Obamacare: What does AARP stand to gain?
For some time I’ve wondered why there isn’t more hue and cry from the insurance industry about Obamacare. When you consider that a socialized option would pretty much put the insurance companies out of business, the silence makes no sense.
What makes even less sense are the companies like Progressive (aptly named) and AARP who are actively pushing for the option.
Take AARP as an example. They cater to the retiree crowd, right? The baby boomers who are now hitting the so-called Golden Years. Such people are likely to be hurt the worst by Obamacare. While I don’t agree with Palin’s use of the term “Death Panel”, I do understand the sentiment behind the hyperbole. In a publicly funded system that will inevitably stretched too thin, there has to be a cost-benefit analysis done on patients to determine if they are worth the expensive treatments.
Pensioners, despite years of tax-paying service to their nation, are worthless. They no longer contribute, and socialist governments only ever think in the instant-gratification short term. The government doesn’t care about the 45 years you spent paying taxes - they only care that they now have to pay you to play golf and crochet.
By withholding expensive, life saving treatment to seniors, the government not only benefits by saving money on that treatment. By pushing you into an early grave, the government gets to stop paying out your Social Security every month. Bonus!
But I digress. A lot. Again, how does AARP benefit from this? Why are they pushing this so hard to their members?
It benefits because along with the rest of the overhaul, Obama wants to institute changes to Medicare Advantage, the current public option for seniors.
Medicare Advantage is a catch-all program for low-income seniors which allows them to choose their drug insurance plan from a variety of companies. Basically, a senior pays into the program, picks an insurance company to go with, and the government subsidizes that company for the cost of the senior’s prescriptions. Everybody wins. (Note: This is different from the Medicare program, which is fully single payer, government run)
So if Obama cuts or eliminates Medicare Advantage, what will those seniors do? Well, they will either go directly to Medicare (the government single-payer option) or they will be forced to buy a supplementary package with a company like… AARP!
Currently, this supplementary drug option - called MediGap - accounts for 70% of AARP’s annual income. How much nicer would things be if they were the only game in town, huh?
Despite an insurance industry report [PDF] that stated Medicare Advantage led to healthier seniors overall, the Obama government wants to slash $150 billion from the MA budget to make way for “healthcare reform”. Baby, bathwater.
Seniors in Medicare Advantage spent fewer days in a hospital, were subject to fewer hospital re-admissions, and were less likely to have “potentially avoidable” admissions for common conditions ranging from uncontrolled diabetes to dehydration, on a risk-adjusted basis, according to a new analysis of publicly available data from AHRQ.
So the administration wants to throw out a program that is actually working, and replace it with a full-on socialized system, or support cronyism with friends at AARP.
A new report just released today on HealthReform.gov is touted with these quotes by Joe Biden and Kathleen Sebelius is interesting:
“We will protect seniors - not burden them with out of pocket costs,” said Vice President Biden. “The bottom line is, seniors will be better off under what we are proposing, and not a dollar from the Medicare trust fund will be used to pay for health insurance reform.”
Right. Because they’re not cutting Medicare - they’re cutting Medicare Advantage. The one that promotes patient choice.
Under health insurance reform, seniors will get better care and their health care costs will go down, said Secretary Sebelius. Reform will strengthen Medicare, cut drug costs, and help ensure all seniors get the high-quality, affordable care they deserve.
Madame, that sounds more like a threat than anything.
It is true - I’m not denying it - that Medicare Advantage is more expensive than Medicare. But it provides patients with a choice in who they deal with, instead of an overarching, meddling government single-payer.
The leftist ideology for decades has been My Body, My Choice. That choice does not seem to apply to basic health care.
Maybe the insurance companies don’t have much to say because they hide behind supposedly grass roots protest organizations rather than come right out and lobby with full disclosure. Maybe they don’t want to get involved directly in the debate because they might be asked to account for why the bureaucratic administration of health care in the U.S. under private insurance companies accounts for 25-30% of all dollars spent, several fold more that the U.S. government-run single-payer programs (which are among the most popular government programs among U.S. citizens)
Comment by RichardDennis — September 24, 2009 @ 1:16 pm
Of course, the astroturf canard. That must be it. I’m sure it has nothing at all to do with the blatantly political propaganda mailings that companies like Humana have been sending out to their enrollees:
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052970204488304574427200839672342-lMyQjAxMDA5MDIwMjEyNDIyWj.html
Comment by Right Girl — September 24, 2009 @ 3:44 pm
[...] A note to city dwellers; My Name is Wendy and I’m an Addict; What I’m Reading; Obamacare: What does AARP stand to gain?; The Delivery: I couldn’t wait till Friday; Crackheads and alcoholics have lower immune systems [...]
