Originally Posted By ecdc <a target="blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/11/whats-behind-the-rate-shock-victim-obsession.html">http://nymag.com/daily/intelli...ion.html</a> >>Everybody knows about the two main ways in which the American health-care system is awful: It’s the most expensive in the world, by far, and also the only advanced health-care system that denies basic care to many citizens. There’s also a third awful trait as well: The system is resistant to change. The very insecurity of American health care, the ever-present fear of finding one’s insurance lifeline snapped and plunging into the howling void of the 50 million uninsured, renders those with insurance understandably terrified of change.... Why has their plight attained such singular prominence? Several factors have come together. The news media has a natural attraction to bad news over good. “Millions Set to Gain Low-Cost Insurance” is a less attractive story than “Florida Woman Facing Higher Costs.” Obama overstated the case when he repeatedly assured Americans that nobody would lose their current health-care plan. There’s also an economic bias at work. Victims of rate shock are middle-class, and their travails, in general, tend to attract far more lavish coverage than the problems of the poor. (Did you know that on November 1, millions of Americans suffered painful cuts to nutritional assistance? Not a single Sunday-morning talk-show mentioned it.)<<
Originally Posted By SuperDry Another thing that many are not taking into consideration is that there is premium assistance for any family that makes less than 400% of the poverty line. So for a married couple with two children, such family that makes less than $96,000 per year gets help with the premium payments. And, it's probably fair to say that if you make more than 400% of the poverty line, any premium increase is not going to create a burden, especially since it's not just a rate increase but instead is a higher premium for a policy that covers more.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer It's funny to me that the GOP is more focused on the "handout" to the people who are getting insurance subsidies than to the fact that it is actually a handout directly to the insurance companies that they are buying insurance from. It's yet another transfer of wealth from taxpayers to businesses.
Originally Posted By SuperDry ^^^ Interesting point. Under any other scenario, this would be just the kind of thing that the GOP would support.
Originally Posted By tiggertoo It's because it has the name 'Obama' in it. I swear, if a lifeboat was called the U.S.S. Obama, Tea Partiers who chose to drown rather than climb aboard.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer "Under any other scenario, this would be just the kind of thing that the GOP would support." It's their plan. It's Romneycare. It was their idea on how to provide healthcare to more Americans while protecting corporate profits.
Originally Posted By fkurucz >>It's their plan. It's Romneycare. It was their idea on how to provide healthcare to more Americans while protecting corporate profits.<< Also similar to what Bob Dole proposed years ago.
Originally Posted By Dr Hans Reinhardt I wonder what the next ginned up GOP Obama crisis will be now that the president has publicly apologized for the horrific web launch of Obamacare and for telling folks that existing coverage would stay intact once the law passed.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>I wonder what the next ginned up GOP Obama crisis will be now that the president has publicly apologized<< He sucks because real Amurcans don't apologize.
Originally Posted By skinnerbox I believe I have the answer, my good Dr: <a target="blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/07/obama-minimum-wage_n_4235965.html?utm_hp_ref=politics">http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...politics</a> <> Obama Gets Behind Democrats' $10.10 Minimum Wage Proposal Posted: 11/07/2013 6:16 pm EST | Updated: 11/07/2013 6:27 pm EST WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama is throwing his support behind congressional Democrats' proposal to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 and peg it to inflation, more than a dollar higher than the $9 proposal he made in his State of the Union address in February. A White House official confirmed to HuffPost Thursday that the administration backs the legislation introduced earlier this year by Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) and Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.). The Hill reported Thursday that Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said the White House was willing to get onboard with the measure. "The President has long supported raising the minimum wage so hardworking Americans can have a decent wage for a day’s works to support their families and make ends meet, and he supports the Harkin/Miller bill that accomplishes this important goal," the White House official said in an email. Harkin and Miller have said that a minimum wage hike to $9 would be insufficient. The president's support of the $10.10 proposal may help more Democrats rally around the bill as the Senate takes it up in coming weeks. "We are very pleased President Obama endorsed a $10 an hour minimum wage bill," Aaron Albright, a spokesman for Miller, said in an email. "This action unites all Democrats and minimum wage advocates behind one proposal that addresses income inequality in a powerful way. Congress must move to raise the minimum wage now." The White House's move was applauded by advocates for low-wage workers, who haven't seen the federal minimum wage raised since 2009, after a series of increases signed into law by President George W. Bush. In states that don't mandate a higher one, the wage floor remains $7.25 per