Real Health Care Reform

[ImWithStupid]

Not government take over of 1/6 of the economy...

 

 

AUGUST 11, 2009, 7:30 P.M. ET

 

The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare

Eight things we can do to improve health care without adding to the deficit.

 

By JOHN MACKEY

 

"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out

of other people's money."

?Margaret Thatcher

 

With a projected $1.8 trillion deficit for 2009, several trillions more in deficits projected over the next decade, and with both Medicare and Social Security entitlement spending about to ratchet up several notches over the next 15 years as Baby Boomers become eligible for both, we are rapidly running out of other people's money. These deficits are simply not sustainable. They are either going to result in unprecedented new taxes and inflation, or they will bankrupt us.

 

While we clearly need health-care reform, the last thing our country needs is a massive new health-care entitlement that will create hundreds of billions of dollars of new unfunded deficits and move us much closer to a government takeover of our health-care system. Instead, we should be trying to achieve reforms by moving in the opposite direction?toward less government control and more individual empowerment. Here are eight reforms that would greatly lower the cost of health care for everyone:

 

? Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs). The combination of high-deductible health insurance and HSAs is one solution that could solve many of our health-care problems. For example, Whole Foods Market pays 100% of the premiums for all our team members who work 30 hours or more per week (about 89% of all team members) for our high-deductible health-insurance plan. We also provide up to $1,800 per year in additional health-care dollars through deposits into employees' Personal Wellness Accounts to spend as they choose on their own health and wellness.

 

Money not spent in one year rolls over to the next and grows over time. Our team members therefore spend their own health-care dollars until the annual deductible is covered (about $2,500) and the insurance plan kicks in. This creates incentives to spend the first $2,500 more carefully. Our plan's costs are much lower than typical health insurance, while providing a very high degree of worker satisfaction.

 

? Equalize the tax laws so that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits. Now employer health insurance benefits are fully tax deductible, but individual health insurance is not. This is unfair.

 

? Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines. We should all have the legal right to purchase health insurance from any insurance company in any state and we should be able use that insurance wherever we live. Health insurance should be portable.

 

? Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover. These mandates have increased the cost of health insurance by billions of dollars. What is insured and what is not insured should be determined by individual customer preferences and not through special-interest lobbying.

 

? Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. These costs are passed back to us through much higher prices for health care.

 

? Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost. How many people know the total cost of their last doctor's visit and how that total breaks down? What other goods or services do we buy without knowing how much they will cost us?

 

? Enact Medicare reform. We need to face up to the actuarial fact that Medicare is heading towards bankruptcy and enact reforms that create greater patient empowerment, choice and responsibility.

 

? Finally, revise tax forms to make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance and aren't covered by Medicare, Medicaid or the State Children's Health Insurance Program.

Many promoters of health-care reform believe that people have an intrinsic ethical right to health care?to equal access to doctors, medicines and hospitals. While all of us empathize with those who are sick, how can we say that all people have more of an intrinsic right to health care than they have to food or shelter?

 

Health care is a service that we all need, but just like food and shelter it is best provided through voluntary and mutually beneficial market exchanges. A careful reading of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution will not reveal any intrinsic right to health care, food or shelter. That's because there isn't any. This "right" has never existed in America.

John Mackey: The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare - WSJ.com

[timesjoke]

But none of those things give Government more control so none of the Liberals and only about half of the Republicans would support them. The Republicans had the power at one time and never passed tort reform, that was my biggest dissapointment from them.

 

America has already slipped and slid way down the socialist path and I fear that we will step the rest of the way down that path sooner or later. Sure, I want to delay it as long as possible, but eact time we turn around, we are fighting off more and more attempts to eliminate free enterprise and give the Government more power over our lives.

 

Right now they already own the banking industry, and a big part of the domestic car production in America, will they get all or part of the healthcare? They certainly want it.

 

 

 

When a government takes over a people?s economic life it becomes absolute, and when it has become absolute it destroys the arts, the minds, the liberties and the meaning of the people it governs. ~ Maxwell Anderson

 

 

Legal plunder can be committed in an infinite number of ways; hence, there are an infinite number of plans for organizing it: tariffs, protection, bonuses, subsidies, incentives, the progressive income tax, free education, the right to employment, the right to profit, the right to wages, the right to relief, the right to the tools of production, interest free credit, etc., etc. And it the aggregate of all these plans, in respect to what they have in common, legal plunder, that goes under the name of socialism. ~ Frederic Bastiat

[RoyalOrleans]

I like John Mackey's plan.

