Stop Low-balling the Public Option

Back in February, reputable economists across the board agreed that the bare minimum stimulus required to prevent the country from suffering long-term unemployment was one trillion dollars. Paul Krugman said the bare minimum was two trillion dollars with no the tax cuts. President Obama, still playing nice with Senate repugs and Blue Dogs, low-balled the stimilus to $750 billion, only $400 billion of which was real job creation.

Guess who was right? We're still hemorrhaging jobs and exploding foreclosures and sabotaging Democrats for the 2010 elections because President Obama low-balled the stimulus.

And now he's doing the same thing to the public option for health care reform.

Many progressives were disappointed that President Obama failed to take a nonnegotiable stand for a public health insurance option during his speech to a joint session of Congress on September 9. Less noticed was the fact that he dropped the target cost of the reform package 10 percent, to $900 billion, from the $1 trillion Congress had been aiming for. But this difference should greatly alarm those who care about providing all Americans with healthcare coverage.

When it comes to this debate, size does matter: within the framework Congress is pursuing, money trimmed from a package will mean lower subsidies, weaker coverage and fewer people with affordable care. And that will be true even if progressive legislators manage to win the increasingly uphill battle for some form of a public option.

SNIP

But limiting the cost to $900 billion makes it impossible to provide adequate assistance to those who cannot afford care. They will be required to buy coverage at higher rates, and their policies will still leave them vulnerable to exorbitant out-of-pocket costs.

Read the whole thing.

In short, stingy subsidies plus fines for not buying health insurance means that low- and middle-income families could end up paying 20 percent of their gross income on health care each year.

Median family income in the United States is $50,000 per year. Can you afford to spend $10,000 every year on health insurance, co-pays and out-of-pocket fees? What if your decision to spend that $10,000 on paying the mortgage or gas to get to work earned you a $5,000 fine for violating the individual mandate?

Feel warm and fuzzy about health care reform now? Likely to vote for Congressional Democrats next year, much less contribute money and volunteer time to their campaigns?

Confident that President Obama cares more about a public option that really works than signing any old piece of shit that lets him claim victory?

Me neither.

Cross-posted at They Gave Us A Republic ....