http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWsx1X8PV_A
"Is it really true that political self-interest is nobler somehow than economic self-interest?" -- Milton Friedman
Here is a pretty interesting interview from him on Donahue:
Donahue asks: "When you see around the globe the mal-distribution of wealth, the desperate plight of millions of people in undeveloped countries … when you see the greed and the concentration of power, did you ever have a moment of dou...bt about capitalism and whether greed is a good idea to run on?"
Friedman responds, "Is there some society out there that doesn't run on greed? Do you think Russia or China doesn't run on greed? What is greed? Of course none of us are greedy; it's only the other fellow who's greedy. The world runs on individuals pursuing their separate interests. The great achievements of civilization have not come from government bureaus. Einstein didn't construct his theory under order from a bureaucrat. Henry Ford didn't revolutionize the automobile industry that way. In the only cases in which the masses have escaped from the kind of grinding poverty you're talking about they have had capitalism and largely free trade. If you want to know where the masses are the worst off, it is exactly in the kinds of society that depart from that. So that the record of history is absolutely crystal clear: that there is no alternative way so far discovered of improving the lot of the ordinary people that can hold a candle to the productive activities that are unleashed by a free enterprise system."
Mr. Donahue: "But it seems to reward not virtue so much as ability to manipulate the system."
Friedman says, "And what does reward virtue? Do you think the communist commisary rewards virtue? You think a Hitler rewards virtue? Do you think American Presidents reward virtue? Do they choose their appointees on the basis of the virtue of the people appointed or on the basis of their political clout? Is it really true that political self-interest is nobler somehow than economic self-interest? I think you are taking a lot of things for granted. Just tell me where in the world you're going to find these angels who are going to organize society for us? I don't even trust you to do that!"
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Bias and bigotry in academia
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=181357
July 19, 2010
Pat Buchanan
A decade ago, activist Ron Unz conducted a study of the ethnic and religious composition of the student body at Harvard.
Blacks and Hispanics, Unz found, were then being admitted to his alma mater in numbers approaching their share of the population.
And who were the most underrepresented Americans at Harvard?
White Christians and ethnic Catholics. Though two-thirds of the U.S. population then, they had dropped to one-fourth of the student body.
Comes now a more scientific study from Princeton sociologists Thomas Espenshade and Alexandria Radford to confirm that a deep bias against the white conservative and Christian young of America is pervasive at America's elite colleges and Ivy League schools.
Wake up! This is the reality of what Christian students face in the secular world of academia.
The Espenshade-Radford study "draws from ... the National Study of College Experience ... gathered from eight highly competitive private colleges and universities (entering freshman SAT scores: 1360)," writes Princeton Professor Russell K. Nieli, who has summarized the findings:
Elite college admissions officers may prattle about "diversity," but what they mean is the African-American contingent on campus should be 5 percent to 7 percent, with Hispanics about as numerous.
However, "an estimated 40 percent to 50 percent of those categorized as black are Afro-Caribbean or African immigrants, or the children of such immigrants," who never suffered segregation or Jim Crow.
To achieve even these percentages, however, the discrimination against white and Asian applicants, because of the color of their skin and where their ancestors came from, is astonishing.
As Nieli puts it, "Being Hispanic conferred an admissions boost over being white ... equivalent to 130 SAT points (out of 1,600), while being black rather than white conferred a 310-point SAT advantage. Asians, however, suffered an admissions penalty compared to whites equivalent to 140 SAT points."
"To have the same chance of gaining admission as a black student with a SAT score of 1100, a Hispanic student otherwise equally matched in background characteristics would have to have 1230, a white student a 1410 and an Asian student a 1550."
Was this what the civil-rights revolution was all about – requiring kids whose parents came from Korea, Japan or Vietnam to get a perfect SAT score of 1600 to be given equal consideration with a Jamaican or Kenyan kid who got an 1150? Is this what it means to be an Ivy League progressive?
What are the historic and moral arguments for discriminating in favor of kids from Angola and Argentina over kids whose parents came from Poland and Vietnam?
There is yet another form of bigotry prevalent among our academic elite that is a throwback to the snobbery of the WASPs of yesterday. While Ivy League recruiters prefer working-class to middle-class black kids with the same test scores, the reverse is true with white kids.
White kids from poor families who score as well as white kids from wealthy families – think George W. Bush – not only get no break, they seem to be the most undesirable and unwanted of all students.
Though elite schools give points to applicants for extracurricular activities, especially for leadership roles and honors, writes Nieli, if you played a lead role in Future Farmers of America, the 4-H Clubs or junior ROTC, leave it off your resume or you may just be blackballed. "Excelling in these activities is 'associated with 60 or 65 percent lower odds on admissions.'"
Writes Nieli, there seems an unwritten admissions rule at America's elite schools: "Poor Whites Need Not Apply."
For admissions officers at our top private and public schools, diversity is "a code word" for particular prejudices.
For these schools are not interested in a diversity that would include "born-again Christians from the Bible belt, students from Appalachia and other rural and small-town areas, people who have served in the U.S. military, those who have grown up on farms or ranches, Mormons, Pentecostals, Jehovah's Witnesses, lower- and middle-class Catholics, working-class 'white ethnics,' social and political conservatives, wheelchair users, married students, married students with children or older students just starting into college and raising children."
"Students in these categories," writes Nieli, "are often very rare at the most competitive colleges, especially the Ivy League."
"Lower-class whites prove to be all-around losers" at the elite schools. They are rarely accepted. Lower-class Hispanics and blacks are eight to 10 times more likely to get in with the same scores.
