On Demand
“SCHIP” On His Shoulder
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
President Bush vetoed the expansion of the SCHIP program today. Elisabeth Ryden Benjamin, director, New York Healthcare Restructuring Initiatives at the Community Services Society, thinks this is a wrong move, while Ben Zycher, senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, sides with the President.
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I wonder what conclusions Mr. Zycher from the Manhattan Institute has come to regarding the Schip program?
As in all good research, I'm sure he probably started out with a testable hypothesis and then came up with results that aligned exactly with his organization's previously-stated ideological agenda. That's how science and research work.
The Manhattan Institute:
Denies global warming.
Fronts Bush's Faith-Based Initiative.
Repeatedly anti-immigrant.
and "The Manhattan Institute, founded by William Casey, who later became President Reagan's CIA director, besides subsidies from a number of large conservative foundations has gained funding from such corporate sources as: The Chase Manhattan Bank, Citicorp, Time Warner, Procter & Gamble and State Farm Insurance, as well as the Lilly Endowment and philantropic arms of American Express, Bristol-Myers Squibb, CIGNA and Merrill Lynch. Boosted by major firms, the Manhattan Institute budget reached US$ 5 million a year by the early 1990s." from WorldInformation.org
I believe that all children should have some access to health care, even if their parents employers won't supply it.
That having been said, this dramatic increase in SCHIP was definately a move to lure the Bush Administration to a veto.
What was Bush's co-pay for the recent procedure to remove polyps from his colon?
I'm not sure why Brian bothers with people from the Manhattan Institute or lunatics like Ruth Wisse. These people are just ideologues for whom the facts don't matter!
The don't live in the "reality based world".
Zycher and the Manhattan institute don't care about kids not getting health insurance- why not just admit it? these free market ideologues are concerned only with the rich.
As we debate and deliberate on HOW to do this, kids are dying, and kids are missing out on preventative care that will save us tax dollars later. Just do it!
So according to your guests, the choice is between "crazy" and "strange..." These 2 sound like a married couple!
Aren't the incentives for corporations to make a profit? How exactly would it be in the interest of corporations to insure more people for cheaper? Why are we resorting to the rhetoric of 'social program bad', 'corporation good'? Ben Zychers rhetoric is not useful and acts as just a veil to ensure the power of private corporations. Clearly Ben does not personally know any uninsured children or families. Why don't you ask him that Brian?
Would someone mind explaining to me why the idea of ensuring more children have adequate health care coverage, no matter how much their family makes, is a bad idea? Children are supposed to be our most precious resource. We have them to further our legacy, to continue to build our world; they are our gift to the future. Don't complain to me about the money -- I pay taxes every year, so I know there's money to be had. It's just that the government would rather spend it on frivolous expenditures than on the people who need it most: the poor, children without health care coverage, wounded veterans, the elderly. Governor's Spitzer and Corzine are to be commended for their foresight.
Mr. S,
So you're saying Orrin Hatch is involved in a scheme to get pres. s-f-b to show his true colors? Don't forget, the current occupant is the spawn of a woman who characterized Katrina as a boon to the disadvantaged people of New Orleans.
My family went without insurance for a more than a year. (floating somewhere between pride & fear) It took a $2,000 dollar trip to the emergency room to get me to apply for state health. Which we thankfully got.
Another point,
When families move off of private insurance to SCHIP it is not because they want to screw the govt- it is because they are struggling to meet all of their expenses.
Oh this guy is too too precious. I think Brian should go exclusively to the Manhattan Institute for opposing views to the reality based community!
How about this--Leave cigarette smokers alone! Why is it OK to tax smokers, a tax that hurts lower income individuals the most, to pay for healthcare for the children of lower income individuals? I'm all for the expansion of SCHIP, but find the money somewhere else. If everyone stopped smoking, as public health agencies want, many government programs would just collapse.
when will someone point out that Medicare and Medicaid (and the VA) are much more efficient bureaucracies than is the private health insurance/hmo system. and of course americans spend much more per capita than other countries with 100% coverage.
zycher- why is government coverage bad for the economy? this guy's arguments are specious, he needs to be challenged.
I'm saying Mr. Reid and Ms. Pelosi did.
Not that it's not a good idea, but to put something this dramatic on President Chimpy's desk without negotiation will surely result in a veto and hurt this vital program.
Let's keep in mind here "the market" is an abstract word that actually means multiple entities of business, consumers and economic trends.
