The depths to which Barack Obama stooped to distance himself from the elements of his own health care proposal was astounding. No mandates or taxes on small businesses? No price controls on insurance companies (just making sure they pay their claims and cover what they say they cover)? I won't even go into the distortion of the claim that McCain proposes "eliminating" state regulation of insurance companies any more than Obama does by setting up a national marketplace.
Then he keeps on claiming he can reduce premiums by $2500. An exaggeration that is on the verge of a lie... Half of that is supposed to come from costs generated fromo electronic health records! But his estimate of "savings" from EHRs is based on productivity gains which themselves are estimates drawn from private sector examples in the auto industry over ten years. The other amount comes from "disease managment" savings achieved by getting doctors to practice guideline driven medicine. That's called rationing. Also unlikely. And even David Cutler, one of the smartest health care analysts in America acknowledges that the $2500 doesn't translate into reduce premiums:
Obama health adviser Cutler confirmed that the campaign's $2,500 per family projection doesn't represent only out-of-pocket savings for individual Americans. It includes savings to the government, employers and insurers, savings that could, Cutler says, trickle down to families in the form of lower taxes, higher wages or reduced premiums. In fact, Cutler says the $2,500 figure simply comes from dividing an overall savings estimate that's somewhat larger than $120 billion by an approximate number of four-person families in the U.S. "[W]e take the total and divide by the total population, then consider a 4 person family,"
Read More
Then he keeps on claiming he can reduce premiums by $2500. An exaggeration that is on the verge of a lie... Half of that is supposed to come from costs generated fromo electronic health records! But his estimate of "savings" from EHRs is based on productivity gains which themselves are estimates drawn from private sector examples in the auto industry over ten years. The other amount comes from "disease managment" savings achieved by getting doctors to practice guideline driven medicine. That's called rationing. Also unlikely. And even David Cutler, one of the smartest health care analysts in America acknowledges that the $2500 doesn't translate into reduce premiums:
Obama health adviser Cutler confirmed that the campaign's $2,500 per family projection doesn't represent only out-of-pocket savings for individual Americans. It includes savings to the government, employers and insurers, savings that could, Cutler says, trickle down to families in the form of lower taxes, higher wages or reduced premiums. In fact, Cutler says the $2,500 figure simply comes from dividing an overall savings estimate that's somewhat larger than $120 billion by an approximate number of four-person families in the U.S. "[W]e take the total and divide by the total population, then consider a 4 person family,"
Read More