That such bigotry is pervasive in 2010 at institutions that preen about how progressive they are is disgusting. That a GOP which purports to represents Middle America, whose young are bearing the brunt of this bigotry, has remained largely silent is shameful.
Many of these elite public and private colleges and universities benefit from U.S. tax dollars through student loans and direct grants. The future flow of those tax dollars should be made contingent on Harvard and Yale ending racial practices that went out at Little Rock Central High in 1957.
Pat Buchanan was twice a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination and the Reform Party's candidate in 2000. He is also a founder and editor of The American Conservative. Now a political analyst for MSNBC and a syndicated columnist, he served three presidents in the White House, was a founding panelist of three national TV shows, and is the author of seven books.
July 19, 2010
Pat Buchanan
A decade ago, activist Ron Unz conducted a study of the ethnic and religious composition of the student body at Harvard.
Blacks and Hispanics, Unz found, were then being admitted to his alma mater in numbers approaching their share of the population.
And who were the most underrepresented Americans at Harvard?
White Christians and ethnic Catholics. Though two-thirds of the U.S. population then, they had dropped to one-fourth of the student body.
Comes now a more scientific study from Princeton sociologists Thomas Espenshade and Alexandria Radford to confirm that a deep bias against the white conservative and Christian young of America is pervasive at America's elite colleges and Ivy League schools.
Wake up! This is the reality of what Christian students face in the secular world of academia.
The Espenshade-Radford study "draws from ... the National Study of College Experience ... gathered from eight highly competitive private colleges and universities (entering freshman SAT scores: 1360)," writes Princeton Professor Russell K. Nieli, who has summarized the findings:
Elite college admissions officers may prattle about "diversity," but what they mean is the African-American contingent on campus should be 5 percent to 7 percent, with Hispanics about as numerous.
However, "an estimated 40 percent to 50 percent of those categorized as black are Afro-Caribbean or African immigrants, or the children of such immigrants," who never suffered segregation or Jim Crow.
To achieve even these percentages, however, the discrimination against white and Asian applicants, because of the color of their skin and where their ancestors came from, is astonishing.
As Nieli puts it, "Being Hispanic conferred an admissions boost over being white ... equivalent to 130 SAT points (out of 1,600), while being black rather than white conferred a 310-point SAT advantage. Asians, however, suffered an admissions penalty compared to whites equivalent to 140 SAT points."
"To have the same chance of gaining admission as a black student with a SAT score of 1100, a Hispanic student otherwise equally matched in background characteristics would have to have 1230, a white student a 1410 and an Asian student a 1550."
Was this what the civil-rights revolution was all about – requiring kids whose parents came from Korea, Japan or Vietnam to get a perfect SAT score of 1600 to be given equal consideration with a Jamaican or Kenyan kid who got an 1150? Is this what it means to be an Ivy League progressive?
What are the historic and moral arguments for discriminating in favor of kids from Angola and Argentina over kids whose parents came from Poland and Vietnam?
There is yet another form of bigotry prevalent among our academic elite that is a throwback to the snobbery of the WASPs of yesterday. While Ivy League recruiters prefer working-class to middle-class black kids with the same test scores, the reverse is true with white kids.
White kids from poor families who score as well as white kids from wealthy families – think George W. Bush – not only get no break, they seem to be the most undesirable and unwanted of all students.
Though elite schools give points to applicants for extracurricular activities, especially for leadership roles and honors, writes Nieli, if you played a lead role in Future Farmers of America, the 4-H Clubs or junior ROTC, leave it off your resume or you may just be blackballed. "Excelling in these activities is 'associated with 60 or 65 percent lower odds on admissions.'"
Writes Nieli, there seems an unwritten admissions rule at America's elite schools: "Poor Whites Need Not Apply."
For admissions officers at our top private and public schools, diversity is "a code word" for particular prejudices.
For these schools are not interested in a diversity that would include "born-again Christians from the Bible belt, students from Appalachia and other rural and small-town areas, people who have served in the U.S. military, those who have grown up on farms or ranches, Mormons, Pentecostals, Jehovah's Witnesses, lower- and middle-class Catholics, working-class 'white ethnics,' social and political conservatives, wheelchair users, married students, married students with children or older students just starting into college and raising children."
"Students in these categories," writes Nieli, "are often very rare at the most competitive colleges, especially the Ivy League."
"Lower-class whites prove to be all-around losers" at the elite schools. They are rarely accepted. Lower-class Hispanics and blacks are eight to 10 times more likely to get in with the same scores.
That such bigotry is pervasive in 2010 at institutions that preen about how progressive they are is disgusting. That a GOP which purports to represents Middle America, whose young are bearing the brunt of this bigotry, has remained largely silent is shameful.
Many of these elite public and private colleges and universities benefit from U.S. tax dollars through student loans and direct grants. The future flow of those tax dollars should be made contingent on Harvard and Yale ending racial practices that went out at Little Rock Central High in 1957.
Pat Buchanan was twice a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination and the Reform Party's candidate in 2000. He is also a founder and editor of The American Conservative. Now a political analyst for MSNBC and a syndicated columnist, he served three presidents in the White House, was a founding panelist of three national TV shows, and is the author of seven books.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
FANNIE-FREDDIE Bailout Could Cost Taxpayers $1 Trillion...
http://www.cnbc.com/id/37982580
Published: Tuesday, 29 Jun 2010
By: Reported by Steve Liesman, written by Michelle Lodge
For American taxpayers, now on the hook for some $145 billion in housing losses connected to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans, that amount could be just the tip of the iceberg.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, the losses could balloon to $400 billion. And if housing prices fall further, the cost to the taxpayer could hit as much as $1 trillion.