Schip, and programs like Schip, are documented and developed plans to provide a service to an explicit demographic.
So we basically have free market ideologues advocating people cease caring about their communities or their fellow human beings and abandoning them to the whims of this vague notion, "the market".
Like the Church in the Middle Ages, like Stalinists in Soviet Russia, those who continue to champion "the market" today as the a priori solution to all human quandary are in fact playing a power game merely meant to subjugate the disenfranchised.
The Manhattan Institute has a great track record of stepping on the disenfranchised: Charles Murray, author of the racist, eugenicist "The Bell Curve" while a fellow there.
Funny how when it comes to unborn children, the government falls all over itself for their rights and their best interests and oohhhhh the precious children!
But once these precious children are born and prescient and breathing human beings....what? they need healthcare? Oh, my, well the government can't get involved in that - it's the first step down the road to communism!
As a family making $110K we can afford a house, using 33% of our income (after, not before, tax!) that costs $250K. Have you SEEN a house in the NYC area (or city) costing that much lately?
Drop the government subsidies to homebuilders, Freddie Mac, etc. that are driving up home costs via government handouts -- until then home buyers must make choices like this every day.
Mr. Zycher cites the benefits that would stem from allowing insurers to charge based on risk. I could understand charging more for customers who smoke and/or eat unhealthy diets. However, could Mr. Zycher justify charging higher rates to customers with congenital conditions?
Spot on, Sarah. And let's not forget the snowflakes.
Does this guy have any kids of his own? Stiches and shots? What world is he living in? I think he need to spend a day in a big city emergancy room....
I'm left to wonder what the entitled Mr. Zycher does for his insurance. He certainly is out of touch when it comes to raising children.
Why does Zycher sound like he is in the witness protection program?
Great point Sarah!!
why do right wing guys always try to bully people who do agree with them??
The entire Western world have single payer insurance, and have an over all healthier population. The universal insurance that these nations in the West have adopted have saved money, and are not bankrupting their nation. Why is it that when we “U.S.A” start discussing insuring just the people with out any insurance we start yelling “who is going to pay for it” and that we are going to bankrupt our country!
How is this possible?
The caller citing $45,000--and Republicans objecting to covering incomes of $80,000--don't seem to realize how much the cost of health insurance has gone up in the last several years. People who pay for their own coverage can spend $15,000 a year for a family. That's a third of $45,000! And remember, half of bankruptcies are caused by a medical crisis that someone can't afford, in many cases even though they do have health insurance. When the middle class can't afford coverage, then yes, it is appropriate for them to get a government benefit.
Having people with opposing views does not necessarily make the discussion fair! It makes it a "who cares" debate, yet again, of two opposing views that, again, goes nowhere. This guy is really wrong. Kids need health care, as does everyone else. We may have the best health care in the world but we don't use for on everyone.
This "regressive tax" on the poor issue is a red herring the industry likes to push.
For one thing, while smokers tend to be poorer, that's only a percentage. Many smokers do just fine economically.
For another, even the tobacco industry recognizes that a higher tax will decrease smoking rates. According to a recent AP article, "Bill Phelps, spokesman for Philip Morris USA . . . . said a steep federal tax increase could accelerate the national decline in smoking to the point that the insurance would have to find other revenue sources." (The diminishing revenue argument is also bogus; Industry PR likes have it both ways.)
More poor people quitting means more of their money can go to child care, education, etc., instead of being completely wasted feeding a nicotine addition.
There is ZERO need for a health insurance industry. Period.
Single payer is THE way to go.
The ONLY reason we don't have single payer is because the existing economic incentives and the way we finance our politics leads to legalized bribery.
So the status quo results from corruption. Corruption that is legal!
It really is that simple. This is a matter of greed vs common human decency.
Simple; but it'll be very difficult to change the status quo as it will fight back tooth and nail in a thousand different ways.
Check-ups are not that expensive?!
Mr. Zycher uses the word "subsidize" as if it were an epithet, when in fact it is merely rhetoric. It is obvious that he is not of the middle class, or he'd realize that those of us who are, no matter how much we may be making, are having a hard time paying our bills, and we need programs like SCHIP to get by until our finances can be stabilized. I for one wouldn't try to "welfarize" this program.
Ben Zycher is a monster. He's making Ms. Benjamen's argument for her!
