Republicans and Democrats can sure tell you their side of the story

Since most people either don't have the time or desire to read these bills (HB3200, HR3962, HR4872, HR 3590), we depend on someone else to tell us what they say. So where do we go?

We can go to Fox News, Republican Politicians, and conservative sources and get "all" the insight and information about the legislation.

And, we can go to CNN, NBC, Democrat Politicians, and liberal sources and get "all" the insight and information about the legislation.

So, if these are the sources in America that are supposed to be for the people, we should be getting the truth, all the truth, and nothing but the truth... right?

So why does it look like these people are looking at two completely different pieces of legislation when we hear the different reports?

Reality! If you look with an objective eye, you can find some good legislation in this bill and you will find some bad. It has it all.

The good:

More people will have access to healthcare. Young adult teachers who can't afford housing, transportation, and barely can put food on the table cannot afford healthcare. This bill may help them get closer to making that happen. How about that family that lives paycheck to paycheck and finds out their little girl has asthma. But, they can't afford the $300 per month in medicine. So, they take a chance and just watch her close. Want to be those parents?

This bill is also good because it has put the pressure on people to find good legislation. Maybe this will create a sense of urgency for some good legislation like tort reform, health care stamps, govt catastrophic insurance, and other things that could actually help us control costs.

The bill will decrease some of our healthcare costs through controls on drug companies, medical equipment suppliers, and will make the insurance companies fight hard to get more productive and efficient to be able to compete with the govt plans.

The bill is going to require everyone to be on a healthcare plan. This will hopefully widen the pool of healthy people on plans and decrease the risks and costs (law of large numbers).

Pre-existing conditions can no longer be considered in providing coverage to someone.

Hey, and my daughter can continue through medical school on my medical plan now (up to age 26). She texted me tonight to let me know how excited she was to be going to school to become a doctor so she can get paid equal to any doctor, no matter what specialty they have or how much education and skill they develop.

The Bad:

BOTTOM LINE: MONEY DOES NOT GROW ON TREES!

Cost. This legislation is projected at over $1 trillion dollars. Someone has to pay for it. The plan suggests that medical supply companies, people who choose to not be covered, people with income over $250,000, corporations who choose to not offer coverage for employees (or cannot afford to), Cadillac plans, and "hopefully" a decrease in healthcare costs. But, no data supports that this will be an accurate number. The real cost will be higher. Reality will hit this plan in the face if it stays in its current form. Our economy is decreasing the high income earners. Our government is building systems on high income earners taxes. The plans they develop will continue to decrease economic output and less tax dollars will be available. If you want proof on how this works, look at California.

The plan makes 32 million people eligible for coverage, but it does not have enough savings to make it affordable. The plan has different provisions that kick in over 1 to 10 years. This plan will not cover 32 million people. It just opens the potential of coverage to them.

Pre-existing conditions patients joining the pool will drive health care costs up for others. This will make health care unaffordable to many who have coverage today. Insurance pricing is based on the law of large numbers. These are actuarial costs that the really smart people crunch and determine how to stay slightly ahead of to make a profit. When you increase the cost in the pool, the actuarial costs go up, the premiums go up. Ok, I know the argument, that isn't a fair thing to say that the pre-existing people shouldn't have coverage. I AGREE. But, don't put a solution in place that makes coverage unaffordable for them and for others.

We are creating an entitlement plan for people who choose to have material things and not pay for medical care. Yep, it is true for a lot of people. But, keep in mind, a lot of people don't fall into this category either.

People will have to buy insurance or pay a fine. This is potentially unconstitutional. It is also bad for people who can't afford another few hundred dollars a month. This is the majority of the people they want to cover in this plan. These people can't afford to pay for this coverage if it costs anything at all. So, lower cost, government subsidized insurance doesn't mean they will all the sudden have a few hundred dollars a month to spend. So, now they get taxed about $700 dollars for not buying insurance.

Business will HAVE to provide insurance or pay a fine. I read financial statements every day in my job. I have seen a lot of financial statements in the last few years that won't allow for ONE DOLLAR of extra expense. Many companies I know today are out of trust and bankrupt, they just don't know it yet. If you require them to cover people who are employed and they don't have the money to do it... they will let people go. This is much worse than our current situation.

The bill does not apply to members of congress. I am sorry, I struggle with this.

The government will have real-time access to an individual's bank account and will have the authority to make electronic fund transfers from those accounts.

SUMMARY

I think you can probably tell that I am not for this bill. But, make no mistake about it. I would be on the fence as to whether I would have voted for it or not if I was in the House. Yep, I said it. I believe we have to do something. We can't keep going down the path of fewer and fewer people having access to health care. I might have voted for this bill for the one reason that I think it made enough people so mad that they are going to do two things.

1. They are going to start looking for ways to get the right legislation in place for us to solve this problem.

2. We will see a lot of people in congress lose their jobs over this (both sides of the political table). I think it is time for this to happen!

Ok, more to come. This was the technical blog. Sorry. Hope it didn't hurt too bad. I'm looking forward to sharing my ideas on what legislation should be brought to the table!