I wonder who it was that said this recently? Take a moment and think about it.
I'm sure your first thought was a Democrat or health reform lobbyist, right?
It was, in fact, Jackie Berry, spokesperson for 3m. 3M is one of the largest companies in the world with over 76,000 employees world wide. 3M has decided to give their retirees cash to go and shop for health care on their own, giving them the freedom to choose whatever plan they see fit.
3M is a company that sees the benefit of the new health care reform law.
Let's let the soak in for a moment, shall we.
(cue elevator music for 1-2 minutes)
And we're back.
So what exactly is going to happen?
- Starting Jan. 1, 2013, 3M retirees eligible for Medicare will get a health reimbursement arrangement: an account with credit in it to buy a Medicare supplement plan or a prescription drug plan.
- Starting Jan. 1, 2015, retirees not eligible for Medicare will also get a retiree health reimbursement arrangement to buy an individual insurance plan on the open market
Berry said retirees will end up saving money, thanks to several provisions due to kick in between now and then.
Open Market? Freedom of choice? Saving Money? Wait...I thought the opposite was supposed to happen under this new law. Was there a very large group of people not telling me the truth? Hmmm....
Not everyone is happy with freedom, however.
Rita Horne, 73, whose husband Einer Horne worked 33 years at 3M, was not pleased to receive the letter.
"I got to tell you, I would like to take Congress and wring their necks," said Horne, of Hudson, Wis. "They've taken a very satisfactory and good health insurance program and going to I don't know what."
Her husband, 75, who's had cancer and open-heart surgery, said he knew this day would come ever since "Obama passed Obamacare."
"You would think every corporation in America would do the same. Number one, it's going to save a hell of a lot of money and number two, it's probably as fair a system as you can get out of anybody," he said.
Will the new plan save money for him? Horne laughed: "I have no idea."
Saving money and being fair you say, Einer? At least he admits it. But Rita doesn't want that freedom or choice at all. Sad. And why, Rita, aren't you guys already on Medicare?
More importantly, take note of the words I have bolded in black. There is nothing that is more accurate a summation of where all this vitriol about health care originates: fear of the unknown. They don't know what is going to happen but they sure don't like it. How is that possible if you don't know?
See, this is where people like the Koch Brothers come in with FreedomWorks and prey upon people's fears. They know people don't really know that much about reform so they use it to their advantage and co-opt them into believing complete lies. The end result is basically the current form of the GOP.
The fact is that as more companies follow the lead of 3M, more people are going to have a choice about where to get their health care. This will eliminate health care being tied to employers which has not worked out well at all. It's a step in the right direction of eliminating the far too many middle men. You don't hear the word "freedom" associated with the new health care law amid the screaming by people who stand the most to lose from reform. But here it is, folks, plain as day.
This is an excellent example of why I supported it. And a shining example of the free market:)
22 comments:
Wow. This one is certain to raise the blood pressure of many who post here. I can't wait for the coming shitstorm of vitriol.
Kudos to 3M for getting out in front on this one. Health care reform has been framed as being constrictive when the exact opposite is true. I'm quite confident that Rita and Einer will discover this in a few years and be quite happy.
Notice the anger in Rita's neck wringing comment. Anger and fear together make for a bad mix which more than often results in profoundly stupid actions.
Before you all pat yourselves on the back too much, could you answer a few questions?
Could 3M have done this before Obama-care? If so why didn't they?
When they say 'saving money', to whom are they referring?
Yeah, I'm with GuardDuck - take away the Obama Administration spin and this is just another greedy corporation dumping its responsibility. We all know how y'all feel about those evil, greedy corporations.
Not to mention, here again is a corporation towing the govt line - not vice versa.
I thought that the idea was to get the employer out of the way so people could have the freedom to purchase their own insurance. The new health care law sets the table for that to happen and here is an example of it happening. It's also an example of Mark talking about why he supports the president which I'm sure will be forgotten quickly in a series of comments which serve only to obfuscate.