Two things are clear: Taxpayers don’t want to foot the bill, and Fannie and Freddie, taken over by the government in 2008 to stanch the financial bloodletting, need a major overhaul.
“Some of us who don’t even own homes are paying to support others and their home ownership, and they ask ‘why?’ said Robert J. Shiller, a Yale University economics professor and co-creator of the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices.
The indices measure the US residential housing market by tracking changes in the value of residential real estate both nationally and in 20 metropolitan regions.
Shiller added that the mission of Fannie and Freddie should be severely cut back “so that they’re not helping middle-class homeowners, [but] they’re helping poor people get into the housing market.”
At the crux of the financial crisis, the government took over Fannie and Freddie to avert possible massive losses for banks, money-market funds and, perhaps, most importantly, foreign institutions that purchased billions of Fannie and Freddie debt because of its implied government guarantee.
The Chinese, for example, had invested heavily, and the US decided it didn’t want them to take a loss on their investment.
One possible scenario for the entities is to turn them into utilities, said Sean Dobson, CEO and chair of Amherst Securities.
“Freddie and Fannie could be used to standardize the mortgage product,” Dobson said, “to completely describe what the risks are and then act as a conduit for the capital markets to take the risk.”
Published: Tuesday, 29 Jun 2010
By: Reported by Steve Liesman, written by Michelle Lodge
For American taxpayers, now on the hook for some $145 billion in housing losses connected to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans, that amount could be just the tip of the iceberg.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, the losses could balloon to $400 billion. And if housing prices fall further, the cost to the taxpayer could hit as much as $1 trillion.
Two things are clear: Taxpayers don’t want to foot the bill, and Fannie and Freddie, taken over by the government in 2008 to stanch the financial bloodletting, need a major overhaul.
“Some of us who don’t even own homes are paying to support others and their home ownership, and they ask ‘why?’ said Robert J. Shiller, a Yale University economics professor and co-creator of the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices.
The indices measure the US residential housing market by tracking changes in the value of residential real estate both nationally and in 20 metropolitan regions.
Shiller added that the mission of Fannie and Freddie should be severely cut back “so that they’re not helping middle-class homeowners, [but] they’re helping poor people get into the housing market.”
At the crux of the financial crisis, the government took over Fannie and Freddie to avert possible massive losses for banks, money-market funds and, perhaps, most importantly, foreign institutions that purchased billions of Fannie and Freddie debt because of its implied government guarantee.
The Chinese, for example, had invested heavily, and the US decided it didn’t want them to take a loss on their investment.
One possible scenario for the entities is to turn them into utilities, said Sean Dobson, CEO and chair of Amherst Securities.
“Freddie and Fannie could be used to standardize the mortgage product,” Dobson said, “to completely describe what the risks are and then act as a conduit for the capital markets to take the risk.”
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Soaring costs force Canada to reassess health model
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100531/hl_nm/us_health_3
By Claire Sibonney - Analysis Claire Sibonney
Mon May 31, 2:38 pm ET
TORONTO (Reuters) – Pressured by an aging population and the need to rein in budget deficits, Canada's provinces are taking tough measures to curb healthcare costs, a trend that could erode the principles of the popular state-funded system.
Ontario, Canada's most populous province, kicked off a fierce battle with drug companies and pharmacies when it said earlier this year it would halve generic drug prices and eliminate "incentive fees" to generic drug manufacturers.
British Columbia is replacing block grants to hospitals with fee-for-procedure payments and Quebec has a new flat health tax and a proposal for payments on each medical visit -- an idea that critics say is an illegal user fee.
And a few provinces are also experimenting with private funding for procedures such as hip, knee and cataract surgery.
It's likely just a start as the provinces, responsible for delivering healthcare, cope with the demands of a retiring baby-boom generation. Official figures show that senior citizens will make up 25 percent of the population by 2036.
"There's got to be some change to the status quo whether it happens in three years or 10 years," said Derek Burleton, senior economist at Toronto-Dominion Bank.
"We can't continually see health spending growing above and beyond the growth rate in the economy because, at some point, it means crowding out of all the other government services.
"At some stage we're going to hit a breaking point."
MIRROR IMAGE DEBATE
In some ways the Canadian debate is the mirror image of discussions going on in the United States.
Canada, fretting over budget strains, wants to prune its system, while the United States, worrying about an army of uninsured, aims to create a state-backed safety net.
Healthcare in Canada is delivered through a publicly funded system, which covers all "medically necessary" hospital and physician care and curbs the role of private medicine. It ate up about 40 percent of provincial budgets, or some C$183 billion ($174 billion) last year.
Spending has been rising 6 percent a year under a deal that added C$41.3 billion of federal funding over 10 years.
But that deal ends in 2013, and the federal government is unlikely to be as generous in future, especially for one-off projects.
"As Ottawa looks to repair its budget balance ... one could see these one-time allocations to specific health projects might be curtailed," said Mary Webb, senior economist at Scotia Capital.
Brian Golden, a professor at University of Toronto's Rotman School of Business, said provinces are weighing new sources of funding, including "means-testing" and moving toward evidence-based and pay-for-performance models.
"Why are we paying more or the same for cataract surgery when it costs substantially less today than it did 10 years ago? There's going to be a finer look at what we're paying for and, more importantly, what we're getting for it," he said.
Other problems include trying to control independently set salaries for top hospital executives and doctors and rein in spiraling costs for new medical technologies and drugs.
Ontario says healthcare could eat up 70 percent of its budget in 12 years, if all these costs are left unchecked.
"Our objective is to preserve the quality healthcare system we have and indeed to enhance it. But there are difficult decisions ahead and we will continue to make them," Ontario Finance Minister Dwight Duncan told Reuters.
