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Meet The New Boss, Same As The Old Boss

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#1

Meet The New Boss, Same As The Old Boss

Michael Lighty

The announcement by the CEO’s from JP Morgan Chase, Amazon and Berkshire-Hathaway that they are forming a new healthcare company signals the symbolic end of the ACA-reform era. They recognize the inefficiencies and profiteering of the private insurance companies, who add no value to businesses dealing with healthcare. And should there be any doubt that the end of the ACA is nigh, there’s this from Trump: “We repealed the core of disastrous Obamacare. The individual mandate is now gone.”

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#2

This initiative from BDB can be seen as a rear-guard action against the increasingly-popular idea of non-profit health care. Obama/Romney/Heritagecare is dying, and good riddance; if at this time we can’t get a national bill passed, then let’s get it done at the state level, or even at the municipal level wherever urban populations present a large enough risk pool. Let’s send all the soon-to-be unemployed insurance CEOs to nursing school. Let’s make them do an honest day’s work for once.

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#3

Bezos, Buffett and Demon swim in a mixture of for-profit corporations, non-profit corporations and foundations, often called “corporate culture”.

Their medical insurance program will be just one more non-profit corporation that their lobbyists will make sure gets preferential tax treatment, not much different than what Henry J. Kaiser started doing in 1933.

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#4

“For the love of money is the root of all evil.”

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#5

17% of GDP.

How this country accepts that as the cost of health care, I’ll never know. All to have a life expectancy just a month or so behind Cuba’s.

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#6

Buffett is CEO of BNSF railroad (“The engine that connects us” and by ‘us’ he means fellow billionaires).
BNSF is the nation’s top coal/oil/gas railway; which reveals Buffett’s priorities. A designated “sacrifice zone” along the Columbia River - no problem for mister Buffett. The Columbia River Crossing I-5 Bridge replacement FIASCO was in part due to Buffett mismanagement of BNSF. Amtrak’s least reliable route, the “Empire Builder” runs on BNSF track on a route that bypasses Montana cities. I wish he’d wipe that satisfied smile off his face.

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#7

Their total lack of empathy would disqualify them for Nursing.

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#8

No, let them be nurses aides and empty the bed pans!

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#9

Tragically, I have personally had to contend with nurses who were as indifferent to human suffering as too many physicians. The problem is deeper:


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#10

Evil is good and good has become evil.

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#11

The US officially passed a threshold, but I’m not sure what to call it.
The core argument for our American way of life has been that it is always better to have private enterprise handle our needs than the government. Challenge any republican and they will say this is true.

If it is always better to have private enterprise handle our problems, challenge them on how this is true when it comes to health care? The evidence abounds that Americans are being raped by Big Pharma because we don’t exercise appropriate regulatory control of the industry on the sales end. There it’s buyer beware because of our exceedingly strong Tort laws (Which have also been eviscerated during the ongoing class war by the 1% on the rest of us.). Government isn’t bargaining with big pharma as the largest single customer, but instead the crony government is using our health care needs as a vehicle for transferring wealth from the masses to the top.

If private enterprise is to be the answer, then everyone in society must be compelled to participate in some programs such as health care, since it is a guarantee that every last one of us will need it at least once in our lives. So why do the republicans chafe at the individual mandate when it is their prerogative? Individual freedoms are more important than the survival of the country/government. And those two cannot be separated without us returning to a far more bloody existence than today, to which the middle ages will attest. For in a vacuum of government, local fiefdoms and warlords will proliferate. Then it’s might makes right. Might as well start the fight now while the chances are better since the wealthy and their puppy class of politicians are still somewhat accessible.

Short of that, perhaps a general strike on May 1 might shake things up, but without a cohesive demand, such as that everyone participate in the benefits of technology and get a living wage and a share of the burden as well as a share of the pie. Nobody should be having to work 80 hours a week and still endure poverty!

#12

I’m on Medicare and have a supplemental plan to boot. My co-pays have gone from $50 to $300 for a CT scan since 2012. That’s a 600% increase in 5 years. My meds which I need monthly have gone from $30 a month to over $70 a month, a 120% increase again over 5 years. Something’s really wrong here! BTW, my costs would be higher if I had savings added to Social Security which, by the way, they want to cut to pay for the tax scam. Socialized healthcare with profit motive removed is the only real way to have proper healthcare. Of course that will never happen in the vampire driven capitalist capital of the world.

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#13

Not without a fight, I’m afraid.
You and I as older and potentially infirm members may need to man the front lines.

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#14

I fear even that is a task for which they are woefully underqualified to assume.

#15

Medicare may be better than open market insurance, but it is not what it is hyped up to be, at least for the average retired subscriber. It has a 20% deductible, which can result in high out-of-pocket. You have to buy supplemental insurance, if you can afford it, or forego expensive diagnostic procedures and labs. In the end, you are paying about the same as the ACA.