 

In fact, I love the plan.

 

Unfortuntaely, Mackey is now a hatemongerer, a fearmongerer, a bigot, a racist, a rightwing extremist, and Irish.

 

Welcome to the club.

[hugo]

Two more suggestions, repeal the Kefauver Amendment to the FDA and eliminate licensing requiremnets for practicing medicine.

[RoyalOrleans]

Two more suggestions, repeal the Kefauver Amendment to the FDA and eliminate licensing requiremnets for practicing medicine.

 

What about repealing Sarbanes-Oxley?

[timesjoke]

I believe this just goes to prove that there are a lot of alternative ideas out there, unlike what Bender claims, but the Libs only want ideas that give the Government (them) more power over people's lives.

[eddo]

I believe this just goes to prove that there are a lot of alternative ideas out there, unlike what Bender claims, but the Libs only want ideas that give the Government (them) more power over people's lives.

 

I don't think that is what bender claims.

 

What I have seen him say is that the Repub's haven't offered up any different ideas, and instead just bash all things Obama- whether they deserve bashing or not.

 

This is the first put together idea that I have seen that holds some merit- and it wasn't by a republican.

[RoyalOrleans]

Well now the unions have gotten involved. The CtW Investment Group, a part of the Change to Win federation of unions that advocates on behalf of workers' investments in pension funds, is calling for Mackey's resignation. The union says that Mackey is undermining President Obama's healthcare reform.

 

CtW Investment Group's Executive Director Bill Patterson says, "Mr. Mackey attempted to capitalize on the brand reputation of Whole Foods to champion his personal political views, but has instead deeply offended a key segment of Whole Foods consumer base." Oh my God! NO! Tell me it's not true! Someone has been OFFENDED!

 

In the meantime, the United Food and Commercial Workers Union is going to be handing out information to Whole Foods shoppers about healthcare reform. Maybe they will hire some homeless people to handout the flyers ... that's always a good way to promote your cause.

 

There's a Whole Foods down the road a piece from my shop. Might have to stop in and throw a little support their way.

[timesjoke]

I don't think that is what bender claims.

 

What I have seen him say is that the Repub's haven't offered up any different ideas, and instead just bash all things Obama- whether they deserve bashing or not.

 

This is the first put together idea that I have seen that holds some merit- and it wasn't by a republican.

 

The Republicans and other conservative groups have been offering these ideas and others like them for years eddo, this is not "NEW" just packaged differently. Bender and I guess now you just refuse to hear or see what has been offered all along as alternative ideas.

 

 

Bender's point is to ignore all other ideas as if they do not exist if they do not include a Government takeover.

[wez]

 

 

Bender's point is to ignore all other ideas as if they do not exist if they do not include a Government takeover.

 

It's patience that allows people like us to tolerate a person such as yourself ~ Abe Froman

 

 

[phreakwars]

The Republicans and other conservative groups have been offering these ideas and others like them for years eddo, this is not "NEW" just packaged differently. Bender and I guess now you just refuse to hear or see what has been offered all along as alternative ideas.

 

 

Bender's point is to ignore all other ideas as if they do not exist if they do not include a Government takeover.

The Republicans had 8 years to enact all these "GREAT IDEAS" when Bush was in office. They had all that time, and a majority in Congress to get it done. Why didn't they do a damn thing then? Hind site is 20/20 eh?

 

Years later, after the Democrats get something going on.... THEN they have all these great plans...

 

YA BULLSHlT.

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[timesjoke]

The Republicans had 8 years to enact all these "GREAT IDEAS" when Bush was in office. They had all that time, and a majority in Congress to get it done. Why didn't they do a damn thing then? Hind site is 20/20 eh?

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I have already said my biggest dissapointment over the few years they had a majority (not 8 years but still...) was not passing tort reform. In many ways a lot of Republicans stopped being conservatives and transformed into partial liberals....but not all the way to socialists.

 

I agree to a degree with your point Bender, but not putting those other things into motion then is not a good excuse to bypass those ideas now and go all the way to Government takeover of healthcare now. There are ways to improve our problems without spending more money we don't have.

 

They just said the budget is worse then Obama had predicted buy another 2 trillion dollars..........2 trillion, that is not just an addition error, that is a massive mistake and we are being asked to put this halfbaked legislation into action based on this same level of math?

 

I am sorry, the pricetag is too high and the benefits way, way too low for any thinking America to approve of such trash legislation that not one of our elected officials have even read yet.

