Forty-seven million people in the United States do not have healthcare coverage—an increase of eight million people from a decade ago. On Jan. 22, President Bush announced a new “healthcare proposal” in his State of the Union speech. But the plan, if implemented, would really amount to nothing more than an increased tax burden for workers with moderate quality insurance and corporate welfare for insurance companies.
“We believe the private sector is the best delivery of health care,” Bush said to a Missouri audience about his program
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Health care is among the top concerns of the U.S. working class as we see it becoming increasingly inaccessible. Forty-six percent of people are “very worried” about paying for healthcare coverage, according to a fall 2006 Kaiser Family Foundation poll. The only issue that caused more concern than health care was the ongoing war and occupation of Iraq.
Under Bush’s plan, families with policies that cost more than $15,000 a year and individuals who have half that benefit would be taxed on any employer contribution above that amount. The average insured family’s insurance coverage offered by their place of employment costs $11,500 a year.
Conversely, families without employer coverage would receive a $15,000 tax deduction; individuals would receive a $7,500 deduction.
It is estimated that 30 million people would pay more taxes as a result of this plan. Many of these people are workers in unionized workplaces.
The sheer fact that health care costs actually top $15,000 per year is ridiculous. But it is a fact under capitalism. Everything, including health care, is a commodity that is sold for the highest profit possible.
Unions fought hard against the capitalist owners to attain employer-covered health care. Now, the Bush administration wants to erode those benefits and penalize workers for having good healthcare plans. Under the Bush plan, employers and individuals would be encouraged to select cheaper health plans.
The Bush administration claims that the proposed tax deductions would create the ability for uninsured people to purchase health coverage. But even if this did work to some degree, it would make health insurance accessible to only about three million people who don’t currently have it.
Bush’s plan also wants to direct some federal funds to state governments to assist people in getting private insurance coverage—not public services. Although this could, in theory, provide access to a small number of poor and uninsured people, it would do almost nothing for the tens of millions who do not have healthcare coverage.
It would not increase federal funding either. Nor would it divert federal funds from the Pentagon war machine. Instead, the existing pool of federal money dedicated to health care would be “allocated more effectively.” This could mean certain healthcare institutions or clinics get defunded to bolster the plan.
Hypothetically, this could lead to the outlandish situation of someone gaining health insurance under the Bush plan, but then not having access to an open hospital or clinic in the immediate area.
The Bush plan also does not set any type of requirements for care. Private insurance companies would decide what type of services would be covered and how much they would cost. The profit motive again takes precedent over the health needs of people.
Insurance companies profit
Meanwhile, health insurance companies are reporting all time highs in profits.
Highmark, Inc., in Western Pennsylvania tripled its profits in 2004, pulling in $2.5 billion. Nationally, life and health insurance profits jumped to 212.5 percent, according to Weiss Ratings, Inc. The trend is continuing with large health insurers like Wellpoint and Health Net reporting 2006 profit increases of 157 and 439 percent, respectively, from just two years ago.
The Bush administration is adamantly opposed to creating so-called entitlement programs to meet people’s needs.
Entitlement programs such as Medicaid and welfare were won out of workers’ struggles in the 1930s and before. Ryan White—a service system for people with HIV—was won by the AIDS movement in the 1980s.
Bush’s plan would chip away at these programs. But, it would create a virtual entitlement program for the capitalist insurance companies—”welfare” for the healthcare industry owners.
The plan would also offer an incentive for corporations that do offer insurance to withdraw from providing benefits. The rationale behind this move is that, under the plan, workers could purchase their own coverage because of the new tax credits.
Already, there is a developing trend for corporations to refrain from providing benefits for workers. In 2006, 61 percent of companies offered health insurance—a drop of 8 percent from just six years ago.
“The fear is that if it becomes more attractive for people to decline employer coverage and buy on the open market, then you could get great spirals in the employer plans,” said Neil Trautwein of the National Retail Foundation.
A different system
To win real health care in the United States, workers must not be fooled by the Bush plan or the empty promises of Democrats, who are now lining up to criticize the plan.
In 1993, Democratic president Bill Clinton proposed a “universal health plan,” which would have relied on a federal mandate to make companies provide for-profit health maintenance organization (HMO) coverage to workers.
After a highly funded vilification campaign by the insurance industry, the Clinton plan never passed.
One way that universal health plans have been vilified has been through fear campaigns that highlight shortcomings of single-payer systems like those that exist in Canada and developed Europe.
Single-payer systems functions on centralization that projects health needs through public and private health delivery institutions, such as hospitals and clinics. Fees generally are kept low and affordable for people in need of health services.
Insurance companies have created fear of such a system by falsely claiming that people who need to access special procedures, such as surgeries, may have to wait to receive them. The single-payer system in Canada, for example, offers most of these public services. However, Canada’s healthcare system is still held in private hands, so there are shortcomings. But the profit motive behind the system is never blamed for the shortcomings in the single-paper system.
The discrepancies in the United States, where no such system exists—other than Medicare, which is very limited—are so much greater and often affect working-class and oppressed communities in a racist way. For example, African Americans are twice as likely to die of disease as whites.
Nearly 1 million African Americans deaths could have been prevented by providing full access to health services between 1991 and 2000, according to the Dec. 2004 American Journal of Public Health.
In socialist Cuba, the owners and profiteers of health provision have long been eradicated. The country has created a health system that is accessible and works with the people to promote the health of all. The doctor-patient ratio is among the highest in the world.
Cuba has attained the lowest infant mortality rate in Latin America. It is also lower than the infant mortality rate in the United States, especially in working-class urban areas.
Overall life expectancy is among the highest of Latin American nations. In addition, Cuba has sent tens of thousands of doctors abroad to improve health in Asia, Africa and the Americas.
The crisis in the U.S. healthcare system is revealing to more workers how the lack of access to health care is linked to the imperialist wars waged by the U.S. government. The demand “Money for health care, not for war” is being heard with greater frequency as the anti-war movement continues to grow and expand. Bush’s healthcare plan stands in opposition to this movement.
