Not Covered $ 831.68That means the contracted charge for this service with UHC is $210.32.Copay $ 42.06UHC payment $ 168.26 The “copay” is 20%. Same plan has a “Deductible/Copay” individual […]