Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Ryan Plan not so Free Market as you Think

Paul Ryan keeps on claiming his Medicare reform plan is based on "free markets." He is even being endorsed by the libertarian Cato Institute.

To be fair, the Ryan Plan is preferable to ObamaCare.  The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will be bad for old people. It will use an unaccountable medical board to impose price controls on payments to providers from Medicare recipients. This will result in denial of care for many seniors, as more and more providers decide to opt out of Medicare. (It'll be de facto rationing.)

Paul Ryan's Medicare Reform Plan

For those born 1956 and earlier, the Ryan Plan will fully fund Medicare. This will prolong the Ponzi scheme for the exclusive benefit of the older baby boomers. With money fueling the inflation fire of the health-care oligopolies, this will make things worse for the younger baby boomers. (Health-care costs will have skyrocketed.) So for those born 1957 and later, they will be mandated to purchase government-approved insurance lest they lose out on the $2500 tax credit.

Evidently, Paul Ryan and his GOP allies are counting on a "divide and conquer" strategy for the 2011 elections. They are willing to pander to the older boomers and to sacrifice the younger boomers. If this is true, it's very cynical.

Is the Ryan Plan based on free market principles? Not really! It is based on "corporate socialism" where taxpayers' money will be used to subsidize private insurance companies. The government will decide which insurance companies would qualify and which would not qualify. The corporate lobbyists will rule this chess game; the American citizens will be the pawns.

Both political parties serve the interests of Wall Street and of the insurance industry. Likewise, regarding ObamaCare: the interests of Big PhRMa, the hospital industry, the AARP, the medical device manufacturers, the AMA, the labor unions ... they all have their fingers in the pie. (The only person missing is the ordinary American.)

Please watch the video by a Russian television on the monopolistic nature of American health-care.

http://bit.ly/lHZEQs

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