 

 

 

 

Anyone who actually reads all the different things Democrats want to impose will be chilled if their not a socialist.

 

The IRS is mandated to release any and all information requested by healthcare workers from federal or state levels under the intention of assessing "affordability credits."

 

 

 

Another interesting element? The IRS must release all requested information to the social security administration workers for the purpose of assessing drug subsidy qualifications even if you never applied for the assistance.

 

 

 

 

Just these two things alone puts a lot of private and personal information out there at the finger tips of the lowest Government workers to use as they see fit. Could a worker needing some extra income figure out a way to see that information? Yep. And maybe that is the point, they want this kind of information to be available to everyone else anyway.

[phreakwars]

Well, I'm not gonna get into yet another long drawn out debate over health care, so I'll bottom line this.

 

Republicans could have acted, they didn't, their loss. Now it's the Democrats turn. No point in bitching about ideas you think are horrible that come from them. Your disappointed in the Republicans for not doing so? So aren't 47 million other Americans. It's one of the reasons they were voted out of congress and the Whitehouse.

 

One can't bitch and complain about losing the girl of their dreams if they never made the effort to introduce themselves to that girl. And you can't talk about how life would have been different had you been the one. You just have to sit back and take it.

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[ImWithStupid]

Well, I'm not gonna get into yet another long drawn out debate over health care, so I'll bottom line this.

 

Republicans could have acted, they didn't, their loss. Now it's the Democrats turn. No point in bitching about ideas you think are horrible that come from them. Your disappointed in the Republicans for not doing so? So aren't 47 million other Americans. It's one of the reasons they were voted out of congress and the Whitehouse.

 

One can't bitch and complain about losing the girl of their dreams if they never made the effort to introduce themselves to that girl. And you can't talk about how life would have been different had you been the one. You just have to sit back and take it.

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Yea, because since the past 8 years were concerned with shoring up the nations security that was decimated by the Clinton administration and that it didn't allow for the progress that was wanted, we should just bend over and take the Dem plan to let the government take over 20% of the US economy, even if there is a better plan out there..

 

There shouldn't be any other ideas introduced, just as the draconian rules that the Dems and Nancy Pelosi put in place to replace the fair rules in Congress that were put in place when the Repubs took over that allowed for the opposition to introduce legislation, because they didn't want to be the assholes the Dems were for the past three decades of control and wanted to allow for fair debate, but would no longer let that happen.

 

Gee, I wonder why there isn't a Repub plan introduced, oh yea, the fukkin Dems won't let them.

 

Now this CEO brings up a viable plan to have health care reform and the fukkin left wing special interests immediately try to boycott Whole Foods for it.

 

The Dems are, and always have been, a bunch of pussies who can't stand, or stand up to opposing ideas, because head to head, their ideas are flawed and can't hold up on their own merits, so they have to go to guerilla tactics and strong arm measures using Union Army's who only care about dues and power, not the people.

[ImWithStupid]

But, hey it sure would be nice if the GOP had a plan that didn't include Fedzilla taking over the health care industry, but would give us health care reform.

 

You know something like The Patients' Choice Act of 2009 located on Rep. Ryan's website.

 

If only.

[phreakwars]

I have a solution for that. Simply regulate what insurance companies charge and how much they can profit. Force them to make it affordable to everyone, and problem solved. Then the insurance companies can fight over getting customers for their crappy service and the government doesn't need to do any more.

 

I mean think about it, the only reason anybody is toying with the notion of .gov interfering in health care, is because insurance companies do such a crappy job of providing it in the first place. If everyone could afford it and get the coverage they need, then you would have no need for government to do a damn thing except provide subsidies to the poor.

 

If Republicans were REALLY REALLY concerned about not getting .gov involved in our health care, then they would be on these insurance companies asses to do their jobs and care for the people they charge the premiums to. Not coming up with these BULLSHlT farfetched ideas of giving insurance companies more control or saying they should be able to sell across state lines. That's just another way for them to find a way of screwing people over more.

 

The Whole Foods boycott has to do with Mackey saying "Americans do not have an intrinsic right to healthcare"

 

Mr Mackey began his article with a quote from Margaret Thatcher and went on to add that Americans do not have an intrinsic right to healthcare - an idea strongly at odds with the views of a large proportion of Whole Foods' customer base.

 

BBC NEWS | Business | Customers call for Whole Foods boycott

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[phreakwars]

BTW, true confession about my EXTREME LIBERAL VIEWS.

 

Admin Zone Forums - View Single Post - Have you ever been banned?

