I am not well versed in the inner workings of Medicare. I do know that the plan, like all things related to health care and health insurance, needs some tweaking. We face an aging population and swelling health care needs. There is always room for improvement. What strikes me most about the terminology we use is the irony; there is very little focus on “care” when it comes to all things health related. Patients become numbers, statistics, and actuarial data. Doctors and insurance companies see dollars. More energy is spent caring about money than caring about people. And now we’ve come to a point in our country where our choices can impact the most vulnerable among us, the elderly. I encourage you to read what the Brookings Institute has to say on the issue of Medicare reform.
I am not here as an insurance expert, but as I write about the topic of Medicare from a lay perspective, I cannot help but cringe at the thought of a voucher system. Something about this system seems sketchy to me. We continue to implement consumer compromises in an effort to reduce costs, but have yet to hold insurance companies accountable. Unfortunately, there are no lobbyists for regular people, and we don’t have the muscle to throw our weight around Congress.
The voucher system sounds good on paper alone. It does not take into account realistic increases in health care costs that seniors would have to pay out of pocket. The plan on paper would have you think seniors would actually make money by pocketing the difference between coverage and actual costs. The truth is, coverage would be eroded over time as health care costs and premiums rise.
There are no guarantees.
Vouchers are supposed to fuel competition. There is still no solid evidence on how that plays out. The crux of the challenge continues to be the insurance companies. How can we ensure they are regulated and not participating in deceptive practices? The fleecing of the elderly is rampant in all things financial. I spent almost 10 years working in the financial services industry and worked a great deal with the elderly population. Policies, tax codes, investments, and such are confusing to the most knowledgeable among us. The complexity is simply mind-numbing and exponentially so for many seniors.
This is how I see it from a purely human perspective ... We are talking about one of our country’s most vulnerable populations here. There are stories in the news everyday about people who try to swindle the elderly. Why would our own government be a part of that treachery? We are talking about 50 million Americans here. Not numbers, not statistics. People. The question to ask is this: Do our leaders care more about the financial deficit or the moral deficit our country faces? We must take care of our people.
This post is part of a weekly conversation with our Moms Matter 2012 political bloggers. To see the original question and what the other writers have to say, see Should Medicare Be Replaced by Subsidies?
Image via James McTaggart
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Comments 47
Brookings Institutue is a left-wing think tank, so their agenda-driven findings are useless.
Under Ryan's plan, Medicare as we know it now, will continue to exist. No person over the age of 55 will lose their Medicare benefits. People who are currently 54 or younger will have the OPTION to participate in the regular Medicare program, or accept a voucher. That is, of course, assuming that Obama is out of office, Obamacare is defunded, and the $7,000,000,000,000 he swiped from Medicare to fund his pet project is given back. Otherwise, Medicare will cease to exist in a bit over a decade, thanks to Obama.
The voucher system is a fantastic way to control who and how much, you pay for health services. Because you will be free to choose not only providers but facilities, you are able to price-shop. Providers and facilities are businesses, and they will be motivated to offer the best service at the best price. Competition for your business will keep costs affordable - because if people can't afford the prices, the docs are out of business.
Perhaps the most idiotic statement in the article - "there are no guarantees" with regards to costs. Gee, really? There's no guarantee that we won't discover a cure for cancer in 4 years, and all the costs associated with cancer treatments will disappear, either. Probably why intelligent people don't deal in guarantees when it comes to fiscal planning.
rightside - $7,000,000,000,000 he swiped from Medicare, is swiped by Romney and Ryan too.
Also, please see my previous posts as to why there is GREAT potentional for people of all ages to lose benefits.
What this brings to mind at first glance is what happened with the introduction of managed medicaid plans which of course, had to offer reduced benefits because they were cheaper (and in the big picture, there are really only two ways to squeeze money out of health care: insurance companies have to decrease benefits, or patients have to pay an increased portion of the cost of care in the form of co-pays and deductibles}. How that played out in my metropolitan area was that the least expensive plan was without a doubt the worst- it was great insurance as long as nothing was wrong with you. It didn't take long before the number crunchers at our extremely large hospital system determined that not only was there no profit, but the cost of providing care to those patients actually cost the organization money. They stopped taking that insurance. So these patients now have a choice but realistically, no access. This is a huge huge many tentacled hospital system- so I guess those folks had to choose to go to a hospital an hour away.
WAIT!!!! I thought Ryan was running as the VICE President. Since when would he dictate something like this as VP? Since when does a VP have this kind of power?
rightside - $7,000,000,000,000 he swiped from Medicare, is swiped by Romney and Ryan too.
Yes, but R/R protect the Medicare plan, whereas BO has NO PLAN in place to pull Medicare out of the flames. Under Obama, Medicare is belly-up in a decade or so.
Also, please see my previous posts as to why there is GREAT potentional for people of all ages to lose benefits.
Jennifer-Everyone is peddling their views here and its not going to stop. These are blogs not articles which means all it is is their views.
Again I am confused as to why we can't talk about the alternative which would be Obama's plan if he had one. Personally, I think these blogs should be about which candidates view's on the issue's would be better but it seems all we get is a bashing of the other side. If any editors are reading this it would be great if these blogs had more REAL content. All I learned from this blog was Illena doesn't like Paul Ryan's plan but she doesn't really know anything about Medicare anyway and all she sites are left leaning groups.
Hey Iliana, you know what's ironic? Obama's "AFFORDABLE CARE ACT". It's not affordable OR focused on improving care.
How about writing about subjects that you do know something about?
Ilina, you are a joke. Stop making a fool of yourself with these idiotic articles.