MIT analyst supports Senate Health care plan: Premiums will go down for Americans
By John Amato Monday Nov 30, 2009 8:00amRepublicans have been flogging the notion that if we have health care reform, your premiums will go up. They have no data to back up the claim, but they repeat it endlessly. Here's a new report that throws cold water on their heads. Will this new report get the attention it deserves by the media?
Jonathan Gruber, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology provides the information for this MIT study:
A new analysis by a leading MIT economist provides new ammunition for Democrats as the Senate begins formally debating the historic health-reform bill being pushed by President Barack Obama.
The report concludes that under the Senate’s health-reform bill, Americans buying individual coverage will pay less than they do for today's typical individual market coverage, and would be protected from high out-of-pocket costs.
So Democrats will argue that under the Senate bill, Americans would pay less for more.
The new document arms Democrats with a response to the contention of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) that the bill would mean “higher premiums, higher taxes, and massive cuts to Medicare.”
The “microsimulation” analysis is by Jonathan Gruber, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Treasury Department official under President Bill Clinton. Gruber used data from the Congressional Budget Office.
Gruber concludes that people purchasing individual insurance would save an annual $200 (singles) to $500 (families) in 2009 dollars. And people with low incomes would receive premium tax credits that would reduce the price that they pay for health insurance by as much as $2,500 to $7,500.
The report will be circulated to Capitol Hill this week. Read the four-page report here.
As Digby says:
Now David Broder has talked to every "expert" at the Washington Post (well almost every expert) and got a different answer, so take all this with a grain of salt. Still, it's important to know what the "scientists" are saying. They often have undue influence on decision making.
Gruber should expect a fair amount of vicious attacks to be heaped on him as republican operatives will surely try to discredit him on every way possible. That's their standard MO.
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David Broder? Oh yeah...he's that bald headed old hack that used to cover Washington during the Roosevelt Administration...TEDDY Roosevelt.
Um, yeah, wasn't he both gay and Satanist, and also a member of the ultra-leftwing American Nazi Party?
'Swhat I heard, anyhow...
Or they could just save themselves some energy by saying "He used to work for CLIIIIINTON!!!!!" Which means the same thing, in most wingnut circles.
living in a country where absolutely nobody in a leadership position is credible. Many experts fit that category also.
Oh, wow. The eggheads support the bill? Greaaaaaat.
That ought to go over really well down at Billy Bob's Cafe.
Pleeeze.
If World Net Daily and The New Republic came out in support of the Senate bill, it wouldn't swing the people in Billy Bob's Cafe. We're talking about information for rational, moderate, independent citizens to think about. MIT has credibility with the average sane person. But that pretty much excludes anybody with a Gadsden flag tattoed on their ass and a KKK hood in their closet.
Still, it's important to know what the "scientists" are saying.
I agree, but if the Republicans don't believe the scientists on climate change or the age of the earth or any other health risk, what makes anyone think that they will listen to the Scientists on this? They only like to listen to the scientists that support their view.
or, the scientists that are paid to support their views...
we are talking social science, not physical--the dif btwn sociology and chemistry
:-)
It is like "Christian Science" or "Compassionate Conservatism" or...
and, damned if they haven't tried, economists have been trying for years and years to assert that their discpline is the brethren of physics and mathematics...
um, no. human = irrational.
..how the individual acts in groups or how groups interact with other groups or any of a number of interactions that show how a population acts like an individual, i.e., polls, census, right-wing, left-wing, mob mentality, etc..you know SCIENCE (def:science, noun, a field of knowledge).
please don't take my comments on social sciences as an insult. i have my undergrad in anthro, with a minor in soc.
but, as i am sure you know, the differences between the physical sciences and the social sciences are real. and, as it should be, economics is a social science.
can make objective observations, make theories and either prove or disprove the hypothesis. In this way, science is science... social or physical. And yes, I consider even economic science a science -- and I would even throw political science (also a social science) into the mix...
My background is in the physical sciences, microbiology and chemistry... but there is still validity in treating the social sciences in a similar vein.