The province has introduced legislation that ties hospital chief executive pay with the quality of patient care and says it wants to put more physicians on salary to save money.
In a report released last week, TD Bank said Ontario should consider other proposals to help cut costs, including scaling back drug coverage for affluent seniors and paying doctors according to quality and efficiency of care.
WINNERS AND LOSERS
The losers could be drug companies and pharmacies, both of which are getting increasingly nervous.
"Many of the advances in healthcare and life expectancy are due to the pharmaceutical industry so we should never demonize them," said U of T's Golden. "We need to ensure that they maintain a profitable business but our ability to make it very very profitable is constrained right now."
Scotia Capital's Webb said one cost-saving idea may be to make patients aware of how much it costs each time they visit a healthcare professional. "(The public) will use the services more wisely if they know how much it's costing," she said.
"If it's absolutely free with no information on the cost and the information of an alternative that would be have been more practical, then how can we expect the public to wisely use the service?"
But change may come slowly. Universal healthcare is central to Canada's national identity, and decisions are made as much on politics as economics.
"It's an area that Canadians don't want to see touched," said TD's Burleton. "Essentially it boils down the wishes of the population. But I think, from an economist's standpoint, we point to the fact that sometimes Canadians in the short term may not realize the cost."
($1=$1.05 Canadian)
(Reporting by Claire Sibonney; editing by Janet Guttsman and Peter Galloway)
By Claire Sibonney - Analysis Claire Sibonney
Mon May 31, 2:38 pm ET
TORONTO (Reuters) – Pressured by an aging population and the need to rein in budget deficits, Canada's provinces are taking tough measures to curb healthcare costs, a trend that could erode the principles of the popular state-funded system.
Ontario, Canada's most populous province, kicked off a fierce battle with drug companies and pharmacies when it said earlier this year it would halve generic drug prices and eliminate "incentive fees" to generic drug manufacturers.
British Columbia is replacing block grants to hospitals with fee-for-procedure payments and Quebec has a new flat health tax and a proposal for payments on each medical visit -- an idea that critics say is an illegal user fee.
And a few provinces are also experimenting with private funding for procedures such as hip, knee and cataract surgery.
It's likely just a start as the provinces, responsible for delivering healthcare, cope with the demands of a retiring baby-boom generation. Official figures show that senior citizens will make up 25 percent of the population by 2036.
"There's got to be some change to the status quo whether it happens in three years or 10 years," said Derek Burleton, senior economist at Toronto-Dominion Bank.
"We can't continually see health spending growing above and beyond the growth rate in the economy because, at some point, it means crowding out of all the other government services.
"At some stage we're going to hit a breaking point."
MIRROR IMAGE DEBATE
In some ways the Canadian debate is the mirror image of discussions going on in the United States.
Canada, fretting over budget strains, wants to prune its system, while the United States, worrying about an army of uninsured, aims to create a state-backed safety net.
Healthcare in Canada is delivered through a publicly funded system, which covers all "medically necessary" hospital and physician care and curbs the role of private medicine. It ate up about 40 percent of provincial budgets, or some C$183 billion ($174 billion) last year.
Spending has been rising 6 percent a year under a deal that added C$41.3 billion of federal funding over 10 years.
But that deal ends in 2013, and the federal government is unlikely to be as generous in future, especially for one-off projects.
"As Ottawa looks to repair its budget balance ... one could see these one-time allocations to specific health projects might be curtailed," said Mary Webb, senior economist at Scotia Capital.
Brian Golden, a professor at University of Toronto's Rotman School of Business, said provinces are weighing new sources of funding, including "means-testing" and moving toward evidence-based and pay-for-performance models.
"Why are we paying more or the same for cataract surgery when it costs substantially less today than it did 10 years ago? There's going to be a finer look at what we're paying for and, more importantly, what we're getting for it," he said.
Other problems include trying to control independently set salaries for top hospital executives and doctors and rein in spiraling costs for new medical technologies and drugs.
Ontario says healthcare could eat up 70 percent of its budget in 12 years, if all these costs are left unchecked.
"Our objective is to preserve the quality healthcare system we have and indeed to enhance it. But there are difficult decisions ahead and we will continue to make them," Ontario Finance Minister Dwight Duncan told Reuters.
The province has introduced legislation that ties hospital chief executive pay with the quality of patient care and says it wants to put more physicians on salary to save money.
In a report released last week, TD Bank said Ontario should consider other proposals to help cut costs, including scaling back drug coverage for affluent seniors and paying doctors according to quality and efficiency of care.
WINNERS AND LOSERS
The losers could be drug companies and pharmacies, both of which are getting increasingly nervous.
"Many of the advances in healthcare and life expectancy are due to the pharmaceutical industry so we should never demonize them," said U of T's Golden. "We need to ensure that they maintain a profitable business but our ability to make it very very profitable is constrained right now."
Scotia Capital's Webb said one cost-saving idea may be to make patients aware of how much it costs each time they visit a healthcare professional. "(The public) will use the services more wisely if they know how much it's costing," she said.
"If it's absolutely free with no information on the cost and the information of an alternative that would be have been more practical, then how can we expect the public to wisely use the service?"
But change may come slowly. Universal healthcare is central to Canada's national identity, and decisions are made as much on politics as economics.
"It's an area that Canadians don't want to see touched," said TD's Burleton. "Essentially it boils down the wishes of the population. But I think, from an economist's standpoint, we point to the fact that sometimes Canadians in the short term may not realize the cost."
