Where anyone gets the idea that Sen. Kent Conrad's effort at not even half-baked health insurance reform through weak-kneed co-ops is an acceptable substitute is beyond me-- especially after reading this:
The health care reform compromise that centrist Democrats and several Republicans have indicated they'd support has shown an inability to effectively lower premiums for consumers, a newly resurfaced government study shows.
The Huffington Post piece continues:
The U.S. General Accounting Office produced a report on cooperatives in March 2000 that was mostly sour on the idea. Using five different co-ops as examples, the study concluded that on the key function -- lowering the cost of insurance -- these non-profit insurance pools came up well short.
"The cooperatives' potential to reduce overall premiums is limited because (1) they lack sufficient leverage as a result of their limited market share; (2) the cooperatives have not been able to produce administrative cost savings for insurers; or (3) their state laws and regulations already restrict to differing degrees the amount insurers can vary the premiums charged different groups purchasing the same health plan."
Let's demand the killing of this cockamanie idea and demand that our legislators pass real healthcare reform and not this doesn't-come-close-to-being-second-rate-idea that Conrad and other so-called "moderates" are pushing.
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