Don't economists do the same thing? Study trends, make hypotheses, study outcomes? For example --- In many ways... the Milton Friedman Economic theory of free markets have been disproved, even though they are being thrust upon up daily by the Ayn Randians of the world. The only problem with the Friedman free-marketeers of the world is that they will not admit that the science of their hypothesis doesn't work and try to continue to foist it on the rest of us...
the claim was never made that social science is not science, just that there is a real difference btwn the physical/natural sciences and the social sciences. and, that difference, is fairly critical when addressing such disciplines as economics. treating economics as a natural science has been a large part of the 08 econ collapse
.
to discredit "science" and "government" with their lame-brain followers, people who don't even know what is good for themselves.
Still, I wish MIT or another reputable agency would show just how profitable it will be for the Med. Insurance companies if NO public health bill is passed.
It might open a few eyes, awaken a few Fox-Zombified dorks.
or how profitable it will be for health insurance companies if the bill is passed.
50 million new customers who are forced to buy their "product", no competition from any sort of "public" option, no meaningful cap on premiums (premium increases limited to 150% of health care costs), no effective enforcement of protections, etc., etc.
This legislation is the biggest giveaway since NAFTA.
was a key architect of the sweeping health insurance reforms that Massachusetts enacted in 2006, while Mitt Romney was governor.
Devils in the details the old saying goes.
another repuglyKKKan operative. and the bill sux dogass. so they are using bipartisanshit to screw us.
I expected better than this at C&L.
Is it true that Hardball interns do their daily research by rubbing and staring into David Broder's skull?
You mean after they've finished cleaning up the coffe-scented saliva that Chris Matthews has sprayed all over the SONY lense on the camera? I think there are quite a few shit jobs on that show.
... that prevents the insurance monopoly from raising rates arbitrarily?
I hardly know enough about this study, but I'm sure "market" analysis probably indicated there were no "market" reasons that gas prices tripled.
What stops insurance from doing the same?
even the senate bill.
I don't see any market forces at all. The HC insurance industry makes quite a large profit margin by cherry picking only healthy clients, refusing to cover anybody with a pre-existing condition, and dropping people when they get sick. Both House and Senate bills mandate that they can't do those things anymore, and also mandate that everybody buy insurance.
I don't see any reason why the HMOs wouldn't all "coincidentally" raise their insurance premiums to maintain the same profit margin in response to the new expense of having to insure people with pre-existing conditions. The original idea was to provide a non-profit competitor (either the Public Option, or a dumb-ass "suped-up co-op," to quote Baucus) to drive down costs. But if you eliminate the Public Option/non-profit competitor, all that's left is a mandate to buy insurance from a monopoly, the worst of all possible worlds.
aahhhh, nooooo!!! *runs for cover*
leading MIT economist's predictions and analyses don't have the same shine as they did back in the 90s when they were cheering on financial deregulations...
anyhoo, something tells me that union members may not give this bill the same support as a "leading MIT economist"
never make a dent in the fatal web of false obligations we have woven for ourselves in this study?
Let me guess, consumers will save a whole whopping $30.00 a year on their premiums.
that there will be no public option. In fact, the public option is just a bunch of fart gas and unadulterated horseshit spewed from Congress, a Congress that has now become oily insurance salespersons.
Here is the end result: the federal governnment will mandate premium payments to the very same greedy and profit driven insurance companies that got us into this mess for those who lack group coverage and, as a result, those folks must buy policies directly from insurers and those who work for small employers, about 30 million people within a few years. With millions of potential new clients, all major insurers are expected to participate and reap ungodly profits with the force of law insuring payment from the US citizenry.
Nothing more.
The insurers will charge higher premiums and the feds will force payment all while Congress folks reap annual commissions from these insurers through their lobbying arms by threatening a public option year after year, knowing none will ever come. Hell, winning an election will be more like a corporate promotion. Maybe "House member" should be replaced with "Sales rep - Texas, district XX" and "Senator" replaced with "Sales Co-Manager Texas Region". This blog and others will be aghast in disgust. Nothing will change.
"WASHINGTON—After months of committee meetings and hundreds of hours of heated debate, the United States Congress remained deadlocked this week over the best possible way to deny Americans health care.