($1=$1.05 Canadian)
(Reporting by Claire Sibonney; editing by Janet Guttsman and Peter Galloway)
Monday, May 17, 2010
Venezuela's Chavez orders takeover of iron-makers:
In other news...US's Obama orders takeover of banks, auto companies, student loans, home loans, healthcare, etc. Hmmmmmm!
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9FNMNMO2.htm
The Associated Press May 15, 2010,
CARACAS, Venezuela
President Hugo Chavez announced Saturday the expropriation of a group of iron, aluminum and transportation companies in Venezuela's mining region.
Among the expropriated companies is Materiales Siderurgicos, or Matesi, which is the Venezuelan subsidiary of Luxembourg-based steel maker Tenaris SA.
Venezuela's socialist president said in a televised that his government was going to take over Matesi because "we couldn't reach an amicable and reasonable settlement with the owners."
Chavez said production at the company has been paralyzed since midway through last year, when Venezuela's president announced plans to nationalize it.
Chavez said he was also going to expropriate Venezuelan-owned Orinoco Iron and aluminum-maker Norpro de Venezuela C.A., which is an affiliate of the U.S. company Norpro in association with France's Saint Gobain, among other companies.
As well, Venezuela will take over transport companies that ship raw materials in areas southeast of Caracas. He did not name the companies.
Since coming to power more than a decade ago, Chavez has nationalized major companies in the electricity, oil, steel and coffee sectors, as well as other private businesses.
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9FNMNMO2.htm
The Associated Press May 15, 2010,
CARACAS, Venezuela
President Hugo Chavez announced Saturday the expropriation of a group of iron, aluminum and transportation companies in Venezuela's mining region.
Among the expropriated companies is Materiales Siderurgicos, or Matesi, which is the Venezuelan subsidiary of Luxembourg-based steel maker Tenaris SA.
Venezuela's socialist president said in a televised that his government was going to take over Matesi because "we couldn't reach an amicable and reasonable settlement with the owners."
Chavez said production at the company has been paralyzed since midway through last year, when Venezuela's president announced plans to nationalize it.
Chavez said he was also going to expropriate Venezuelan-owned Orinoco Iron and aluminum-maker Norpro de Venezuela C.A., which is an affiliate of the U.S. company Norpro in association with France's Saint Gobain, among other companies.
As well, Venezuela will take over transport companies that ship raw materials in areas southeast of Caracas. He did not name the companies.
Since coming to power more than a decade ago, Chavez has nationalized major companies in the electricity, oil, steel and coffee sectors, as well as other private businesses.
Reality Check On Our Nation's Debt!!!
Reality Check: Our nation's debt is currently over $12.9 TRILLION ($117,682 per taxpayer). We are in so deep that even if we seized 100% of the fortune's of Bill Gates $53B & Warren Buffett $47B, we would only be able to pay LESS THAN ONE PERCENT (.77%) of our total debt!
Our nation's debt is currently SO HIGH, (over $12.9 TRILLION, $117,682 per taxpayer) That even if we seized the ENTIRE FORTUNES of the ONE HUNDRED RICHEST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD ($1.4 trillion) we would still only be able to pay 10.8% of our total debt!
Even the entire vast fortune's of the ONE THOUSAND RICHEST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD, would come NO WHERE NEAR paying off our debt.
But you know who is expected to pay off the debt...YOU AND I, OUR CHILDREN, OUR GRANDCHILDREN!!!...
Time to stand up for ourselves don't you think?!
Special Report
The World's Billionaires
03.10.10, 06:00 PM EST
http://www.forbes.com/lists/2010/10/billionaires-2010_The-Worlds-Billionaires_Rank.html
Live US Debt Clock:
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
Our nation's debt is currently SO HIGH, (over $12.9 TRILLION, $117,682 per taxpayer) That even if we seized the ENTIRE FORTUNES of the ONE HUNDRED RICHEST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD ($1.4 trillion) we would still only be able to pay 10.8% of our total debt!
Even the entire vast fortune's of the ONE THOUSAND RICHEST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD, would come NO WHERE NEAR paying off our debt.
But you know who is expected to pay off the debt...YOU AND I, OUR CHILDREN, OUR GRANDCHILDREN!!!...
Time to stand up for ourselves don't you think?!
Special Report
The World's Billionaires
03.10.10, 06:00 PM EST
http://www.forbes.com/lists/2010/10/billionaires-2010_The-Worlds-Billionaires_Rank.html
Live US Debt Clock:
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
Great Letter To Editor On Immigration:
(Sent but refused to publish in Orange County Register)
Dear Editor:
So many letter writers have based their arguments on how this land is made up of immigrants. Ernie Lujan for one, suggests we should tear down the Statue of Liberty because the people now in question aren't being treated the same as those who passed through Ellis Island and other ports of entry.
Maybe we should turn to our history books and point out to people like Mr. Lujan why today's American is not willing to accept this new kind of immigrant any longer. Back in 1900 when there was a rush from all areas of Europe to come to the United States, people had to get off a ship and stand in a long line in New York and be documented. Some would even get down on their hands and knees and kiss the ground. They made a pledge to uphold the laws and support their new country in good and bad times. They made learning English a primary rule in their new American households and some even changed their names to blend in with their new home.
They had waved good bye to their birth place to give their children a new life and did everything in their power to help their children assimilate into one culture. Nothing was handed to them. No free lunches, no welfare, no labor laws to protect them. All they had were the skills and craftsmanship they had brought with them to trade for a future of prosperity.
Most of their children came of age when World War II broke out. My father fought along side men whose parents had come straight over from Germany , Italy , France and Japan . None of these 1st generation Americans ever gave any thought about what country their parents had come from. They were Americans fighting Hitler, Mussolini and the Emperor of Japan . They were defending the United States of America as one people.
