New US Health Care legislation is likely to resulting in requiring change of providers

I am glad that Con has taken this debate. We are getting into some important issues. Con's arguments, if I understand correctly, is that because pending legislation does not directly require a person to change their existing health care provider, that the assertion "you won't have to change" is technically correct, even though as a consequence of the legislation it is extremely likely that a substantial number of providers or the policies currently provided by insurers will become unavailable. 1. Con argues that because the people who receive private health care through their employers "don't have much of an option to start with" the fact that perhaps half of them will lose what they now have should not count. (a) Whether what they now have offers much of an option or not, the statement "if you like what you have you will get to keep it" is nonetheless false. The government plans to undercut the free market by at least 20%, and perhaps 30% to 40%. Many employers will elect to pay substantially more in an attempt to compete with the government's unlimited resources and power to set the rules. Con provided no evidence that the estimate of 83 million losing coverage is wrong, so therefore the lose of the ability to "keep what you now have" is substantial. (b) Many employers in fact offer many health care options. There tends to be more options in urban areas where there are more providers. My experience in Silicon Valley is that employers in my area offer three to eight health care insurance options to employees. 2. Under the Baucus mark-up and all other legislation, a large percentage of existing health insurance policies, in some states a majority, will become illegal. Con says, "I fail to see how this affects the individual's choice of coverage plans." The effect is that if the plan you now have and like becomes illegal, you will not be able to choose it. It is reasonable to suppose that many insurance carriers will offer amended plans that conform with the new laws, but at higher prices to meet the required coverage. A person may for various reasons like to have a lower level of coverage at lower cost. They will not get to keep what they have. 3. Con says, "everyone will be able to choose to use the government health care or not." I think that misunderstands the issue. Some people currently do not have any health care insurance and are "happy with what they now have" ... which is to say they are happy buying health care services as the need arises. At issue here is the fate of people who do not want to purchase health insurance, but rather are happy fending for themselves. All of the legislation proposed by Democrats has a mandate for individuals to purchase health insurance, whether they want to or not: "The Senate Finance Committee's bill: ... Everyone must get coverage through an employer, on their own or through a government plan. Exemptions for economic hardship. The bill requires individuals and families to buy coverage as long as it costs no more than 8 percent of their income." "The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee's bill: ... Individuals will have to have insurance, enforced through tax penalties with hardship waivers." "House Democratic Bill: ... Individuals must have insurance, enforced through tax penalty with hardship waivers. " http://www.google.com... 4. There is controversy over what HR 3200, page 16, requires. The least onerous interpretation is that those who leave an employer will not be able to by the coverage they had with the employer directly from the private carrier. Instead they must elect to buy through what is offered in the government-run "pool." There are other restrictions as well: "the "Limitation On New Enrollment" section of the bill clearly states: 'Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day' of the year the legislation becomes law.' ... So we can all keep our coverage, just as promised — with, of course, exceptions: Those who currently have private individual coverage won't be able to change it. Nor will those who leave a company to work for themselves be free to buy individual plans from private carriers." http://www.investors.com... 5. "Obama can only speak for as much as he's aware of." Yes, and Obama is aware that if the government undercuts the free market by 20% to 40%, that many employers will drop the coverage they now have. Therefore he must be aware that his statement that "if you like what you now have, you will get to keep it" is false. Currently, Medicare refuses to pay market prices for health care services. The health care system survives survives by private insurers paying extra to compensate for the Medicare underpayment. The Democratic Senator from Nebraska said Wednesday in the Finance committee that every hospital in his state would go bankrupt if it were not for the private insurance system compensating for government underpayment. The proposed government option in HR 3200 cuts payments to providers by 20% in order to achieve the savings that allows them to undercut the free market. But as the free market shrinks, hospitals will be forced to charge the private insurers more to compensate for the still reduced payments from the government. That makes private insurers even less competitive, so the chance that you be able "to keep what you know have" will become even smaller as carriers are forced out of the market. a. Pro argues, "I would like to point out that my opponent has made no argument that says people will be FORCED to use the new system outlined in the health insurance prop in any way." They will be forced to use the new system because (1) undercutting the free market by 20% to 40% will cause much of the market to disappear, and a person cannot keep what is unavailable, (2) many of the policies people now have will be outlawed, so they cannot keep them, (3) if you are happy being uninsured, you won't be allowed to keep that status, (4) and rules mandate switching to the government run pool. b. Pro argues that the government option is just intended to provide fair competition with the free market. Whatever the intent, private enterprise cannot compete with the government's unlimited ability to subsidize losses through tax dollars; ability to set payments to providers by law independent of costs and markets; ability to exempt themselves from regulations by the states, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and other laws; ability to exempt themselves from federal, state, and local taxes; the ability to raise capital at little or no cost; and the ability to mandate that consumers buy their product. The government is therefore not in any sense competing with private enterprise. It has all the features in place to ensure that they will succeed in driving out most of the private competition. None of the proposed legislation offers all of the government advantages to private enterprise for the purpose of ensuring fair competition. If Con believes all these government advantages are unimportant, I challenge him to say so directly. c. Con restates the arguments made and rebutted in (a). Easily foreseeable results need not be directly mandated to be counted upon. The argument that a person will be able to get something does not equate to "keeping what you now have." The assertion that "if you like what you now have, you will be able to keep it" is clearly untrue.