Pingback by Steynian 385 « Free Canuckistan! — September 25, 2009 @ 9:06 am
AARP(American Association of Retired People) Should be changed to FAARP(Formally American,etc,etc,etc. Or, better still GARP(Global Association,etc,etc. Just checked their website. They are are soliciting members(fee reqired) from over 100 third world countries. Or, developing nations. Or, whomever, wherever. All they have to be is 50 years of age and able to come up with the membership fee! President Obama let’s anyone sneak in for free. Why join AARP? All will be taken care of. All, except those for whom the AARP and the USA were founded for. To respond to the story’s headline…AARP,through the “for profit” organizations under it’s “non profit umbrella” expects to gain MONEY…Just as The Obama Empire does…so it can help the helpless,etc,etc,etc.
And, around and around we spin in the grip of “Future Shock”Alvin Toffler.
Comment by Octavia St James — September 25, 2009 @ 4:29 pm
The staff a the AARP headquarters in DC is made up of young leftists that choose to ignore their members. They are part of the DC infrastructure that wants to change the world and thinks they have all the answers.
Probably hoping for a job as a congressional aide someday.
Comment by DouglasT — September 29, 2009 @ 11:01 pm
Medicare for all, that is what the government should be implementing. All other industrialized nations have it. Why doesn’t America? We are, at least we claim to be, a better country than this. NO one, I mean No One, should be forced to file bankruptcy because they become ill; yet this is happening everyday in this country of ours. My sister, whi is 50 and a 30 yr gov employee, was diagnosed with a brain disease and has been financial ruined. Why, she did everything right. No one of average wealth can survive the cost of a serious health issue in America. Why is this so hard to understand? My sister’s brain surgery will in time restore her health to normal but she has been destroyed financially. Is this right????
Comment by cj — September 30, 2009 @ 8:03 pm
[...] reason behind the AARP’s advocacy may be good old-fashioned graft: Again, how does AARP benefit from this? Why are they pushing this so hard to their [...]
Pingback by Crushing of ObamaCare Dissent | QandO — October 5, 2009 @ 2:01 pm
2/27/2010
I read that the AARP got a grant for $18 billion dollar ?
And there are around 150 thousand people that pay over $500.00 per month to AARP for Medicare ?
I have been going to a great deal of trouble to show that this whole Health Care Package is a $100 Trillion dollar package.
Sooooo, this is why the AARP is in bed with the Government, wow, Welcome to the first steps for Force Pay in a split petition. wow ! this is what I get for staying out of issues for over 30 years…
This story is one of thousands of people who have been dumped on by Insurance Companies. So One day on a blog site i asked the big why… Why force pay into a failed system of Insurance Companies and at the same time tax that all ready burden system ?
It is because of a dirty little secret. This health care system is a $100 trillion dollar bread maker per year, and the tax lie was the secret of the 10% per cent tax across the board, so where does this secret tax money go ?….,….
I can show on page 100 at our site a conflict of information of numbers released by Officials, and it looks like a lot like borrowing from Paul to pay Petter… until I noted the balance of a number with just a top ten list of Health Care Insurance Companies, and this threw my mind off,
so at a kind of a low ball figure what is 100 milliom Health Care members x $100.00 per month x 12 months ?
Then I pulled a list of several hundred HCIC COs. It is stated that over 45 million people are not covered. So I did this at $5.00 per month for the poor x 12 ?
And last for this blog, I pulled the top 1000 Companies that face force pay. Please remember their are around 373 to 400 million people that are legal in the U.S. and around 117 million illeagle……..
Soooo, some body is taking cookies out of the jar, ohhh yea the are only around 250 million people old enough to work at a job, but according to lay offs there are around 173 million + people still working….
Hmmmm I got a little more work to do,
Henry Massingale
FASC Concepts in and for Pay It forward
http://www.fascmove.mysite.com on google page 1 american dream official site.
Comment by Henry Massingale — February 27, 2010 @ 4:29 pm
shoot I am sorry for the typ o this is our correct address and it was $18 million dollars not billion…….. I am truely sorry for the error
Henry Massingale
FASC Concepts in and for Pay It forward
http://www.fascmovement.mysite.com on google page 1 american dream official site.
Comment by Henry Massingale — February 27, 2010 @ 5:19 pm