just say where you’d attack it, what suggestions you have, and thanks in advance for reading all this!

AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE AFF

Poverty shouldn’t exist in the United States, one of the richest countries in the world. But it does. According to the US Census Bureau there are 45.7 million people that do not have insurance, 8.7 million of those being children. With us being one of the richest countries in the world we should be able to provide affordable access to health care for every individual in the United States, but we don’t. My partner and I stand resolved that the United States government should substantially increase social services for persons living under the poverty line in the United States. We offer the following plan.

Plank 1: Administration. The plan will be passed by U.S. Congress and implemented by a non-profit agency, so as not to give the government too much control.

Plank 2: Mandates. The federal government should only play a limited part in the health care reform, by providing subsidies in the form of grants to the non-profit agencies , providing 30% of their budget which will be paid for by the taxes that are collected for this program. And to support the program in any way necessary excluding extra funding beyond 30%..

Plank 3: Logistics. This plan will be executed by raising or introducing taxes in three different areas that contribute to the rising cost of health care. The taxes include a High Risk Factor Tax, a Fatty Food Restaurant Tax, and a Cigarette/Alcohol Tax. We will explain the taxes in more detail later in the plan.

Contention 1 – Inherency

A. The factors which influence health care costs are not understood by the majority of most Americans – including politicians. Controlling health care costs is not a matter of simply charging the patient less money and has ramifications in industries other than health care.

Wyn Staheli, President of InstaCode Institute, LLC said, * “Uninsured Americans are often uninsured because their employers don’t have enough funds to pay for comprehensive health insurance because the economy is down and health insurance premiums are soaring at phenomenal rates. These rate increases are being driven by malpractice, litigation (lawsuits) , and the resulting malpractice premiums that doctors are being required to pay after a successful, (or unsuccessful, however you choose to look at it lawsuit), which drives up the cost of overhead for the provider which is then passed along as increased rates to the patient or the insurance company. Also the cost of these procedures and all of these advances in medicine is more expensive as new technology comes to market the cost of research and development is passed on as increased costs for the procedure, for the procedure or the medication.”

*use this if neg asks about InstaCode Institute and what they do –
(InstaCode Institute provides billing and reimbursement support and solutions for health care providers.)

B. Existing federal programs do not catch the “middle class,” and “lower middle class” who make too much money for Medicaid or are too young for Medicare, excluding the V.A. (veteran’s program)

A New York Times article stated that, “More than one-third of the uninsured — 17 million of the nearly 47 million — have family incomes of $40,000 or more, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute, a nonpartisan organization. More than two-thirds of the uninsured are in households with at least one full-time worker.”

C. Employees are not taking advantage of employer-based health insurance because even though the employer pays a portion of the premium, the employee may not have the funds to pay the remaining premium.

Consumers Union, a non-partisan, non-profit organization said this regarding employer insurance costs, “The single biggest challenge facing Utah’s small business owners today is the cost of providing health insurance for their employees. Employers want to provide health benefits, but the cost is just too high. 88% of Utah small businesses not offering health insurance say they don’t because they can’t afford to, while 79% of those who do offer it say they are really struggling to do so.”

Kaiser Health News, a nonprofit news organization committed to in-depth coverage of health care policy and politics said this about passing along premium increases to employees, “Employers struggling with the steady rise of health insurance costs – which in 2009 increased 5 percent to an average of $13,375 for family coverage — are passing on more of the expense to their workers through higher deductibles and co-payments, according to survey released today.”

D. Lack of transportation for people in poverty limits their access to medical care.

E. Medicaid funding has been severely cut back and there isn’t enough money for outreach programs for people living in poverty.
U.S. officials are having a difficult time
E. Medicaid funding has been severely cut back and there isn’t enough money for outreach programs for people living in poverty.
U.S. officials are having a difficult time determining why fraud is so high with these two programs; however, they suspect it may have something to do with the guidelines for filing a claim. For each file claimed, payment has to be made in 14 to 30 days. With Medicare only receiving upwards of 4.4 million claims each day, only 3 percent are reviewed. As a result, more than $10 billion was improperly paid in claims in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2008.

States will have three options for making up the loss of federal Medicaid funds: 1) cutting back on their Medicaid programs by reducing eligibility (and thereby causing more low-income people to become uninsured), cutting back on health benefits, and/or reducing payments to providers (which already are lower than the payments that providers receive for treating most other patients); 2) cutting back on other
2) cutting back on other state programs and using those funds to replace the lost federal Medicaid dollars; or 3) raising taxes. In states that choose the first option, low-income families, individuals with disabilities, and seniors could be dropped from Medicaid entirely or could face increased out-of-pocket costs or restricted access to providers.