When we liberated France , no one in those villages were looking for the French-American or the German American or the Irish American. The people of France saw only Americans. And we carried one flag that represented one country. Not one of those immigrant sons would have thought about picking up another country's flag and waving it to represent who they were. It would have been a disgrace to their parents who had sacrificed so much to be here. These immigrants truly knew what it meant to be an American. They stirred the melting pot into one red, white and blue bowl.
And here we are with a new kind of immigrant who wants the same rights and privileges. Only they want to achieve it by playing with a different set of rules, one that includes the entitlement card and a guarantee of being faithful to their mother country. I'm sorry, that's not what being an American is all about. I believe that the immigrants who landed on Ellis Island in the early 1900's deserve better than that for all the toil, hard work and sacrifice in raising future generations to create a land that has become a beacon for those legally searching for a better life. I think they would be appalled that they are being used as an example by those waving foreign country flags.
And for that suggestion about taking down the Statue of Liberty , it happens to mean a lot to the citizens who are voting on the immigration bill. I wouldn't start talking about dismantling the United States just yet.
(signed)
Rosemary LaBonte
Dear Editor:
So many letter writers have based their arguments on how this land is made up of immigrants. Ernie Lujan for one, suggests we should tear down the Statue of Liberty because the people now in question aren't being treated the same as those who passed through Ellis Island and other ports of entry.
Maybe we should turn to our history books and point out to people like Mr. Lujan why today's American is not willing to accept this new kind of immigrant any longer. Back in 1900 when there was a rush from all areas of Europe to come to the United States, people had to get off a ship and stand in a long line in New York and be documented. Some would even get down on their hands and knees and kiss the ground. They made a pledge to uphold the laws and support their new country in good and bad times. They made learning English a primary rule in their new American households and some even changed their names to blend in with their new home.
They had waved good bye to their birth place to give their children a new life and did everything in their power to help their children assimilate into one culture. Nothing was handed to them. No free lunches, no welfare, no labor laws to protect them. All they had were the skills and craftsmanship they had brought with them to trade for a future of prosperity.
Most of their children came of age when World War II broke out. My father fought along side men whose parents had come straight over from Germany , Italy , France and Japan . None of these 1st generation Americans ever gave any thought about what country their parents had come from. They were Americans fighting Hitler, Mussolini and the Emperor of Japan . They were defending the United States of America as one people.
When we liberated France , no one in those villages were looking for the French-American or the German American or the Irish American. The people of France saw only Americans. And we carried one flag that represented one country. Not one of those immigrant sons would have thought about picking up another country's flag and waving it to represent who they were. It would have been a disgrace to their parents who had sacrificed so much to be here. These immigrants truly knew what it meant to be an American. They stirred the melting pot into one red, white and blue bowl.
And here we are with a new kind of immigrant who wants the same rights and privileges. Only they want to achieve it by playing with a different set of rules, one that includes the entitlement card and a guarantee of being faithful to their mother country. I'm sorry, that's not what being an American is all about. I believe that the immigrants who landed on Ellis Island in the early 1900's deserve better than that for all the toil, hard work and sacrifice in raising future generations to create a land that has become a beacon for those legally searching for a better life. I think they would be appalled that they are being used as an example by those waving foreign country flags.
And for that suggestion about taking down the Statue of Liberty , it happens to mean a lot to the citizens who are voting on the immigration bill. I wouldn't start talking about dismantling the United States just yet.
(signed)
Rosemary LaBonte
Thursday, May 06, 2010
FREDDIE MAC seeks $11 billion dollars from feds to cover losses...
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20100505/tts-us-economy-property-finance-972e412.html
Thursday May 6, 2010
WASHINGTON (AFP) - – Troubled US government-backed mortgage firm Freddie Mac on Wednesday asked for an additional 10.6 billion dollars from the Treasury Department to cover losses.
Announcing a 6.7 billion dollar loss in the first quarter, Freddie Mac said it would need the new funding by June 30 this year.
The Washington-area company has already received more than 50 billion dollars in taxpayers cash to cover losses from toxic assets.
It warned that further demands would be on the way: "Freddie Mac expects to request additional draws," the firm said in a statement.
"The size and timing of such draws will be determined by a variety of factors that could adversely affect the company's net worth."
In 2008, the government pledged to ensure that Freddie Mac, and its larger sister organization Fannie Mae, kept a "positive net worth."
The deal was designed to prop up the vital US housing market from collapsing totally and pushing the economy over the precipice.
But in a sign that the US housing sector is still in difficulty, Freddie said the percentage of its loans not paid on time or in full rose to 4.13 percent in the first three months of the year.
In the final three months of last year the rate stood at 3.98 percent.
The future of Fannie and Freddie has become the latest bone of contention between Democrats who argue they must remain government-backed to aid low-income housing and Republicans who advocate their privatization.
In March, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner swatted aside pressure for a swift reform of the mortgage giants as data pointed to a still struggling real estate market.
Geithner told Congress any restructuring of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which received a 100-billion-dollar-plus government bailout at the height of the housing crisis, "must be done as part of a reform of the wider housing finance system."
Geithner argued reforms would "take several months" to develop and should only be "enacted and executed at a time of greater market stability."
Thursday May 6, 2010
WASHINGTON (AFP) - – Troubled US government-backed mortgage firm Freddie Mac on Wednesday asked for an additional 10.6 billion dollars from the Treasury Department to cover losses.
Announcing a 6.7 billion dollar loss in the first quarter, Freddie Mac said it would need the new funding by June 30 this year.
The Washington-area company has already received more than 50 billion dollars in taxpayers cash to cover losses from toxic assets.
