Sharing responsibility for health care costs
House Democrats unveiled a sweeping health care reform bill last Thursday built on shared responsibility.
Individuals would have to buy health insurance for themselves and their families.
Taxpayers would subsidize coverage for those unable to afford it on their own.
Employers would have to offer health benefits to their workers or make payments to help underwrite the cost of their coverage.
Most Americans get health insurance through their jobs. But that system has begun to unravel as health insurance premiums have soared. The cost of family coverage jumped 131 percent over the past 10 years.
A new report from the state Department of Social Services, which runs Missouri Medicaid, illustrates just how messy the current system has become.
The report ranked large companies with the most employees or family members enrolled in Medicaid. It’s a big list — 172 companies.
Nearly 871,000 Missourians get health care through Medicaid. Workers at those 172 large companies account for just one in every 15, about 57,000 people.
But they represent a substantial expense to state and federal taxpayers. Their care cost taxpayers almost $27 million during the first three months of 2009.
The report lists only companies with at least 150 workers and at least 50 workers or their family members on Medicaid. The largest of them is Wal-Mart, which employs nearly 39,000 people in Missouri. About 4,600 of its workers or their family members are on Medicaid. Their care cost more than $4.2 million from January to March.
Another retailer, Casey’s General Store, was number two. It employs about 3,500 people. More than 1,000 of its workers or their family members are on Medicaid. Their care cost taxpayers about $884,000.
That’s not surprising. Most large companies offer health insurance to their workers. But the numbers vary dramatically by the workers’ earnings, whether they work full or part time and the category of industry of their employer. In the retail industry, only about half of workers are offered coverage.
At companies that employ a large number of workers earning less than $23,000 a year, only about 40 percent are offered benefits. At companies with a substantial number of part-time employees, only a third of the workers get health insurance.
That pattern is common in retail stores, which is why a number of large retailers made the list. It’s also true for temporary staffing agencies, call centers, nursing homes and home-care agencies, all of which rely on part-time, low-wage or temporary workers.
State government made the list, too. Missouri employs more than 59,000 people. About 1,000 of them have Medicaid coverage for themselves or family members at a cost of more than $800,000. Also on the list were large hospitals that employ thousands of people. They get much of their revenue from Medicare and Medicaid.
Large companies face the vexing challenge of trying to retain employees or create jobs in the face of a recession and rising health care costs. That makes it harder for them to cover health insurance expenses for part-time or low-wage workers.
Companies shouldn’t be discouraged from hiring unskilled or part-time workers. Jobs, even those that pay low wages, keep the economy moving and families afloat.
The challenge for health reformers is to strike a responsible balance for all parties without crashing the whole system. Shared responsibility is critical.
Although I agree with shared responsibility and life choices responsibility and health insurance reform in general, the PD has yet to explain to me how they can endorse a 1900 page bill plus a planned 800 page amendment? It is complete ignorance to vote for anything that you don’t know what you are getting.
Remember you endorsed Obama and look what we got? One can never have too much information. Be careful what you wish, err vote for.
Will the people that I am “sharing” my $s with that are “unable to afford it on their own” be “sharing” their cell phone, eating out, tatoos, cloths… with me? Welfare enables individuals to misallocate their resources - somebody else will cover for me. It also enables companies that might otherwise have provided some level of coverage. When you change it to a national scale, what do you think will follow?
One of the first steps the Missouri Department of Social Services should take is to change the way acronyms are handled in its reports.
Poor Walmart, can’t afford health care for all of their employees so it requires the tax payer to pick up the tab. So much for the cheapest store in town, in the end we all pay Walmart to offer so-called low prices. I wonder how much money they’re spending to defeat this. I’d rather shop at Target.
Penny - You think Target is different? Think again. From their website: “Non-exempt team members are offered a Full-Time, Part-Time or Limited benefits package based on average hours worked and position at Target.” In fact, in a 2005 article in the Minneapolis Start-Tribune (reprinted at link below), the author said that entry-level hourly works at Target “have more difficulty qualifying for health care coverage than their peers at Wal-Mart.”
http://www.reclaimdemocracy.org/walmart/2005/target_better.php
Penny…Shop at COSTCO.