Did that guy just blame the mother for that kid's aneurysm? Seriously? I mean, really?
Mr. Zycher, I think, is the most cold-hearted cut-throat guest I've heard on this show (what's worse is I think he knows it). On top of that neither of these guests can debate, they can only shout with their fingers in their ears. Please, next time a "debate" turns out like that, just thank them and move on to the next segment.
I'm not a doctor, but isn't an aneuryism a random, freaky event that can happen to anyone, regardless of age, sex, creedence, color and WHAT FRIGGIN' INSURANCE THEY HAVE?!
Gaines,
You must have missed william kristol!
(Sorry Brian, couldn't let it pass.)
This comment was removed for its offensive nature.
this zycher cat is one of the scariest sounding people i have ever heard on the radio.
the voice is also pretty creepy....but i was just talking about the rhetoric.
"children don't really need health insurance anyway".
this was pretty much his point.
he is such a market fundamentalist that he would prefer to simply leave kids with no health insurance rather than have the government help cover them.
there is not a single person working for the manhattan institute who even has to deal with any of the terrible consequences of what they promote in this area. they all have expensive deluxe health coverage as do all their friends and family....so those who are NOT in this position are merely numbers to be manipulated to achieve conservative policy goals.
Mr. Zycher is woefully out of touch. My father is an Pediatric ED docter and the ED is constantly overwhelmed with children coming in for ridiculous health care reasons such as needing a band-aid (no kidding!) and getting a note to return to school--these are hardly emergency needs. While it is valid to seek medical attention for whatever reason, these needs are much better served at the hospital run clinical around the corner from his hospital. To say that a child should go to the ED for a check-up and then correcting himself after your asking him "Really? A child should go to the Emergency room for a check-up?" and saying 'there were plenty of ways to get medical care' is so outrageous as to bewilder any intelligent person. Sure you can get care it is PAYING for the care, which is of concern! My child is on SCHIP and I am currently without health insurance. Without her health insurance I would be in a dire financial state, or she would go without. I wonder who is giving him facts, because he has them disgustingly wrong. It is a great diservice to our children to deny them SCHIP.
I read a few years ago that, contrary to the conventional caricatures of European nanny states, the rate of self-employment was higher in Italy than in the U.S., and that health insurance helped explained this disparity. In Italy, quitting your job is a lot less risky. Does employer-based private health insurance depress the entrepreneurial spirit?
A case in point: My wife is a freelancer without benefits. This year I also, for fortunate reasons, became self-employed. My family's annual household income increased by about $10,000, from $50,000 to $60,000, but our monthly health insurance bill went from $400 for a family of three to $1100--a second rent. We are not poor, but we have almost no disposable income and almost no savings.
Bush and Zycher keep insisting that public health insurance is bad for the economy. But doesn't the inflationary cost of private health insurance reduce consumer spending to the economy's detriment? (I'd love to replace my old, energy-guzzling refrigerator but can't.) If potential entrepreneurs balk at the risks and costs of self-employment, aren't potential jobs lost? Didn't American automakers open factories in Canada in part to reduce their health insurance bills? Furthermore, because health care is driven by need, not choice, isn't it a fallacy to treat it as a conventional free market?
Nick Lento has it dead on. I hear a lot of "If theres more coverage then my taxes go up". Understand that your income taxes pay only for servicing the federal debt, to the Federal Reserve. Which is a private bank, which prints money out of thin air at will, operating entirely for private profit.
If you don't understand that then you will be hopelessly trapped in this Hegelian dialectic. A meaningless debate.
The conversation about the 'middle class' not needing coverage for their kids is ridiculous - real incomes have been decreasing in our country since the 1970s; translation: the middle class is not as well off as it once was. Add to that the skyrocketing of health care costs, and you've got lots of families--poor and middle class--who: 1) do have employer-supported insurance but struggle to afford the remaining premiums, deductibles and copays 2)don't have employer-based coverage and are faced with a choice between devastating premiums or no coverage; or 3) simply cannot afford coverage.
How dare Mr. Zycher and others suggest that some kids having no coverage is a solution for anyone? Not his kids or grandkids, I assume - anyone who has a child knows that the worst thing in the world is not being able to get them the care they need. This goes for long-term wellness care as well as catastrophic coverage. It is unconscionable if we as a society go on allowing so many kids to go without.
