Just Another Bailout Of The Financial System

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2009/12/economist-health-care-bill-is-just.html

Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Economist: Health Care Bill "Is Just Another Bailout Of The Financial System"

It is obvious that many republicans oppose the proposed health care bill. But many liberals and progressives oppose it as well.

For example, economist L. Randall Wray writes:

Here’s the opportunity, Wall Street’s newest and bestest gamble: there is a huge untapped market of some 50 million people who are not paying insurance premiums—and the number grows every year because employers drop coverage and people can’t afford premiums. Solution? Health insurance “reform” that requires everyone to turn over their pay to Wall Street. Can’t afford the premiums? That is OK—Uncle Sam will kick in a few hundred billion to help out the insurers. Of course, do not expect more health care or better health outcomes because that has nothing to do with “reform” ... Wall Street’s insurers... see a missed opportunity. They’ll collect the extra premiums and deny the claims. This is just another bailout of the financial system, because the tens of trillions of dollars already committed are not nearly enough.

Wray points out that - with the repeal of Glass Steagall - the financial sector and the insurance businesses (the "f" and "i" in the "fire" sector) are somewhat merged.

Wray is no conservative. He is Ph.D. is Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, Research Director with the Center for Full Employment and Price Stability and Senior Research Scholar at The Levy Economics Institute - which focuses on inequality in the distribution of earnings, income, and wealth.

Dr. Andrew Coates describes the bill as "a guarantee of insurance industry dominance and the continued privatization of health care in every arena.”

Dr. Coates is no conservative. He is a medical doctor, a member of the Public Employees Federation, AFL-CIO, secretary of the Capital District chapter of Physicians for a National Health Program, and teaches at Albany Medical College.

And - as I have previously pointed out - progressives such as law school professor Sheldon Laskin, anti-war activist David Swanson, and Miles Mogulescu are calling the bill authoritarian and unconstitutional because the government cannot legally force people to buy private health insurance.

Indeed, given Wray's point that this is just another bailout in disguise, the bill should more properly be called a "wealth reform" bill than health reform legislation.