Health Care a big Election Issue
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Health insurance is a vital thing for all people; without it, medical bills are outrageous, with it you pay monthly for it, usually out of pocket. For many of you today, your healthcare comes from your parents’ employer, or from their self-bought family insurance. The elderly have Medicare, which according to nobel prize winning economic columnist for the New York Times Paul Krugman, the Republicans of DC tried to destroy in the Clinton Administration. That’s what the 1995 shutdown of the government was about. McCain, being a veteran Republican saw how Medicare is quite resilient, and tried a new approach. He wants to remove the healthcare of Non-seniors, people under the age of 65. For people that have to find their own health insurance, because their employers do not provide it, or because they don’t like the coverage, they have a good idea on how hard it is to find individual health insurance. Usually, it’s very difficult to find health insurance, and most speople stick with their employer’s provided health insurance. With McCain’s new idea, there isn’t going to be any more health insurance provided by employers. His health care plan will give families $5000 refundable tax credit. How will he come up with this money? He’s going to pay for it by taxing the employer’s health care benefits. Maybe that is why McCain doesn’t mention health care in his speeches, or maybe it’s because it’s going to be a $3.6 trillion dollar tax hike. As a result, most employers will be reducing coverage or allover dropping it completely, leaving millions to find their own health care. According to the Tax Policy Center, based on McCain’s current “plan”, he would do almost nothing to reduce the number of currently uninsured people as well. With his plan dismantling health care, he would even increase the number of currently uninsured Americans by about 20 million people. McCain’s health care plan is more destructive than helpful, making people either lose their health care or have to pay out of pocket. Obama’s health care, on the other hand, says if you like your current health insurance, keep it, the only thing that would happen is your rates would go down, almost the exact opposite extreme of what McCain’s plan is. But what if you don’t like your current health care or you don’t like it? With Obama there will be more helpful insurance options, cutting insurance companies prices and leverage without installing a government run system. Health care might not be the biggest topic on the voter’s minds this coming election, but if you don’t have health insurance good luck being healthy enough to vote for McCain’s 2nd term.
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