My friend Ezra Klein, whom I quote far too often (or perhaps not often enough), has a smart post up on the price of bipartisanship on healthcare reform:There's an obvious logic to bipartisanship, particularly when you're pursuing large reforms in a closely divided republic. But I'd like to see some transparent calculations about the worth of bipartisanship. The question of Republican votes, after all, isn't whether they are, all else being equal, a good thing. It's whether they're worth the tradeoffs necessary to attain them.
Broder and the Post editorial board focus other portions of their arguments on the importance of cost controls, for instance. So it would be interesting to see them explain how many Republican votes you have to gain to justify losing a policy that would lower the costs of health insurance by nine percent a year, as the Lewin Group estimated a "level-playing field" public plan would do. And how many Republican votes are worth sacrificing a policy that would lower the cost of health insurance by between 20 percent and 30 percent a year, as the Commonwealth Fund estimated a "strong" public plan would do? So let's estimate the cost of bipartisanship and determine whether or not it is actually worth it, assuming the Lewin Group and Commonwealth Fund crunch their numbers roughly accurately.
According to the National Coalition on Health Care (and organization I know nothing about): The annual premium for an employer health plan covering a family of four averaged nearly $12,700. The annual premium for single coverage averaged over $4,700. Let's hedge a bit and estimate savings from a "level-playing field" at 6% and from a strong public option at 10%.
That works out to a level-playing field saving a "typical" family of four (or the breadwinner's employer or some combination thereof) $762 a year on premiums under a level playing field and $1,270 a year with a strong public option.
You can do the math for the individual, but it is a significant sum of money.
In otherwords, if bipartisan means no public option, than bipartisan means the Congress deciding that your family would be better off $1,000 poorer every year.
And that's the typical family with employer-provided coverage, so for the people trying to fend for themselves on the small group or (heaven forbid) the individual market, the savings would be even bigger.
That's not to say that there aren't tradeoffs. If Chuck Grassley opposes a bill AND said bill passes, in all likelihood we are on the road to serfdom. Note, of course, that it will be a slightly richer serfdom than our current free prosperity, but serfdom just the same. Or something. And stuff.
The ultimate irony here is, of course, that the conservative objections to healthcare reform so far have focused largely on the concern about choice and cost. Of course, the proposals on the table to offer a new public option (choice!) that would cut expenses (cost!) for Americans is being treated as anathema.
It makes one think that these Republicans aren't so worried about choice and cost as they pretend to be. Or they've invented a new economics that would put new math to shame in its mindlessness. |
