 |
Health Care Legislation
I understand that we cannot move forward as a nation until we fix the major problems in our health care system. These problems reduce our productivity, drain our economy, undermine our readiness for emergencies, and threaten our well-being. We need a better deal on health care. Universal coverage and universal responsibility by all parties is the only way to get a truly better deal. While we wait, we waste money, lives, and productivity. In Congress, I will pursue policies that address this crisis, the waiting will stop. We must move forward together to be a healthier, fairer, more productive people with a health care system that makes us stronger. I support the universal responsibility of individuals, employers, insurance companies, and government for universal coverage. This means that everybody should be covered and every person and every business must contribute based on their ability to pay. If a person is unable to pay for insurance, the government must help buy their insurance through subsidies on a sliding scale based on income. Like individuals, businesses should only have to make contributions based on their ability to pay. In exchange for a larger market and a lot more customers, most of whom are pretty healthy, the insurance industry will have to end price and coverage discrimination against people who need medical care. Universal coverage is an important priority for our productivity, our economic growth, our readiness to deal with national and local emergencies, and the lives and health of our people. I support plans that can be implemented easily. There is no reason why enactment of a Universal coverage plan should be postponed or implementation impeded. Delay empowers coverage opponents and wastes lives and money. We cannot afford to wait. I will advocate the formation of a voluntary health insurance marketplace identical and parallel to the Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan. Any employer and any individual/family must be able to purchase high-value health insurance at an optimal price either through paying a defined contribution into the marketplace or through purchasing health insurance as an employment benefit from the marketplace. Coverage must occur through direct enrollment as people choose their plans or automatically when people file their tax returns, complete W-4 forms at the start of employment similar to the way they sign up for health insurance now when they start a job, or show up for health care with a provider. Through the process of automatic coverage and enrollment, universal coverage would be guaranteed. I also support voluntary participation in a universal healthcare marketplace. Employers and individuals must be permitted to choose to keep their existing insurance arrangements or participate in universal healthcare. No one should be forced into this more sensible system, but over time, as people see how well it works, we should expect that more and more people will choose to join. Every American must be guaranteed a number of comprehensive health coverage options within a universal healthcare system. At the same time, market forces must be harnessed to make insurance more affordable and improve health care, rather than harm it, as is all too often the case today. If employers choose to provide coverage from a universal healthcare system as an employee benefit, their employees should get to choose from all the plans in the marketplace, making a wide array of choices automatic. It must free employers from having to make actual healthcare choices for their employees, a particular burden to smaller employers who interact closely with employees and lack the administrative capacity to oversee insurance plans. People must be allowed to keep their insurance plan even if they change jobs. As more people choose to participate a universal healthcare system, more and more Americans would gain a choice of diverse private health plans at lower prices - the kind of choice today that is limited to employees of the federal government and large corporations. Americans will eventually gain the ability to choose for themselves and their families the kind of health plan they want, rather than leaving that choice in the hands of employers who may be more interested in controlling costs than in meeting each family's needs. In addition, people who make personal choices to improve their health such as smoking cessation, weight loss, and exercise programs should have access to plan rewards and incentives. Health coverage must also become increasingly portable. If people like their health plan, they should be allowed to keep it regardless of job changes (unless they happen to work for an employer who insists on staying outside a new federal healthcare system). What kind of health care and benefits you get will should no longer depend on what state you're from - you should be able to count on your health care as an American whether you're from Mississippi or Massachusetts. Chronic illness now accounts for 74 percent of private health insurance medical spending, 96 percent of Medicare spending, and 83 percent of Medicaid spending. We need to make significant changes in how we prevent and treat chronic illness. A better approach can lead to better health as a nation and savings. As your Representative, I will push for an integrated system of chronic disease management modeled after the system used by the Veterans Administration. That system should employ the most innovative methods of care coordination including interoperable health information technology and management between providers and levels of care. Universal Healthcare must promote widespread use of information technology among all providers and plans and will provide the mechanisms for monitoring and improving quality. I strongly support Medicare and feel Medicare must remain intact; all people under 100% of poverty must remain eligible for Medicaid with adjustments in the federal match to hold states harmless. |
|