It warned that further demands would be on the way: "Freddie Mac expects to request additional draws," the firm said in a statement.
"The size and timing of such draws will be determined by a variety of factors that could adversely affect the company's net worth."
In 2008, the government pledged to ensure that Freddie Mac, and its larger sister organization Fannie Mae, kept a "positive net worth."
The deal was designed to prop up the vital US housing market from collapsing totally and pushing the economy over the precipice.
But in a sign that the US housing sector is still in difficulty, Freddie said the percentage of its loans not paid on time or in full rose to 4.13 percent in the first three months of the year.
In the final three months of last year the rate stood at 3.98 percent.
The future of Fannie and Freddie has become the latest bone of contention between Democrats who argue they must remain government-backed to aid low-income housing and Republicans who advocate their privatization.
In March, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner swatted aside pressure for a swift reform of the mortgage giants as data pointed to a still struggling real estate market.
Geithner told Congress any restructuring of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which received a 100-billion-dollar-plus government bailout at the height of the housing crisis, "must be done as part of a reform of the wider housing finance system."
Geithner argued reforms would "take several months" to develop and should only be "enacted and executed at a time of greater market stability."
Saturday, May 01, 2010
GM paid back government loan -- with taxpayer money -- to get more taxpayer money!
"In short, GM is using government money to pay back government money to get more government money. And at a 2% lower interest rate at that. This is a nifty scheme to refinance GM's government debt--not pay it back!"
The General Accountability Office concluded, ""The Treasury is unlikely to recover the entirety of its investment in Chrysler or GM."
http://www.forbes.com/2010/04/23/general-motors-economy-bailout-opinions-columnists-shikha-dalmia.html
GM is paying back Uncle Sam to shake him down for more money.
Uncommon Sense
Still Government Motors
Shikha Dalmia, 04.23.10, 3:40 PM ET
GM CEO Ed Whitacre announced in a Wall Street Journal column Wednesday that his company has paid back its government bailout loan "in full, with interest, years ahead of schedule." He is even running TV ads on all major networks to that effect--a needless expense given that a credulous media is only too happy to parrot his claims for free. Detroit Free Press' Mike Thompson, for example, advises bailout proponents to start "warming up their vocal chords" to jeer their opponents with chants of "I told you so."
But before belting out their victory aria, GM-boosters ought to hear the whole story--not just the fairytale version about Government Motors' grand comeback that Mr. Whitacre is feeding them.
Uncle Sam gave GM $49.5 billion last summer in aid to finance its bankruptcy. (If it hadn't, the company, which couldn't raise this kind of money from private lenders, would have been forced into liquidation, its assets sold for scrap.) So when Mr. Whitacre publishes a column with the headline, "The GM Bailout: Paid Back in Full," most ordinary mortals unfamiliar with bailout minutia would assume that he is alluding to the entire $49.5 billion. That, however, is far from the case.
Because a loan of such a huge amount would have been politically controversial, the Obama administration handed GM only $6.7 billion as a pure loan. (It asked for only a 7% interest rate--a very sweet deal considering that GM bonds at that time were trading below junk level.) The vast bulk of the bailout money was transferred to GM through the purchase of 60.8% equity stake in the company--arguably an even worse deal for taxpayers than the loan, given that the equity position requires them to bear the risk of the investment without any guaranteed return. (The Canadian government likewise gave GM $1.4 billion as a pure loan, and another $8.1 billion for an 11.7% equity stake. The U.S. and Canadian government together own 72.5% of the company.)
But when Mr. Whitacre says GM has paid back the bailout money in full, he means not the entire $49.5 billion--the loan and the equity. In fact, he avoids all mention of that figure in his column. He means only the $6.7 billion loan amount.
But wait! Even that's not the full story given that GM, which has not yet broken even, much less turned a profit, can't pay even this puny amount from its own earnings.
So how is it paying it?
As it turns out, the Obama administration put $13.4 billion of the aid money as "working capital" in an escrow account when the company was in bankruptcy. The company is using this escrow money--government money--to pay back the government loan.
GM claims that the fact that it is even using the escrow money to pay back the loan instead of using it all to shore itself up shows that it is on the road to recovery. That actually would be a positive development--although hardly one worth hyping in ads and columns--if it were not for a further plot twist.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sean McAlinden, chief economist at the Ann Arbor-based Center for Automotive Research, points out that the company has applied to the Department of Energy for $10 billion in low (5%) interest loan to retool its plants to meet the government's tougher new CAFÉ (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) standards. However, giving GM more taxpayer money on top of the existing bailout would have been a political disaster for the Obama administration and a PR debacle for the company. Paying back the small bailout loan makes the new--and bigger--DOE loan much more feasible.
In short, GM is using government money to pay back government money to get more government money. And at a 2% lower interest rate at that. This is a nifty scheme to refinance GM's government debt--not pay it back!
GM boasts that, because it is doing so well, it is paying the $6.7 billion five years ahead of schedule since it was not due until 2015. So will there be an accelerated payback of the rest of the $49.6 billion investment? No. That goal has been pushed back, as it turns out.
In order to recover that investment, the government has to sell its equity. It plans to do that only when GM becomes a publicly traded company once again. GM was hoping to turn a profit by the end of 2010 and float an initial public offering this winter. However, GM Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell, when queried about that timeline a few days ago, demurred. The offering will be made, he said, "when the markets and the company are ready."
(Take that, taxpayers!)
