Views in brief
We need facts about health care costs
I JUST finished reading Helen Redmond's excellent article "Why can't we all get KennedyCare?"
It repeated all the points of a letter I sent to the "Honorable Senator" from my home state of Massachusetts when he was previously hospitalized to have a gob of fat removed from his arteries. That was a letter to which Kennedy never responded, as he usually does when I write to him, not even with a form-letter.
The reason I am writing to you is that I would like someone to do what I cannot: present some facts and figures that would show what the cost would be to American taxpayers if we demolished our present health care debacle and replaced it with a national health care system.
If KennedyCare was abolished--along with Medicare, veterans medical care, all the private insurance costs, all employer-paid insurance, and all of the state and municipal insurance costs--would national health care be more expensive in reality? If the cut that insurance companies now get, the duplication of services by competing corporate hospitals and the gouging by pharmaceutical companies were all eliminated, isn't it safe to say the net cost of healthcare would actually go down?
Can someone such as Helen Redmond publish another article that would dispel the myth of a cost-prohibitive national health care system? That's not to say that such information would make national health care more politically viable, but it would expose the lies that our politicians feed us. The outcome would be up to the public.
The one drawback that I see in national health care is the propensity for fraud that is apparent in Medicare, but it also exists in the private insurance system.
John Guiel, from the Internet
Wealth is behind KennedyCare
There seems to be a lot of misconceptions about the health care that U.S. Congress members get ("Why can't we all get KennedyCare?").
They get the same health care plans that all federal workers get. It is far from free and is not as good a plan as some unionized workers in the private sector get.
I work for the Department of Labor. In my case, I pay about $300 a month of the "employee-share" through paycheck deductions. There are various co=pays, deductables ($500, I think) and co-insurance. A hernia operation last year cost me about $550 in out-of-pocket expenses. A couple of years earlier, I got bitten by a potentially rabid cat. The emergency room visit and rabies shot series cost about $600 in out-of-pocket expenses.
If I lose my job, I can continue to get coverage, but have to pay the full premium through a plan similar to COBRA-mandated benefits in private industry--about $1,300 per month for family benefits. At 52 years of age, I better not lose my job! (The exception is the Defense Department. When I lost my job with the Army Corps of Engineers, the employer-share was covered for up to a year--a much better deal, but no other government departments have this benefit.)
Kennedy is getting such good care because he is rich.
Paul Donahue, from the Internet
More ways they don't count inflation
REGARDING "WHY the numbers don't add up": People should see also pages 80-89 in Kevin Phillips' new book Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism.
Besides leaving out food and energy price increases when measuring inflation, the government fudges the numbers in other ways. Two examples: First, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) takes into account "consumer substitution." They assume that if the price of hamburger goes up, consumers will buy chicken instead. Therefore, items with rising prices receive less weight in the calculation of inflation.
According to Phillips, "The current interlacing of gimmicks...far from representing the costs of a constant standard of living, has been described by critics as measuring downward mobility--an index that, in the words of one, 'more closely represents the costs of holding to an ever-declining standard of living.'"
Second, the BLS also employs the concept of "hedonics." Hedonics is a measure of the "pleasure" involved in consuming a good. Hedonics would claim that a current flat-screen, high-definition television provides more pleasure to the consumer than an older model, or that the same amount of money today buys a more powerful computer than it did two years ago. The actual price of the new TV or computer is therefore adjusted downward, lessening inflation.
Phillips also provides a URL for a Web site that attempts to take the "fudge factor" out of the current government statistics: "Shadow Government Statistics". This site demonstrates that both inflation and unemployment are much higher than the official numbers show.
Andree Rathemacher, from the Internet
The National Open Antiwar Conference
IN RESPONSE to Eric Ruder's article "Is the antiwar movement scaring people away?": Ruder neglects to mention the National Open Antiwar Conference in Cleveland, Ohio, the weekend of June 27-29. The International Socialist Organization (ISO) has endorsed this meeting and at least one ISO leadership person is speaking there.
This conference is a good opportunity to build a genuine united front against the war in Iraq. Pity the ISO's newspaper can't see fit to promote the conference.
John Leslie, from the Internet
