Julie with a B

Wednesday, February 16, 2005
 
A good place to start would be Health Care
California Assemblyman Joe Nation, has a proposal that would make health care in California mandatory.
Read the short version in the Press Democrat news article here.
Read the long version in pdf file here. The long version is easy to read and has some nice graphs.

Some of the highlights from the bi-partisan proposal are these.
How is it going to be paid for?
""Health care is a right," Nation said. "If we can get these 6.4 million people into the system, overall costs will go down."
The plan would require individuals to purchase at least catastrophic and preventive maintenance coverage. Regional purchasing pools would be established to allow individuals and small businesses to buy policies at discounted group rates.
"We think that individuals and small businesses are going to benefit by the pools," said Richman, who is a doctor.
Part of the plan would be funded by the federal government. About one-third of the uninsured are children and their parents who have not signed up for health coverage offered through a variety of state and federal programs, Nation said. His plan would create a new program to boost enrollment, allowing the state to collect a bigger share of federal matching funds.
To pay for the rest of their plan, Nation and Richman would expand the state's 2.35 percent tax on health care premiums. The state would begin taxing premiums collected by nonprofit health insurers, such as Kaiser Permanente and Blue Shield of California. Other health plans, such as Health Net and Blue Cross of California, would begin paying a tax on premiums instead of the corporate income tax.
Large employers that are self-insured, such as Microsoft, PG&E and SBC Communications, also would be required to pay a 2.35 percent tax on fees paid to companies that administer their plans.
The tax would raise about $1 billion annually to provide matching funds for government sponsored health care.
In addition, the state would cap the amount of tax write-offs for businesses that deduct a portion of their premium payments.

- posted by JulieB @ 10:03 PM
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