hour. "The White House got this ball rolling in a big way by putting this in the State of the Union," said Judy Conti, federal advocacy coordinator at the National Employment Law Project. "I think they've come to a point where they realize the economy deserves a robust minimum wage. The jobs we're creating are hourly jobs with low wages. We need to do everything we can to raise it." The $10.10 figure in the Harkin-Miller proposal isn't arbitrary. Progressive economists like to point out that if the minimum wage had kept pace with inflation since its high in the late 1960s, it would now be above $10. Of course, it's possible the president's original $9 proposal could weaken Democrats' bargaining position with the House GOP. Republicans may seek a smaller minimum wage hike, if they agree to one at all. Republican leaders have already called it a job-killer. During his State of the Union address, Obama argued that hiking the minimum wage would improve the lives of millions of workers and their families. "Even with the tax relief we’ve put in place, a family with two kids that earns the minimum wage still lives below the poverty line. That’s wrong," Obama said. "Tonight, let’s declare that in the wealthiest nation on Earth, no one who works full time should have to live in poverty." While the federal minimum wage has held steady, many states and municipalities have continued to raise or implement their own minimum wages. Just this week, New Jersey voters approved a minimum wage bump to $8.25 per hour. Last month, California lawmakers raised theirs to $10, making it the highest state minimum wage in the nation. The congressional Democrats' proposal would raise the minimum wage to $10.10 through a series of increases, then it would be adjusted each year according to inflation. The minimum wage would also rise for restaurant servers and other tipped workers, whose employers can pay them as little as $2.13 before tips. The minimum wage for those workers would be set at 70 percent of the regular minimum wage. <>
Originally Posted By EighthDwarf It appears this proposal may come after studies done on the UK's minimum wage. Opponents of raising the minimum wage here traditionally argue that raising the minimum wage reduces employment, but that apparently was not the UK's experience (much to my surprise admittedly). <a target="blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2013/02/labour-markets?zid=309&ah=80dcf288b8561b012f603b9fd9577f0e">http://www.economist.com/blogs...d9577f0e</a> From the link: "Britain’s experience offers another set of insights. The country’s national minimum wage was introduced at 46% of the median wage, slightly higher than America’s. A lower floor applied to young people. Both are adjusted annually on the advice of the Low Pay Commission. Before the law took effect, worries about potential damage to employment were widespread. Yet today the consensus is that Britain’s minimum wage has done little or no harm. The most striking impact of Britain’s minimum wage has been on the spread of wages. Not only has it pushed up pay for the bottom 5% of workers, but it also seems to have boosted earnings further up the income scale—and thus reduced wage inequality. Wage gaps in the bottom half of Britain’s pay scale have shrunk sharply since the late 1990s."
Originally Posted By skinnerbox <<Not only has it pushed up pay for the bottom 5% of workers, but it also seems to have boosted earnings further up the income scale—and thus reduced wage inequality.>> And that's why the GOP hates the notion of raising minimum wage here in the states. They're tied to the robber baron class. The 1% doesn't want income inequality reduced in our country. They like having the competitive political advantage of being able to outspend everyone else during elections. Income inequality is their middle name.
Originally Posted By TomSawyer Why don't the Coch brothers and other plutocrats understand that giving workers more pay means more goods and services purchased which means more revenue for their businesses?
Originally Posted By RoadTrip <<Why don't the Coch brothers and other plutocrats understand that giving workers more pay means more goods and services purchased which means more revenue for their businesses?>> Because unfortunately (as usual), liberals are horse-shit at selling their programs. They talk about how no one who works full-time should be unable to support a family, that this will do something to address income inequality, and on and on with all kinds of fuzzy liberal feel-good platitudes. We get the usual liberal suspects here on LP raging on (as usual) about the "robber baron class" and how they like the political advantage that the income inequality produces. Sorry folks, you are preaching to NO ONE but the choir. You will not convince ONE PERSON who does not already agree with you. Instead they should be out there talking about how the advantages of an increased minimum wage could be a major step towards solving many problems in America that are widely recognized by people across the political spectrum. Reduce the massively increasing need for food stamps. Reduce dependence on Medicaid programs. Reduce demand for subsidized housing. Reduce use of the earned-income credit (basically a direct transfer between those who pay taxes and those who pay none... they receive a "refund" of amounts never withheld in the first place). Increase tax revenue to the treasury, a major reason for our current deficit caused by the recession (in addition to the overwhelming expense of fighting two major wars at once). Why don't they have some policy wonk out there figuring out the massive deficit reduction that this could accomplish? Somewhere along the line liberals need to take a few marketing courses in addition to all their political science, psychology and sociology courses. Shaking my damned head...