"Both parties understand that the current system is broken," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters Monday. "But what we can't seem to agree upon is how to best keep it broken, while still ensuring that no elected official takes any political risk whatsoever. It’s a very complicated issue."
"WASHINGTON—After months of committee meetings and hundreds of hours of heated debate, the United States Congress remained deadlocked this week over the best possible way to force Americans to insure corporate profits while dressing it up as health care or a bailout.
..President Obama's polularity numbers plummet faster than a bowling ball chucked from a plane at a thousand feet, we get upset and blog all day about it, republican'ts claim victory (even though they don't support the legislation in the first place), we hear Howard Dean scream again, America gets screwed!
That about it?
thousand feet would reach the ground at the same as a bowling ball.
"Gruber should expect a fair amount of vicious attacks to be heaped on him as republican operatives will surely try to discredit him on every way possible. That's their standard MO."
Why am I not surprised? Looking at some of the posts in this thread... they are right on cue, aren't they?
... complaining of insurance monopolies and the lack of rate regulation.
Who knows? Could happen....
that is all.
about the massachussetts fiasco?
Declaration of Independence
When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary to dismantle those (Corporations) which hold us in debt, in bondage . .
Nice idea anyway
... a new Magna Carta.
"government of the corporations, by the corporations, for the corporations ..."
Sorry, but the repukes just have the means to get out their lies and bull shit in force...and if this information were to get out, it would be buried under a TON of repuke deception and misinformation.
I honestly don't think anyone knows what is going to happen. You would suspect that premiums would go down with government competition; but then again, if the insurance bandits have to cover everyone and can't deny or recind coverage....it could easily go up as well.
This whole thing is a shell game. Nobody knows...everyone throws out info that supports their pro/con position, and it really doesn't matter in the end; because it isn't whether or not it goes up or down, it's whether or not we get coverage for ALL our citizens so we can stop being destroyed by medical protection.
I don't care of the cost goes up or down. I care that we get universal health care that protects the Americans and their families so we can go on living a healthy and prosperous life. F*ck the repukes. They are only concerned with themselves, and they say "F*CK the rest of the country....I got mine!"
Your now an enlightened individual. Now comes the hard part. Dealing with reality.
..but his party is not trying to rescue America from the health insurance nightmare the corporations have us in.
The Dems can't control their party in spite of being in the majority. I'm Tim Kaine and I'm denying DINO's campaign funds and anything else if they're not on board. Whatever it takes but that ain't gonna' happen.
A whole $500 less!
Wow, lemme see what it is per year now...
Well I'll be dipped in shit!
I'd only have to pay $11,500 a year instead of $12,000!
WOW! Now I'll be able to buy a house in 30 years instead of 30 years and 6 months!
Maybe I should just go "low income" so I can save even more!
Let's see how that works:
I bring home $17000 a year (low income, remember?) and I pay $8000 of that for yearly rent (assuming I live in some far out of the way rural town, double that for CA, NY or any where else there is work), $500 more for utilities, $300 for a phone, $720 more for bus fare to and from work and I am on a forced starvation diet totalling $3600 a year.
That leaves me ...
$3820.
And exactly how much is insurance going to cost me?
In other words:
BULLSHIT!
A supplement of what exactly?
Here, let me help you:
Notice the words "Tax Credit".
That means what?
It means I pay it all first and then next year I can write it off of my taxes.
You do understand how that works right?
Don't be such a sucker.
What a dick!
And not too bright either.
to be a republican before you qualify for a crying towel. You've been whining for days now, get over it or at least try getting your arguments right.
You have not done anything to refute them, you have just decided to toss some ad hominem at me.
Perhaps you might try refuting my argument instead of attacking me personally?
As for whining for days, really?
Where have I been "whining"?
Mostly I've been pointing out the facts and making cogent arguments to support my views.
Two things you aren't too good at.
waiting until the final bill comes out and then we can discuss it.
You want us to shut up and not point out how lacking it all is and just sit tight and wait for an even further watered down version to make it through the Senate!
Sorry.
I don't think I can be as big a sucker as you are.
throwing up aa bunch of phoney numbers like it appeaars you may have.