Contention 2 – Harms

A. Insurance companies now are able to deny coverage due to pre-existing conditions, will drop policy holders due to sickness, and increase premiums.

A New York Times article had this story concerning issues with pre-existing conditions, “Readling, a 50-year-old real estate agent, is one of nearly 47 million Americans with no health insurance. Increasingly, the problem affects members of the middle class, people like Readling, who said she made about $60,000 last year. As an independent contractor, like many real estate agents, Readling does not receive health benefits from an employer. She tried to buy a polic

Let me remind you that in this nation we do not rely on natural resources like other rich nations. We solely rely on our economy and production. Therefore who riches and the money used by our government comes directly from our tax money. I do not see why the government should SUPPLY health care to everyone with other people money. Mind you i do not have health insurance so you would think i fell in the category of supporters. yet i do not.
because in reality the main problem is greed and cost, but as usual our government instead of facing the real issue and fight it tries to find a way around it and do a patch work instead. and there is only one simple reason to that … because every single politician has at least one hand in some lobbyist or great health company’s pocket. and everybody knows that you do not bite the hand that feeds you.
Stop charging thousands in premiums, stop paying high management millions of dollars in salaries, stop spending millions if not billions in adds and commercials promoting this or that brand of medication, stop abusing the system simply because you can and finally … stop ripping off your own people because you are greedy.
THAT should do it … now who has the cojones to face the music? … no one.

I don’t personally believe in this but this is my plan…please read and give ideas if you have any.

Poverty shouldn’t exist in the United States, one of the richest countries in the world. But it does. According to the US Census Bureau there are 45.7 million people that lived below the poverty line in 2007, 8.7 million of those being children. Is free health care included in this? With us being one of the richest countries in the world we should be able to afford free health care for every working individual in the United States, but we don’t. My partner and I stand resolved that the United States government should substantially increase social services for persons living under the poverty line in the United States. We offer the following plan.

Plank 1: Administration. The plan will be passed by U.S. Congress and implemented by a non-profit agency, so as not to give the government too much control.

Plank 2: Mandates. The federal government should only play a limited part in the health care reform, only accounting for the taxes that are collected for this program. And to support the program in any way necessary excluding extra funding.

Plank 3: Logistics. This plan will be executed by raising or introducing taxes in three different areas that contribute to the rising cost of health care. The taxes include a High Risk Factor Tax, a Fatty Food Restaurant Tax, and a Cigarette/Alcohol Tax. We will explain the taxes in more detail later in the plan.

Contention 1 – Inherency

A.Existing federal programs do not catch the “middle class,” and “lower middle class” who make too much money for Medicaid or are too young for Medicare, excluding the V.A. (veteran’s program)

Wyn Staheli, President of Instacode Institute, LLC said, * “Uninsured Americans are often uninsured because their employers don’t have enough funds to pay for comprehensive health insurance because the economy is down and health insurance premiums are soaring at phenomenal rates. These rate increases are being driven by malpractice, litigation (lawsuits) , and the resulting malpractice premiums that doctors are being required to pay after a successful, (or unsuccessful, however you choose to look at it lawsuit), which drives up the cost of overhead for the provider which is then passed along as increased rates to the patient or the insurance company. Also the cost of these procedures and all of these advances in medicine is more expensive as new technology comes to market the cost of research and development is passed on as increased costs for the procedure, for the procedure or the medication.”

this is the one contention we have, any more would be appreciated as well as hams and solvency
we’re 15.
i’d say that’s pretty naive, we aren’t sending this to congress to get to to pass it, we’re just trying to pass a class and you’re not giving any good advice anyway.

the government does not need more power anyway
and medicaid isn’t just for kids.
kids can have it but it is designed for low income families
and i have to have mandates in my plan, not my choice there but i’m not giving the government any power over the agency that will be in charge of health care but the agency has power over them

Please consider the relativity of poverty, when the poor of America can be seen running around in cars and talking on cell phones.
Malpractice is not a bad thing, it keeps doctors honest, but it is out of hand, so yes, some tort reform is necessary, but that is indeed a state issue… Research Texas who has implemented Tort Reform.
Cost does correlate with technology, but so does quality.
Anyone can access Medicaid, if their bills exceed their income. But Medicaid should become a compensatory program, where the participants receive service in exchange for service, like a "work study program"
Mandates are unConstitutional, so keep that in mind, but a non-profit to tie in with the suggested volunteer, or work-benefit program, would be possible.