 

 

That's what happens when I don't play "LIBERAL SYMPATHIZER" all the time and actually take an honest right wing stance.

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[timesjoke]

The problem is Bender, most people are not upset at their insurance provider.

 

Every study, every poll shows that almost all Americans are happy with their healthcare. That is why Obama has had to completely change his wording away from healthcare reform to insurance reform, the people were not responding.

 

The same is true for the reform message as well, the people on the whole get great medical care so when Obama says he wants to force all Americans to accept a massive increase in Government spending to change something they are happy about, it gets their attention and they speak out.

 

That is why Obama's popularity rating is dropping so low in general, and that is why the overall support for this medical care power grap is loosing support so fast, finally people see that Obama is not telling the truth about what the many bills have inside them.

 

 

 

By the way, the real number of uninsured is around 15 million, not 47, they count illegals and people on medicare or other programs in their 47 million number, and you don't need to hand 20% of our economy over to the Federal Government to provide 15 million people some access to medical care.

 

 

 

 

 

I believe the final straw that broke the liberals/socialists back on this issue was calling real concerned Americans fake protestors, unamerican, and angry mobs who were expressing fake concerns.

 

That pissed a lot of people off, in one case a friend of mine's parents went to one of the meetings here in Florida and again the protestors were called ugly names by this Obama administration. Before his parents were involved he really never placed an identity on the blanket accusations of Obama against the protestors but after his parents went to their first protest suddenly he saw the reality of just how bad and corrupt Obama really is.

 

This man is and has always been a liberal supporter, and he just told me that he is changing to an independant and does not support Obamacare anymore.

 

They insulted his parents............

 

 

Stupid move Obama.

[phreakwars]

Insurance reform IS the real agenda, always has been. I can agree that people are happy with the health care they receive. It's not the Dr.'s fault some greedy insurance company doesn't let someone get treatment for something. Nobody REALLY wants health care reform, they want insurance reform. I know that's what I want. I have no complaints about my Dr.

 

Obama changing it to insurance reform over health care reform is doing the smartest thing possible IMO.

 

As for your very boring claim about Obama's approval, almost all Presidents go through a period where their approval ratings slip just to see an increase later on.

 

Myself I wouldn't call real concerned Americans fake protesters, technically, they are IGNORANT protesters.

 

As for the actual number being 15 million... have any data from freerepublic.com to back that up?

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[timesjoke]

Insurance reform IS the real agenda, always has been. I can agree that people are happy with the health care they receive. It's not the Dr.'s fault some greedy insurance company doesn't let someone get treatment for something. Nobody REALLY wants health care reform, they want insurance reform. I know that's what I want. I have no complaints about my Dr.

 

There is an endless supply of Obama promises to reform medical care, he only recently changed his plan when it was clear the people were not responding to his scare tactics.

 

But, he has such a hardon for his socialist agenda he is not listening to the American people again when they say they are happy with their insurance too. Most people expect to pay for what they get in life, healthcare has a cost.......imagine that, lol.

 

 

 

Obama changing it to insurance reform over health care reform is doing the smartest thing possible IMO.

 

Smart to a degree, but still not what the people want. The people have spoken, most are against the Government takeover of healthcare, will the elitist Obama listen?

 

As for your very boring claim about Obama's approval, almost all Presidents go through a period where their approval ratings slip just to see an increase later on.

 

Boring?

 

I find it exciting that the American people have stood up so powerfully to fight against big Government. You can litterly draw a line on his approval ratings and show his decline is directly linked to his trying to force this plan on us even thought we do not want it.

 

 

Let's look at it this way, Obama has massive charisma so people will tend to like him even if they hate his policies so his personal numbers going down fast are a good indicator, but a much better indicator is how poorly the average American rates the Congress. If they were crafting something the people wanted and doing a great job in fighting the Republicans, then why are the approval numbers for congress so very low?

 

Obviously the people are unhappy with a bunch of liberals who refuse to listen to the people who voted them into office.

 

 

Myself I wouldn't call real concerned Americans fake protesters, technically, they are IGNORANT protesters.

 

Better informed than the elected officials who have not even read the bills obviously.

 

They are not ignorant just because they do not buy the lies Bender.

 

 

As for the actual number being 15 million... have any data from freerepublic.com to back that up?

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You know as well as I do that there are no solid numbers anywhere to be found. According to the 2007 census

http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/hlthins/hlthin07/p60no235_table6.pdf

 

There were around 37 million Americans without insurance, and another 10 million illegals in America without insurance.