Is that what you think?
What, do you live at your mom's or something?
I paid $1000 a month for a family of 3 for health care, a $500 a year savings is NOTHING as I pointed out.
As for low income, $17000 a year take home is ~$9 an hour, low income right?
You can just take the rest of my numbers and divide them by 12 (I did it the other way around to create them) and you'll get a pretty accurate picture of the current costs of utilities, public transportation and the like.
Phoney numbers? Only a fool who lives in his mom's basement would fail to recognize the numbers that I posted as close to reality.
Tell you what, even after this bill makes it through to screw us all let's you and me not discuss it mkay?
You just aren't up to the task.
the only $500 a year savings? Are you a single parent? In most states you would qualify for Medicaid on your inncome. You are trying to tell us that you spend over 60% of y0our net income for health insurance. Just seems farfetched by doing the math.
You are trying to argue this and you haven't even read the article?
Here, in the article above:
Do you see it now?
As for 60%, now you are the one making up numbers. Funny how people like you do things like that, you know, accusing others of doing what you are doing?
No, I paid 22% of my income after taxes for health insurance. That is in no way far fetched.
Like I said, you are seriously not up to debating this.
that you made a net income of $17,000 and paid $12,000. I'm usuing your numbers
.
I said:
I never said how much really make.
I only said how much I really spent on health insurance.
You should stop now, you aren't helping yourself by continuing to display your lack of reading comprehension in this manner.
you should assume how much a low income earner would pay.
Shouldn't.
I worked out the numbers for what a $9 an hour worker has to work with.
That leaves him/her a grand total of $320 a month extra if they starve themselves.
There are NO plans available for that price anywhere in the country.
They do NOT get money from the government in ANY of the proposals put forth to help them cover it, they get "tax deductions". As I pointed out, you have to pay it all first to deduct it at the end of the year.
That means a worker without employee health care making $9 an hour will NOT be insured by ANY plan put forth so far.
Period.
Are you really this obtuse or are you just pulling my chain?
no to all.
Then what is your excuse for being so damned opaque, not reading the article before jumping into a debate about it and being unable to actually comprehend what you do bother to read?
and I wasn't able to download the 4 page article which is only Grubers opinion. Apparantly, you believe everything you read.
I hit the nail on the head.
Oh well, I don't feel right beating up on someone who rides the short bus.
I think I'll just let this thread stand as a testament to your thickness without adding any more to it.
my parents kicked me out of the house when I turned 65 and qualified for medicare.
.
You do know that doesn't help your case.
10 or 65, makes no difference if you are as thick as a brick.
you really do believe everything you see in print, don't you? Everything you see on TV and hear on the radio is true too.
Do you actually rebut any arguments or is attempting unsuccessfully to attack the person all you are capable of?
Don't bother answering, it is clear that you don't have the requisite grasp of the topic to do much more than misquote and attack.
You aren't up to debating here, and you aren't really much of a troll either.
Bye bye loser.
If you really believe in that stuff.
The knuckle dragging luddites couldn't care less what some edumacated scientistic person says. They're all elite libruls lying to cover up stuff and defy GAWD!
:)
These clowns don't look at a problem and say "if it's broke, fix it." The approach is more like "if it's broke, let's break it some more and make it worse."
I think it depends more on how much $$$ it will make them.
If actually fixing something was what paid best . . .
they need to make payments on boats, vacation homes, keep the little lady happy, etc . . Their house payment alone is probably more then most Americans make each month.
Probably their car payments and expenses for that matter.
"Their house payment alone is probably more then most Americans make each month."
So it really is more important!
(snark)
... just another white lab coat.
The truth remains that whether costs go up or go down, the members of Congress have their Cadillac plan at taxpayer expense. There is no incentive for them to seek what is better for us.
I think the couple that crashed the state dinner shows what 'official Washington' is - a bunch of desperate famewhores disconnected from reality.
"The government consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. They have, taking one with another, no special talent for the business of government; they have only a talent for getting and holding office."
H. L. Mencken
What's in the Senate bill that will keep costs down?
The same magicical stuff that makes the Iraq and Afghanistan occupations free?