Also, a note about discussing 'the working poor' and 'the middle class' - the poverty line for a family of 4 is somewhere around $21,000 for 2007. The 'middle class' in this country are not equipped to deal with rising costs, and it results in rising costs across the board.
What does the government propose for PREVENTATIVE health care such as perhaps more health awareness courses in school, anti-smoking campaigns, nutrition awareness? Most of these poorer kids are fed on pizza and MacDonalds daily. What programs does it have in place for healthy eating and lunch programs?
And the responder who questioned Mr. Zycher's understanding of what kind of care kids needs is right on. An earache in an adult is far less detrimental than it is for a 5 year old. Little immune systems are still developing and getting sick as a kid is common. They are in constant danger of it. I was in the hospital twice as a kid and was in the military and had immmediate health care available. Parents shouldn't suffer and have to be constantly behind with the bills through the cost of day to day living.
First, Benjamin's are the accurate statistics, drawn from government agencies and other reputable sources. Zycher is quoting right-wing think-tanks.
Secondly, "inter-state competition" is right-wing-ese for the abolition of state insurance regulation. This means, for example, that the CA state agency that imposed a $1M fine last year on Wellpoint for illegally dropping pregnant women and sick people from its health plans and NYS's rules mandating the sale of health insurance policies to cover children whose parents do not have policies, would no longer exist.
Thirdly, my Unicare health insurance family policy costs $22,000 per year, a premium of which I pay half out of pre-tax dollars. In January, my 19 year-old son will be dropped from the plan because he is a part-time rather than a full-time college student, and I will have the choice of either paying $500 per month for COBRA, or buying a plan that would undoubtedly exclude coverage for my son's pre-existing conditions. So it is b.s. that kids can be covered cheaply.
Finally, we have public schools, fire and police departments, highway commisions, santitation pick-up and other public services without the fear that G.E. and Microsoft will be taken over by the government. The socialism argument is a mere bogeyman strategy.
I know that I am preaching to the choir, but these are the points that I would have made had I been too bleeping furious to call.
Laura,
Yup, he did blame the mother for the kid's aneurysm. That was his way of making sure he got the last word.
Brian,
Stop putting these clowns on the air.
Why don't we let Wal-Mart provide healthcare. At least Wal-Mart seems to be able to get costs down (aside from abusing employees). It doesn't seem Ms. Benjamen has any ideas for keeping costs down - just adding more people to the dole, no matter what the cost, and framing the opposition as evil. At least the "evil" Mr. Zycher is suggesting ways of getting the costs down through competition - i.e. letting states compete. Why are costs skyrocketing and where is the money going? It would be nice to hear an answer to this question because it seems NY State would love to keep pouring tax payer money into this abyss, no questions asked. Clearly – in Ms. Benjamen’s world – the solution is a career in the health insurance industry, where all the money is going and you can feed off the state and afford your own private health insurance.
I wish that Bush would be as agressive in pushing preventive healthcare reform as he was in pushing for preventive war.
Below is a list of Zycher's "publications," copied from the Manhattan Institute's website. While he purports to be an economist, there is not a single scholarly publication among them. This guy is a mere propagandist for right-wing causes. While I think both sides of every issue should be discussed, I really found this Ann Coulter clone to be despicable: insulting, condescending and dishonest. Can't we do better?
Should the federal government negotiate directly with pharmaceutical companies? Medicare Patient Management, July/August 2007
Drug Imports: The Unappreciated Downside Investor's Business Daily, 05-08-07
License to Ill National Review Online, 01-11-07
We oppose negotiations on Medicare Part D drug prices The Hill, Letter to the Editor, 01-10-07
Prescription drug costs Washington Times, 12-27-06
The Human Cost of Drug Price Negotiations RealClearPolitics.com, 11-29-06
Getting Off the Latest Beltway Bandwagon: Why Conventional Wisdom on Drug Marketing Is Wrong Medical Progress Today, 10-20-06
A bad plan for prescription drugs The San-Diego Union Tribune, 8-28-06
The Bureaucratization of Safety and Effectiveness Medical Progress Today, 7-7-06
The real oil profiteers Orange County Register, 5-7-06
Policy Forum: The State of the Union Health Care Proposals The Dogs That Yawned Medical Progress Today, 2-7-06
Reports
I only hope for the people opposing this expansion that Ben Zycher is not their lead guy. He made me want to support the legislation just because ... talk about being a mean old man. Break it up Ben, have a pop-tart.
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