The unionized retailer just ratified a new contract which won over 90% of the employees support. After 4 years at COSTCO, cashiers earn more than $47,000 a year. COSTCO covers 92% of all employees healthcare. The CEO of COSTCO, Jim Sinegal, brings home $350,000 a year. Unlike the Walton family with a combined net worth over $180 BILLION. Sinegal doesn’t buy $78 million dollar Rembrants like Alice Walton… while you pickup the tab for Wal-Mart’s dismal healthcare plan.
Sinegal stated: “Our employees are entitled to good wages and benefits. They should be able to buy nice homes and send their children to nice schools. They should be able to retire with dignity”.
It’s amazing isn’t it? That a Big Box retailer can stay in business while doing the right thing for employees… while helping this great country to lessen it’s tax burden. Some peole scream about taxes. Others actually do something.
Then again, you have far right republicans who want to destroy unions.
Ask yourself why..and then ask yourself who do they really represent.
They protect the Alice Waltons of America..Not the Jim Sinegals.
And then they protest with tea parties to complian about government spending.
Go figure.
Garrison,
Jim Sinegals total compensation in 2008 was around 3.8 Million. However, he does take care of his employees. I think we agree on this one. The dude cares and knows what he is doing.
http://www.equilar.com/CEO_Compensation/Costco_Wholesale_James_D._Sinegal.php
If a business doesn’t pay their unskilled high school dropouts a living wage and provide a nice benefit package let’em move their business to Mexico or China. Who needs them?
The folks that studied hard and acquired some skills can work a little overtime and kick in a little extra to take up the slack. They don’t need that college fund for their kids, either. The government will give them a Pell Grant or something if they are worthy.
If productive taxpayers weren’t so selfish they could drive a cheaper car and live in a smaller house to help out the folks who are motivation deprived. After all, that’s what a compassionate, sharing society is all about.
A CENTRIST, some of us found the Top Line Changes on the blended House Bills by searching the Web or Google. There are still many more steps before they and the blended Senate Bill are reconciled, both Houses vote and the President has a bill to sign.
Egoist, where and what are these generous welfare benefit you’ve described? No where in this country! Health Care reform won’t benefit the shiftless or some illegal immigrant! Look at your family, your friends, neighbors as well as millions of Americans who’ve worked hard all their lives. They lost coverage when the jobs they thought they’d have until retirement disappeared. The small businesses that are hiring can’t afford to offer health care coverage. Large employers who do don’t assign enough hours for workers to qualify. Those fortunate enough to get jobs with benefits discover that treatments for their hypertension or a child’s asthma are excluded as pre-existing conditions. We all know at least one person who has been affected? Would you deprive them (and 47 Million Americans) to withhold coverage for relatively few?
Opponents to reform can’t grasp that the solution isn’t simply about spending more. For the past 10 years, rising premiums, reduced benefit levels, out of pocket expenses, etc. have sucked up our cost of living increases and disposable incomes. Doing nothing will guarantee those costs will rise at a faster rate. Shifting the dollars in our health care delivery system to where we taxpayers will get a better return makes sense. Improvements may require initial investments. It’s like buying a reliable car to get to that job that pays more and has better working conditions.
The guys who benefit from the current system financed this campaign designed to scare us. Proposals are being distorted and terms like ‘death panels,’ ‘government take over, ‘the commies are coming,’etc. are used to increase our level of fear to interfere with our ability to process facts.
Believe it or not, our government has performed better than the private sector as an insurer. Medicare is government managed and overhead is 3% of its revenues; operating expenses for private insurers are between 30-40%of their income. A public option would reveal the waste and inefficiencies in our health care delivery system.
MERCHLADY- “Egoist, where and what are these generous welfare benefit you’ve described?” Respectfully, you misunderstand me. I do not regard these welfare benefits to be generous, quite the opposite. I regard them as but a rung up from torture, or some sort of mind control. It tricks people into a life of dependency, and leads to a metronome cycle of bitterness and grovelling. In short it destroys a life that – short as it is – would otherwise be something to build up, expand and enjoy.
Welfare is a death spiral for the recipient and theft from the productive.