 

Talking about Americans only (Taxpayers should not be paying for illegals)

 

9 million uninsured make over 75k and can easily afford insurance but they "chose not to" buy insurance that is available to them.

 

8 million make between 50k and 74,999, again, they should be able to afford insurance as well.

 

So off the top you can take 17 million people off the 37 million list because their not having insurance is completely voluntary.

 

 

The crazy numbers come in with the remaining 20 million and most of those are already on public assistence and receiving medical care but they are on government care, not private insurance so they get to add them to the totals.

 

I believe the real number is around 5 to 10 million who actually "need" help but trying to give some understanding and even making an error in favor of the Liberals in an attempt to give them the benefit of the doubt, clearly at best they can claim is 15 million who have nothing, no kind of healtchare and that is really giving them a lot of understanding.

 

 

I do not see why we need to rip apart 20% of our economy to help 4% of the population.

[eddo]

It's patience that allows people like us to tolerate a person such as yourself ~ Abe Froman

 

 

 

did you just quote the Sausage king of Chicago???

[RoyalOrleans]

IObama changing it to insurance reform over health care reform is doing the smartest thing possible IMO.

 

Obama's little "dick-switch" midstream is as old as civilization itself: find something or someone to demonize to gain a despotic expansion of power, make them the focus of all evil in the world, and get the general public worked up so much that they jump on the bandwagon.

 

For Hitler, the Jews were the focus of all evil in Germany. Now it's the insurance companies in the United States. What's next? Concentration camps for insurance executives? Maybe Princess Nancy is building ovens somewhere.

 

As for your very boring claim about Obama's approval, almost all Presidents go through a period where their approval ratings slip just to see an increase later on.

 

President Obama and the Democrats truly seem dumbfounded by America's response to their healthcare reform plans. Maybe this has something to do with it. Polling, studies and focus groups have been working for years to come up with precise language that would win over voters on the issue of healthcare. We are talking as far back as 2005, the Herndon Alliance met with the AARP, Service Employees International Union, the American Cancer Society and the liberal health-policy group Families USA in order to figure out how liberals could change the language of the healthcare debate.

 

This is why Barack Obama changed his rhetoric to "health insurance reform" rather than "healthcare reform." This is why he says phrases like " the mandatory purchase of health insurance would 'be affordable, based on a sliding scale.'" This phrasing "precisely mirrored language that had been poll-tested and put before batteries of focus groups by Democratic consultants over the past few years," according to the Wall Street Journal. "The words had been carefully chosen in an effort to take away the rhetorical targets of health-overhaul foes and replace them with terminology that would bring ordinary Americans on board."

 

Myself I wouldn't call real concerned Americans fake protesters, technically, they are IGNORANT protesters.

 

I guess I am ignorant, too. I attended the last townhall meeting for my district. My district's representative is a Republican, Nathan Deal, a former Democrat, and a bait-and-switch turncoat. He got an earfull.

 

I say America is waking up. I happened. He happened. She happened. The heart, the soul, the spirit of America is waking up to the call of bureaucratic overlordship on either side of the congressional aisle.

 

Truth and information is the Democrats' bane.

[hugo]

The fact is health insurance companies operate on about a 4% profit margin. There are no significant savings to be found. It is another mostly unfinanced government program.

[RoyalOrleans]

It's not health "insurance" we're talking about here; it's a health care payment plan.

 

Insurance is something you purchase to partially reimburse you for UNEXPECTED expenses related to home or auto ownership, or your health. Your auto insurance policy will step in with some cash for a crash, but not for an oil change or new tires. Your homeowner's insurance will come up with some money for repairs to fire damage, but not to replace your water heater or that 20-year-old roof. There are certain budgetary requirements that come into play when you own a house or a car, and your insurance company would laugh you out of the county if you went to them to be reimbursed for an oil change or having your carpets cleaned.

 

Why, then, do you think that your health "insurance" should pay for ordinary and expected healthcare expenses? It shouldn't. These are things that you should budget for. But the American people have a different idea. They believe that their health care is someone else's responsibility - either their employer's or the governments. Power-mad politicians are only too glad to pander to that idiotic expectation.

 

You think the government has control over vast amounts of your life now? Wait until the government controls your health care.

[hugo]

See Milton's Four ways to spend money. Health care is largely paid for with other peoples money. That is the primary flaw in our health care system. Democrats wish to expand on this flaw. RO is correct, health insurance should only cover catastrophic illnesses.