Originally Posted By mawnck +1 to post 14, with a caveat. "Getting your message out there" includes "getting your message past the gatekeepers". The lamestream news media isn't interested in reporting about solving middle-class America's problems, because they're complicated, and middle-class America is already predisposed to think they don't have any problems. And they don't have any good stock footage to show while they talk about it. And if you don't have cool stuff to look at, Joe Twelvepack changes the channel to someone that does. Therefore "This program helps poor downtrodden starving families feed their kids!" (cue the usual stock shots of overweight African Americans at an Alabama Wal Mart paying with food stamps) is far more likely to get air time. This is an America problem, not just a messaging problem. But, I reiterate, I am not disagreeing with you. The Dems have an echo chamber problem too.
Originally Posted By fkurucz >>Why don't the Coch brothers and other plutocrats understand that giving workers more pay means more goods and services purchased which means more revenue for their businesses?<< Because it really isn't about money ... it's about power. Also, they would rather have a bigger percentage of a smaller pie, than a piece of a larger pie, that while bigger, is a smaller percentage. I have become convinced that they really want everyone to be poor and under their heel.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip I rest my case. That post will convince A LOT of people who don't already agree with you. Sigh...
Originally Posted By ecdc >>Sorry folks, you are preaching to NO ONE but the choir. You will not convince ONE PERSON who does not already agree with you.<< Huh? You really think liberals can just fix American stupidity with a little bit of marketing? Obama goes out and explains to people how the number one cause of bankruptcy is medical expenses, how insurance companies can discriminate against you if you have a pre-existing condition, and how we spend more on healthcare in this country than any other country for less care. And what do people do? They scream and yell about socialism and how their freedoms are being taken away. Do you really think there aren't people out there talking about the benefits of raising the minimum wage for everyone? It's out there every single day. The fact that you don't see it doesn't mean it isn't so. We don't have a messaging problem, we have a stupid problem.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip Sorry, but I don't buy that. And maybe as mawnck pointed out, it is more a problem of what the MSM decides to report on. But look at the posts here... how many people mentioned the benefits to all that I did and how many just did the usual finger-pointing at the other side? Yes, you will NEVER convince the extremists on either side who are more interested in ideological victories than practical solutions. But you forget that an increasing large part of the electorate is independents and those who consider themselves either moderate democrats or moderate republicans. Moderates ARE looking for practical solutions, not finger pointing at the other side. And moderates are currently by far the largest voting block. We are tired of politicians who want to blame the "47%" or on people who "cling to their guns and to their religion". That is why NOTHING currently gets done in this country. And I can guarantee you, a price is paid for such statements. Romney likely would be president now if not for his stupid "47%" remark. And yet they never learn. Obama is starting to understand it after five years... thank God. You could see that in his recent apology about the horrendous website implementation and people who contrary to his prior statements, are now losing their insurance. Of course the usual response here on LP was that the insurance they are losing was crap insurance and they deserved it. Thank God Obama has grown past that response.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>You really think liberals can just fix American stupidity with a little bit of marketing?<< I rise in defense of RT's point. The screamers and yellers are unreachable. The heck with 'em. What a lot of Dems miss is that the battle is for the middle. And red meat doesn't work so good on the middle. Yes, perhaps there are people talking about the benefits of raising the minimum wage, but they aren't going to get through the clutter until the red meaters clam it. fkurucz's post 16, which is as accurate a post as ever there was, is not going to be persuasive to a RoadTrip, nor is it really even relevant. We should raise the minimum wage because the greedy bad guys who make Dixie Cups want you to be financially destitute? What is that I don't even. However, fkurucz's message is the one that's getting through. Not yours. Because it's an emotional message rather than a common sense one. Ideally, you want the fkuruczes to shuddup so that the media is forced to go with the *effective* message instead. (No offense, fkurucz.) The Republicans are great at this. So much so that it's big news when one of them *doesn't* stick with the talking points. TL;DR: Yeah, it's a complicated problem, but a big part of it is that Dem marketing sucks.
