Once the government assumes full control of health care in the U.S., what happens then? The Patient Protection and Unaffordable Health Care Act (Obamacrap) will eventually control every aspect of health care and health insurance. The new PCIP program technically began on July 1 but more or less entered with more questions than answers.
The biggest question should be, how will this be funded?
Of course the obvious answer is it will come from taxpayers. The government doesn't have any money other than the IOU's they print and the money they take from the wage earners, savers and investors.
When the government orchestrated takeover of health insurance was being cobbled together much was said about how much more costly health care is in America vs. other countries. At 16% of the GDP vs roughly 10% or less for other developed countries. One has to wonder what the game plan really is for reducing the cost of health care by 40%.
One solution, at least with regard to providers who treat Medicare patients, is to simply pay them less. This is already in the works but the problem lies in how does the government force doctors and hospitals to accept 40% less for services rendered? There is already a cumulative 22% cut in provider payments that is part of Obamacrap but it has been "fixed" with a temporary patch whereby Congress simply decided (by separate action) to delay any cuts in order to appease the medical providers.
This is called kicking the can down the road so you don't have to address it now.
It doesn't fix anything and it only affects the cost (if they ever implement it) for 40 million of us. Problem is, there are another 280 million or so that aren't (yet) in that system.
The new mandates do nothing to make health insurance more affordable. In fact, just the opposite is true as premiums will increase significantly as Obamacrap is phased in. Already we are getting indications of what is to come as health insurance companies are raising rates in anticipation of the new rules. At least one Georgia health insurance company has increased premiums three times since the first of the year. Others have dropped maternity options and at least one no longer writes children's health insurance policies.
A few smaller health insurance companies have announced they will no longer write new policies. Others have discontinued popular plans and are now pushing "low cost" alternatives that do not cover brand name prescription drugs.
In September children who apply for coverage cannot be denied coverage and the policy must cover any pre-existing medical conditions. This provision will not affect the cost of health care but it will dramatically increase premiums for children's health insurance. It will also impact the total dollars spent on health care for children.
Obamacrap does nothing to reduce the cost of health care but does and will stimulate demand for health care. We already have a utilization problem. Obamacrap will make it even worse.
When taxes are levied on anything that is not nailed down (and some that are) to subsidize the cost of health insurance for everyone the result is not going to be pretty.
In 2009 tax collections by the federal government were 15% of GDP. How much tax rates and tax collections will have to increase to feed the Obamacrap beast is the subject of speculation. At a minimum, tax collections will have to increase by 50% and probably more. That is just to cover the cost of subsidizing health insurance for the bulk of the population. It doesn't even count the deficit or interest on the national debt.
The next few years are not going to be pretty. What we can say with a degree of certainty is this. Health care as a percent of GDP will not subside but continue to grow. Funding for health care will come in the form of more and higher taxes and many of those tax burdens will be shared by those under age 50 or so. The baby boomer generation is already ageing out of the workforce and they are ready to collect their entitlements.
Baby boomer's are expected to live longer than their parents (the greatest generation) which will put even more strain on Social Security and especially Medicare.
For all the political rhetoric, Obamacrap has done nothing to reduce the cost of health care which means premiums and taxes will continue to grow like Kudzu.