Podcast Center
Video Center
Webcasts
Resource Center
Events
September 14, 2010 at 08:00 PM
Since before the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) was passed, the Democrats and Republicans have been hashing out the details and arguing over which or their sides has it right – will reform provide more quality of care, or less? Is it constitutional, or unconstitutional? Is it socialism or simply an expansion of our existing private system?
Now, months after the act’s passage, the debate continues, and there are no signs that either side will slow down any time soon.
Here are some of the top arguments from both sides on the key issues involved in the PPACA.
| Quality of Care Improvements |
|
| Pro: “Patient care under Medicare will improve as pilot programs to improve efficiencies are implemented. Doctors and hospitals are encouraged to coordinate care through payment incentives. For the first time, Medicare will reward quality, not quantity; thus, bonus payments will be given to those doctors and hospitals that provide good quality care.” Alliance for Retired Americans |
Investor’s Business Daily |
| Health Reform as Socialism |
|
| Pro: “Opponents of health insurance reform continue to spread myths, including peddling the bogus notion that the health reform bill is ‘socialism’ and a ‘government takeover of health care.’ The fact is the reform legislation builds on our existing private health insurance system… “[H]ealth insurance reform legislation expands private health insurance in America, and is based on increasing choice and competition… among a variety of private insurance plans.” Nancy Pelosi |
Sean Hannity |
| Constitutionality |
|
| Pro: “The Constitution gives Congress the power to tax and spend money for the general welfare. This tax [PPACA] promotes the general welfare because it makes health care more widely available and affordable. Under existing law, therefore, the tax is clearly constitutional… “Many important and popular government programs are based [on] Congress’s ability to give incentives through taxation and redistribute tax revenues for public purposes. To strike down the individual mandate the Supreme Court would have to undermine many years of precedents justifying these programs that stretch back to the New Deal (and in the case of the rules for direct taxes, to the very founding of the country). “Opponents of the individual mandate insist that they are only defending individual freedom, but they are actually taking a far more radical position. They are really claiming that it is unconstitutional to make Americans pay taxes.” Jack M. Balkin, JD, PhD |
|
| Insurance Premium Reductions |
|
| Pro: “We estimate that, on net, the combination of provisions in the new law will… lower premiums by nearly $2,000 per family… “Without reform, premiums are expected to increase from $13,305 in 2010 to $21,458 in 2019. Relative to this increase, premiums under reform increase only three-quarters as much. By 2019, family premiums are nearly $2,000 lower. Adding reductions in out-of-pocket costs and lower taxes for Medicare and Medicaid will result in estimated savings for the typical family of over $2,500 that year.” Center for American Progress |
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) |
Source: ProCon.org