Well, all this time I thought you lefties thought Wal-mart was evil because they didn't provide insurance for their employees.
Now I find out they were simply giving those employees the freedom to choose their own insurance.
I sure wish you'd all make up your mind.
U.S. Waives Health Insurance Minimums for 1 Million
"Thirty companies and organizations, including Jack in the Box Inc. and the United Federation of Teachers, won’t be required to raise the minimum annual benefit included in low- cost health plans covering seasonal, part-time or low-wage employees. The Department of Health and Human Services said it granted waivers in late September so workers with minimum plans would keep coverage without major premium increases. "
I thought that the idea was to get the employer out of the way so people could have the freedom to purchase their own insurance.
If that was the case I would've been all for it, but as far as I know that was never part of the proposal. Or have you read all 3000 pages and found something no one else seems to know about?
Corporations should have no responsibility for providing health care for their employees, any more than they should provide them food, clothing and shelter, the other necessities of life.
It's just an accident of economic history that companies began to offer health insurance back in the day when it was cheap and it was a recruiting tool. But since the price has been going up, companies have been shifting more and more of the burden onto employees, while maintaining control over the administration and cost structure.
As I've noted before, corporate-controlled health care is the worst of all possible solutions. When companies foot the bill, they are the customer, not the patient. That means the health care provider is beholden to the company and is going to make the company happy, and that does not necessarily make the patient happy.
When I had company-provided health care every single expense was initially rejected out of hand by the insurance company, no matter what. These weren't frivolous claims -- every one was ordered by a doctor -- and every one was ultimately accepted by the provider on the second or third try.
Now I pay for my own health care, and since I'm 20 years older, there are more numerous and more expensive claims (though thankfully nothing life-threatening). But the astonishing thing is that the provider has never rejected a single item -- they just accept them all without argument.
Why? I can't know for certain. But I'm pretty sure that corporations and health care providers have an unwritten agreement that the provider is encouraged to challenge claims because they will both save money if they can con employees into paying for things themselves.
In the best of all possible worlds everyone would buy their own insurance and companies would have to compete for our business on the basis of price and service to the patient, just like most other products and services. The way it is now, most people get company-funded policies chosen by execs who get kickbacks for their company or special considerations when they're wined and dined by health insurance provider salesmen.
Corporations should just pay us more instead of jerking us around with ever-shrinking health care subsidies. The exchanges provided by the new health care law should make this whole thing more transparent and cheaper in the long run. Health care providers will serve a single customer -- the patient -- and the inherent conflict of interest between employer profits and patient health will be eliminated.
Corporations should have no responsibility for providing health care for their employees, any more than they should provide them food, clothing and shelter, the other necessities of life.
Should government be responsible for providing people with food, clothing and shelter?
As I've noted before, corporate-controlled health care is the worst of all possible solutions. When companies foot the bill, they are the customer, not the patient. That means the health care provider is beholden to the company and is going to make the company happy, and that does not necessarily make the patient happy.
And if you take the words "corporation", "corporate" and "company" out of that and replace them with the word "government", leaving all else the same.... that changes what, exactly?
And we're back to the "government is the devil" theme. I will never understand the extreme hatred that the right has for government. It makes no sense whatsoever considering how much government does for them every single day.
Who was it that said the right are like children? They sure as heck are like children who hate being told what is best for them.
"It's just an accident of economic history that companies began to offer health insurance back in the day when it was cheap and it was a recruiting tool."
It's not an "accident", it's an unintended consequence of a government action. Wages were frozen by the government during WWII and adding benefits was the only way companies could work around that artificial limitation. And now Obama has a "Pay Czar", plus ObamaCare tries to force what benefits must be provided and you're wondering about our opposition to more artificial limitations on the market?
It's precisely BECAUSE of such unintended consequences that we oppose top down meddling in the economy.