(just taking a guess here)
~
..better.
I was speaking of the magical dust which wafts from the wings of angels.
The illusion that costs are down?
will ask the Senate for another Credit Line Increase to pay for Health Care along with another Credit Increase to keep the government running another 30 days as to finish Health Care reform.
"Surge" in Afghanistan whereby he will again ask the Senate for an Additional increase in the credit line to pay for ads saying . . "we are working on Health Care."
bail out another contributors failing company . . . per the "emergency spending act"
Funny how we can spend trillions on useless wars that benefit the Military Industrial Complex, give energy giants access to hugely profitable natural resources, train a new generation of "terrorists" and give them a cause to fight, yet we can't find a few bucks to insure the health of the citizens who pay for all this with their hard earned dollars.
But we can legislate that every citizen must buy private insurance that wastes 1/3 of their premium on profit and overhead (that includes advertising, lobbying, outrageous CEO salaries, etc.), limits available care via denials (this legislation will not stop that), "network" restrictions, administrative obstruction, etc. The corporate death panels will live on, that's how they make money.
You want to know who the real terrorists are?
..useless wars (although I do think if Afghanistan was prosecuted properly with the intention of getting or killing obl it wouldn't have been useless but I digress from the thread), w BORROWED billions or trillions on useless wars (see comment above, w investigated for war crimes NOW!)
... so we can spend the millions necessary to train, equip, transport and support soldiers for Afghanistan, but we can't be arsed to provide our country with healthcare reform.
..the Afghanistan Army cuz they can't do it themselves. What, no OIL money from that pipeline? How come karzai?
and I may be ignorant about this, but why now wouldn't a new insurance company start up that has low, affordable premiums. It would seem like you could quickly gain a LOT of new clients and still turn a profit. Am I missing something here?
Executive salaries and perks, glass offices, luxury suites over at the stadium, etc. There's a lot involved in starting up an insurance company that isn't obvious to the casual observer!
..profitable in this economy, all of your "..if's, and's and but's.." could be reconciled as well. We are in a jobless recovery at the moment; put a job, any job out there for the consumption of the public and it will be scarfed up faster than a cheeseburger at company picnic.
..can be an insurance executive. There are fairly stringent requirements - you must have:
a. no soul
b. complete disregard for your fellow humans (see a.)
c. a willingness to put profit ahead of any other consideration (see a. and b.)
were granted an exemption from our "Anti-Trust" (Monopolies) laws after WWII.
Sickening, isn't it?
why hasn't one already cropped up?
one problem is that the health-profiteers are shielded from anti-trust laws, and have formed regional monopolies, making it near impossible for any upstarts
Americans would pay "less" but with the subsidies that the SOB Health Co's are getting the policy would actually increase no?
All this is, is a bailout to the health co's. why the f' are you touting this MIT analysis as a great thing? don't you realize that the government is going to be ponying up half of the cost of the plan? don't you think that means that the health co's are going to raise rates b/c we "think" we are saving money.
Americans are so stupid.
"Gruber concludes that people purchasing individual insurance would save an annual $200 (singles) to $500 (families) in 2009 dollars"
Oooohhh 40.00 a month. We can all stop worrying now. What a bullshit fucking bill.
massachussetts insurance ain't so hot, so if this guy endorses the senate(read: Baucus) bill. I want a second opinion.
time as a bowling ball.
In another blow to Democrats' health care claims, the Congressional Budget Office released an analysis on Monday projecting that the Senate health care bill would raise premiums by more than $2,000 on family policies compared to what the cost otherwise would be if Congress were simply to do nothing.
The report, prepared at the request of Sen. Evan Bayh, found that premiums on policies individuals purchase on their own or through the government-run exchanges would cost 10 percent to 13 percent more in 2016 than under current law. In dollar terms, in 2016 an individual policy would cost $5,800 and a family policy would cost $15,200 if the Senate bill were enacted, according to the CBO, compared with $5,500 and $13,100 under the status quo.
In an appearance on Fox News Sunday, Bayh, a moderate Democrat from Indiana, said that the CBO report would figure prominently in his decision making process as he evaluates whether he should support the legislation.
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