New Studies Report Wide Disparity in Health Care Plans
darkcrow
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http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/09/16/new_studies_report_wide_dispar.html
By Perry Bacon Jr.
Barack Obama and John McCain are both proposing more than $100 billion a year in spending for health care, but the candidates' plans have vastly different goals, and vastly different outcomes.
New studies from the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center and the policy journal Health Affairs suggest that Obama's proposal would eventually cover more than 34 million of the roughly 47 million Americans currently without insurance, while McCain's would cover at best 5 million uninsured.
Obama's plan relies on a variety of measures to reduce the number of uninsured, such as increasing the number of people in programs such as Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program, requiring all children to have insurance and offering subsidies for people who cannot currently afford insurance.
Obama's plan was crafted with the intention of creating universal health insurance, although both studies suggest some people would remain uninsured. McCain, meanwhile, touts his plan as one that will rely more on the consumer market to reform health care.
Currently, the value of a person's health care plan is not taxed, creating essentially a subsidy by the government for health care. McCain would tax health benefits while creating a $5,000 tax credit -- $5,000 for families or $2,500 for individuals -- to subscribe for insurance coverage. The studies assume that millions of Americans will use this credit to purchase health care and that some businesses will drop employees from their health insurance plans, resulting in some people losing insurance as well.
Both proposals would face an uphill climb to becoming law. Virtually all congressional Democrats are opposed to McCain's health care vision, which they believe would destroy the employer-based health care system and replace it with one that benefits the young and healthy but not people who are older or sick. (Health insurance companies charge much higher prices for people who are older or have chronic illnesses.)
With the federal budget deficit increasing and a huge list of other projects already proposed, it's not clear that a Democratic Congress would push through Obama's health-care plan either. Some congressional Democrats are already touting more modest goals, such as making sure that all children have health insurance.
By Perry Bacon Jr.
Barack Obama and John McCain are both proposing more than $100 billion a year in spending for health care, but the candidates' plans have vastly different goals, and vastly different outcomes.
New studies from the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center and the policy journal Health Affairs suggest that Obama's proposal would eventually cover more than 34 million of the roughly 47 million Americans currently without insurance, while McCain's would cover at best 5 million uninsured.
Obama's plan relies on a variety of measures to reduce the number of uninsured, such as increasing the number of people in programs such as Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program, requiring all children to have insurance and offering subsidies for people who cannot currently afford insurance.
Obama's plan was crafted with the intention of creating universal health insurance, although both studies suggest some people would remain uninsured. McCain, meanwhile, touts his plan as one that will rely more on the consumer market to reform health care.
Currently, the value of a person's health care plan is not taxed, creating essentially a subsidy by the government for health care. McCain would tax health benefits while creating a $5,000 tax credit -- $5,000 for families or $2,500 for individuals -- to subscribe for insurance coverage. The studies assume that millions of Americans will use this credit to purchase health care and that some businesses will drop employees from their health insurance plans, resulting in some people losing insurance as well.
Both proposals would face an uphill climb to becoming law. Virtually all congressional Democrats are opposed to McCain's health care vision, which they believe would destroy the employer-based health care system and replace it with one that benefits the young and healthy but not people who are older or sick. (Health insurance companies charge much higher prices for people who are older or have chronic illnesses.)
With the federal budget deficit increasing and a huge list of other projects already proposed, it's not clear that a Democratic Congress would push through Obama's health-care plan either. Some congressional Democrats are already touting more modest goals, such as making sure that all children have health insurance.
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