What do we need health insurers for anyway? - latimes.com
By Michael Hiltzik
February 28, 2010
*
Angela Braly can't kid me.
When the chief executive of gargantuan health insurer WellPoint (parent of Blue Cross of California) went before a congressional subcommittee the other day, she displayed all the smile-through-the-tears pluck of Annie looking to a sunny tomorrow or Scarlett swearing to God she'll never be hungry again.
WellPoint didn't really want to jack up health premiums on its customers by as much as 39%, she said -- it had no choice. "We care deeply about our California customers," she said.
But what she was really telling the committee members was this: "Please put us out of our misery."
Braly explained that her company's premium increases on individual policies were based on several circumstances: One, people are getting older. Two, people are becoming unemployed, and if they're healthy they're dropping out of the insurance pool. Three, the cost of diagnostic testing is soaring.
Implicitly, she begged for the government to help -- put people back to work so they're eligible for cheaper group plans, and clamp down on costs. (Not even the government can stop people for growing older.) Without that help, she intimated, premiums are going to keep rising sharply and WellPoint's already meager profits are going to be hammered worse.
In delivering this appeal, Braly was forced to make an implicit admission that her industry almost never makes explicitly: The nation's health coverage system is so hopelessly broken that even the health insurance industry can't handle it anymore.
Her testimony, and other statements she and other WellPoint executives have made, suggests that insurers can't profitably manage through periods of high unemployment. They can't price policies in a way that keeps healthy young people in the same pool as older people, producing a mockery of the very point of indemnity insurance. Despite a decade of unobstructed consolidation, which was sold to regulators as a way to control healthcare costs by creating mega-insurers like hers, her industry can't control healthcare costs....
Replies
7
SoWal Insider
I am very familiar with Wellpoint. Pull their annual reports and check out Angela's total compensation. Plead to the gov't my ass!!
SoWal Expert
Note that Wellpoint is also the company Evan Bayh's wife works for. :roll:
Any guesses as to how he voted on reform or the public option?
Any guesses as to how he voted on reform or the public option?
SWGB
Note that Wellpoint is also the company Evan Bayh's wife works for. :roll:
Any guesses as to how he voted on reform or the public option?
I thought she just owned tons of stock?
SoWal Expert
Nope, she's on the board of directors.
Beach Fanatic
Nope, she's on the board of directors.
do you suppose that might be one of the reasons "he couldn't get anything done in Congress"...
SoWal Expert
do you suppose that might be one of the reasons "he couldn't get anything done in Congress"...
Yep, I will definitely go out on a sturdy limb and say that there was a teensy conflict o' interest there. :roll:
We SO need to throw all the lobbyists and corporations OUT of our government! :angry:
SoWal Expert
Here's a couple more.............
Joe Lieberman's wife has been a consultant to Pfizer and ALCO.
Jackie Clegg Dodd, the wife of Christopher J. Dodd , D-Conn., serves on the boards of Javelin Pharmaceuticals Inc., Cardiome Pharma Corp., Brookdale Senior Living and Pear Tree Pharmaceuticals, records show.
Kimberley Thune, wife of Sen. John Thune , R-S.D., is employed by the Sanford Health Plan, a South Dakota health care provider.
Among the House’s top leaders, Leslie Larson, the wife of House Democratic Caucus chairman John B. Larson of Connecticut, works at Aero-Med Ltd., a medical product supplier.
Nearly four dozen members of Congress have spouses employed in the health care industry — ties that lawmakers acknowledge are influencing their thinking about how the health system should be overhauled.
Financial disclosure forms made public in mid-June showed that at least 39 members were tied to the industry by their spouses in 2008. In addition, 13 full-voting House members are medical doctors.
Six senators reported that their spouses earned income from health industry jobs. An additional two, Republicans Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and John Barrasso of Wyoming, are physicians.
The influence and connections that result from this little-examined reality of Washington life rarely violate ethics rules or laws. But the experiences can make a significant difference in how members view health care overhaul proposals.
CQ Politics | Spouses in Health Care Affect Members?€™ Views
61 members of Congress—39 in the Senate, 22 in the House, 38 Democrats and 23 Republicans—got money from 10 or more outside lobbyists whose healthcare or health insurance industry clients also contributed to their campaigns.
http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2009/10/hidden-bundles-of-lobbyist-giv.html
Joe Lieberman's wife has been a consultant to Pfizer and ALCO.
Jackie Clegg Dodd, the wife of Christopher J. Dodd , D-Conn., serves on the boards of Javelin Pharmaceuticals Inc., Cardiome Pharma Corp., Brookdale Senior Living and Pear Tree Pharmaceuticals, records show.
Kimberley Thune, wife of Sen. John Thune , R-S.D., is employed by the Sanford Health Plan, a South Dakota health care provider.
Among the House’s top leaders, Leslie Larson, the wife of House Democratic Caucus chairman John B. Larson of Connecticut, works at Aero-Med Ltd., a medical product supplier.
Nearly four dozen members of Congress have spouses employed in the health care industry — ties that lawmakers acknowledge are influencing their thinking about how the health system should be overhauled.
Financial disclosure forms made public in mid-June showed that at least 39 members were tied to the industry by their spouses in 2008. In addition, 13 full-voting House members are medical doctors.
Six senators reported that their spouses earned income from health industry jobs. An additional two, Republicans Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and John Barrasso of Wyoming, are physicians.
The influence and connections that result from this little-examined reality of Washington life rarely violate ethics rules or laws. But the experiences can make a significant difference in how members view health care overhaul proposals.
CQ Politics | Spouses in Health Care Affect Members?€™ Views
61 members of Congress—39 in the Senate, 22 in the House, 38 Democrats and 23 Republicans—got money from 10 or more outside lobbyists whose healthcare or health insurance industry clients also contributed to their campaigns.
http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2009/10/hidden-bundles-of-lobbyist-giv.html
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