Yes, removing such historical meddling will be painful as the market corrects.
I think it's funny that you're complaining about a mess that was created by government, and using that mess to try and argue in favor of more government involvement.
But I'm pretty sure that corporations and health care providers have an unwritten agreement that the provider is encouraged to challenge claims because they will both save money if they can con employees into paying for things themselves.
Or, you just had a really crappy insurer. My health insurance pays for stuff no problem. I know that isn't always the case, but you have no problem generalizing from your own very limited experience.
I will never understand the extreme hatred that the right has for government.
Where did anyone say the govt was the devil - other than you that is? Anyway, I sure don't understand the knee-jerk hatred of business from the left.
Now if I could only be rid of the idiots both left and right.
And we're back to the "government is the devil" theme.
Are we? All I did was ask a question. A question which, I note, you decline to gather the cojones to actually answer.
As I've noted before, corporate-controlled health care is the worst of all possible solutions. When companies foot the bill, they are the customer, not the patient. That means the health care provider is beholden to the company and is going to make the company happy, and that does not necessarily make the patient happy.
And if you take the words "corporation", "corporate" and "company" out of that and replace them with the word "government", leaving all else the same.... that changes what, exactly?
blk noted problems with the existing system, where the payer is disconnected from the person receiving the service. I didn't argue, nor did I accuse. I asked a question, that being how is it any better, or even any different, if the payer, still disconnected from the patient, is now the government instead of the employer?
You don't have to answer, of course. But your refusal to answer, your refusal to even consider the question, and your immediate dismissal of the entire concept rather than risking actually thinking it through... those are an answer that is eloquence itself.
I hate to break this to you, but in the real world, "no comment" is, in fact, a comment.
I read about Freedom associated with the health care bill this morning...Obama exempted a bunch of companies from the mandates in the bill. Freedom from complying with the new law...plain as day. Any comment on that move by them?
And we're back to the "government is the devil" theme.
Please keep in mind that ALL I'm doing is assuming that people are going to be people, throughout the process, and that their political affiliation, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, religion, etc. isn't going to stop them from being normal people. In other words, the ones running the government program are going to be no more and no less greedy, power hungry, lazy, stupid, short-sighted, etc. than their private sector counterparts. If you have any evidence that suggests otherwise, I have yet to see it.
So far as I can tell, you are assuming that either people magically become evil when they own businesses and magically become good and wise when they work for the government (but only if they're Democrats), or that somehow what is apparently an identical process will yield different results when performed by a different group.
If you can't even muster the balls to correct my misconceptions (assuming they are such), then you can damn well just suck up the fact that I draw the conclusions I do. A+B=C. Get over that.
Sebelius threatens insurers
"But one can't argue with the fact that insurers aren't going to do these things for free. There is no such thing as a free lunch. If you're going to require insurers to cover more expensive customers and provide more benefits, it's going to cost more.
Making matters worse, ObamaCare utterly fails to control rising health-care costs. In fact, a new report from the government's own actuaries concludes that total US health-care spending will rise faster as a result of the new law than if we had done nothing.
"The result is that insurance premiums will jump as much as 9 percent next year, especially in the individual and small-group markets. Some customers could see hikes of 20 percent or more.
"It's not like the Obama administration couldn't see this coming. New York implemented many of the same insurance rules in 1983. The next year, premiums rose by nearly $500 per policy, resulting in nearly 500,000 New Yorkers dropping their insurance.
"Massachusetts under RomneyCare, which is nearly identical to the new national law, has seen its premiums rising at nearly double the national average. The state has resorted to price controls, leading insurers to threaten to leave the state or stop writing policies."
"Any comment on that move by them?"
Tell the rest of the story, last.
What's your point Mark? I read the story and don't know what you're getting at.
How long does the waiver last? Why is there a waiver? What are the specifics of it?
You tell us. The people you voted for did it.
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