Monday, September 14, 2009

The Baucus Bill - Obamacare the sequel

Here is the summary from US Senate Finance Committee:

Beginning in 2013, all US citizens and legal residents would be required to purchase health insurance or have health coverage from an employer, through a public program (i.e., Medicare, Medicaid, or CHIP), or through some other source that meets the minimum creditable coverage standard. Exemptions from the requirement would be allowed for religious objections consistent with those allowed under Medicare and for undocumented immigrants. Individuals who choose to keep the plan they have today would be deemed to have satisfied the requirement.
In other words - If you are an American citizen, you have to do what we say ... if you are an illegal alien, do what you want.

The bottom line is that where this mandate starts is where healthcare freedom ends: Out of this mandate, forcing Americans to buy what the Government dictates, flows bureaucratic definitions of acceptable coverage, care, and massive subsidies that shift money from almost everyone to almost everyone else. In the pursuit of the mythical bureaucratic solution to an intractable problem (of total health insurance), we hurt healthcare freedom, choice, innovation and quality.

There are ramp-ups in Medicaid, S-Chip and Medicare requirements, all to wrap more and more people in Government-run healthcare. It makes a broken system more broken.

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