|
Whilst lefty attention is concentrated on the public option question, each version of the health care bill has been assiduously stuffed with coporate welfare on an epic scale.
The Eshoo-Barton Amendment has got some coverage; FDL highlights another gift to the moneybags: nationwide plans.
Apparently, the provision in Harry's substitute
Allows insurers in the individual and small group markets to offer a qualified health plan nationwide, which is subject to only the State benefit mandate laws of the State in which the plans are issued; but requires such plans to provide the essential benefits package.
So - the insurers shop for the state with the flimsiest regs and issue the plans from there; and those regs govern the plan in all the other 49. (States can opt out - but the insurers' lobbyists will have a word to say on that.)
There is a pattern - which way in the distant past (coupla years ago) I did some pieces on - in which Federal laws are enacted which pre-empt state regulations on things like (from memory) predatory lending.
It's really effective, and is very hard to drag from below the radar where it mostly goes on.
Of course, shedloads of moolah are going to be laid at the feet of insurers, pharma, hospitals, etc, by any health care bill that passes (money press-ganged from the average Joe); but the bill will also be making whole load of gifts in kind like Eshoo-Barton and the nationwide plans provision the value of which I suspect has not even been quantified.
It would be nice to have a list...
|
STATE BLOGS
