Hook Dem
10-21-2004, 08:44 AM
Kerry health plan would fail, say critics
Recycled Clinton concept favors healthy, avoids sick
By Laura Gilcrest, CBS MarketWatch
Last Update: 2:54 PM ET Oct. 18, 2004 E-mail it | Print | Alert | Reprint | RSS
WASHINGTON (CBS.MW) -- Critics of Sen. John Kerry's health care plan say that one aspect of the scheme, the Congressional Health Plan, is simply a reincarnation of an old Clinton administration idea that is doomed to fail.
The plan would open up to the entire country the health insurance scheme that federal employees have had for years under the Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan.
Depending on where he or she lives, a worker enrolled in the federal health plan can choose from between 10 and 20 different health insurance plans, ranging from HMOs to fee-for-service schemes.
Kerry's proposal would allow small businesses -- those with 50 or fewer employees -- to buy into the federal health plan via purchasing pools. Larger companies could also access the program by sponsoring the health benefits at their work sites.
Champions of the Kerry plan claim it would allow U.S. employees to choose a health plan tailored to their own medical needs, cutting costs in the process. But opponents of the program say that it actually creates "perverse incentives" that will shift most health insurance dollars to healthy enrollees, while the costly, chronically ill will be left in the lurch.
The Congressional Health Plan is actually the failed "managed competition" scheme that then-First Lady Hillary Clinton floated a decade ago, said John Goodman, president of the Dallas-based National Center for Policy Analysis and architect of the health savings account concept.
That aspect of Kerry's health care proposal "will morph into the Clinton plan very quickly because it's got all of the same problems," he said.
Click on link below to view the entire article. Basically, it is the old failed Clinton plan and this from CBS!!
http://cbs.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?siteid=mktw&dist=nwtpm&guid=%7BD59C36B2%2DDF52%2D4DB9%2D9E36%2DD5E00CDA42 E1%7D <http://cbs.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?siteid=mktw&dist=nwtpm&guid=%7BD59C36B2% 2DDF52%2D4DB9%2D9E36%2DD5E00CDA42E1%7D>
Recycled Clinton concept favors healthy, avoids sick
By Laura Gilcrest, CBS MarketWatch
Last Update: 2:54 PM ET Oct. 18, 2004 E-mail it | Print | Alert | Reprint | RSS
WASHINGTON (CBS.MW) -- Critics of Sen. John Kerry's health care plan say that one aspect of the scheme, the Congressional Health Plan, is simply a reincarnation of an old Clinton administration idea that is doomed to fail.
The plan would open up to the entire country the health insurance scheme that federal employees have had for years under the Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan.
Depending on where he or she lives, a worker enrolled in the federal health plan can choose from between 10 and 20 different health insurance plans, ranging from HMOs to fee-for-service schemes.
Kerry's proposal would allow small businesses -- those with 50 or fewer employees -- to buy into the federal health plan via purchasing pools. Larger companies could also access the program by sponsoring the health benefits at their work sites.
Champions of the Kerry plan claim it would allow U.S. employees to choose a health plan tailored to their own medical needs, cutting costs in the process. But opponents of the program say that it actually creates "perverse incentives" that will shift most health insurance dollars to healthy enrollees, while the costly, chronically ill will be left in the lurch.
The Congressional Health Plan is actually the failed "managed competition" scheme that then-First Lady Hillary Clinton floated a decade ago, said John Goodman, president of the Dallas-based National Center for Policy Analysis and architect of the health savings account concept.
That aspect of Kerry's health care proposal "will morph into the Clinton plan very quickly because it's got all of the same problems," he said.
Click on link below to view the entire article. Basically, it is the old failed Clinton plan and this from CBS!!
http://cbs.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?siteid=mktw&dist=nwtpm&guid=%7BD59C36B2%2DDF52%2D4DB9%2D9E36%2DD5E00CDA42 E1%7D <http://cbs.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?siteid=mktw&dist=nwtpm&guid=%7BD59C36B2% 2DDF52%2D4DB9%2D9E36%2DD5E00CDA42E1%7D>