The reality is that there is no certainty that GM will ever be able to make taxpayers whole. Some analysts such as Center for Automotive Research's Sean McAlinden and Global Insight's George Magliano believe that it will--eventually. McAlinden maintains that this will happen when the company's market capitalization touches $60 billion. (At GM's peak in 2000, this level was only $57 billion.) This is a challenging but not an impossible goal--provided the economy does not dip into another recession, he maintains. Magliano too maintains that the company will be able to pay back taxpayers if the industry is able to ramp up annual vehicle sales from the expected 10.8 million this year to 17 million in 2014 and GM captures 20% of these sales.
The General Accountability Office, on the other hand, remains deeply pessimistic. It concluded in a December report (which a more recent April report has said nothing to contradict, despite media spin to the contrary) that: "The Treasury is unlikely to recover the entirety of its investment in Chrysler or GM, given that the companies' values would have to grow substantially more than they have in the past."
Mr. Whitacre's bailout payback ploy is a desperate attempt to win back the car-buying public deeply disgusted by the spectacle of GM rattling its tin-cup before Uncle Sam. But the fact of the matter is that the company is still deep in the hole. It might claw its way back – or it might not. But surely it's premature for its media boosters to pop open the champagne bottle without getting their story straight?
Shikha Dalmia is a senior analyst at Reason Foundation and a biweekly Forbes columnist
The General Accountability Office concluded, ""The Treasury is unlikely to recover the entirety of its investment in Chrysler or GM."
http://www.forbes.com/2010/04/23/general-motors-economy-bailout-opinions-columnists-shikha-dalmia.html
GM is paying back Uncle Sam to shake him down for more money.
Uncommon Sense
Still Government Motors
Shikha Dalmia, 04.23.10, 3:40 PM ET
GM CEO Ed Whitacre announced in a Wall Street Journal column Wednesday that his company has paid back its government bailout loan "in full, with interest, years ahead of schedule." He is even running TV ads on all major networks to that effect--a needless expense given that a credulous media is only too happy to parrot his claims for free. Detroit Free Press' Mike Thompson, for example, advises bailout proponents to start "warming up their vocal chords" to jeer their opponents with chants of "I told you so."
But before belting out their victory aria, GM-boosters ought to hear the whole story--not just the fairytale version about Government Motors' grand comeback that Mr. Whitacre is feeding them.
Uncle Sam gave GM $49.5 billion last summer in aid to finance its bankruptcy. (If it hadn't, the company, which couldn't raise this kind of money from private lenders, would have been forced into liquidation, its assets sold for scrap.) So when Mr. Whitacre publishes a column with the headline, "The GM Bailout: Paid Back in Full," most ordinary mortals unfamiliar with bailout minutia would assume that he is alluding to the entire $49.5 billion. That, however, is far from the case.
Because a loan of such a huge amount would have been politically controversial, the Obama administration handed GM only $6.7 billion as a pure loan. (It asked for only a 7% interest rate--a very sweet deal considering that GM bonds at that time were trading below junk level.) The vast bulk of the bailout money was transferred to GM through the purchase of 60.8% equity stake in the company--arguably an even worse deal for taxpayers than the loan, given that the equity position requires them to bear the risk of the investment without any guaranteed return. (The Canadian government likewise gave GM $1.4 billion as a pure loan, and another $8.1 billion for an 11.7% equity stake. The U.S. and Canadian government together own 72.5% of the company.)
But when Mr. Whitacre says GM has paid back the bailout money in full, he means not the entire $49.5 billion--the loan and the equity. In fact, he avoids all mention of that figure in his column. He means only the $6.7 billion loan amount.
But wait! Even that's not the full story given that GM, which has not yet broken even, much less turned a profit, can't pay even this puny amount from its own earnings.
So how is it paying it?
As it turns out, the Obama administration put $13.4 billion of the aid money as "working capital" in an escrow account when the company was in bankruptcy. The company is using this escrow money--government money--to pay back the government loan.
GM claims that the fact that it is even using the escrow money to pay back the loan instead of using it all to shore itself up shows that it is on the road to recovery. That actually would be a positive development--although hardly one worth hyping in ads and columns--if it were not for a further plot twist.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sean McAlinden, chief economist at the Ann Arbor-based Center for Automotive Research, points out that the company has applied to the Department of Energy for $10 billion in low (5%) interest loan to retool its plants to meet the government's tougher new CAFÉ (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) standards. However, giving GM more taxpayer money on top of the existing bailout would have been a political disaster for the Obama administration and a PR debacle for the company. Paying back the small bailout loan makes the new--and bigger--DOE loan much more feasible.
In short, GM is using government money to pay back government money to get more government money. And at a 2% lower interest rate at that. This is a nifty scheme to refinance GM's government debt--not pay it back!
GM boasts that, because it is doing so well, it is paying the $6.7 billion five years ahead of schedule since it was not due until 2015. So will there be an accelerated payback of the rest of the $49.6 billion investment? No. That goal has been pushed back, as it turns out.
In order to recover that investment, the government has to sell its equity. It plans to do that only when GM becomes a publicly traded company once again. GM was hoping to turn a profit by the end of 2010 and float an initial public offering this winter. However, GM Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell, when queried about that timeline a few days ago, demurred. The offering will be made, he said, "when the markets and the company are ready."
(Take that, taxpayers!)
The reality is that there is no certainty that GM will ever be able to make taxpayers whole. Some analysts such as Center for Automotive Research's Sean McAlinden and Global Insight's George Magliano believe that it will--eventually. McAlinden maintains that this will happen when the company's market capitalization touches $60 billion. (At GM's peak in 2000, this level was only $57 billion.) This is a challenging but not an impossible goal--provided the economy does not dip into another recession, he maintains. Magliano too maintains that the company will be able to pay back taxpayers if the industry is able to ramp up annual vehicle sales from the expected 10.8 million this year to 17 million in 2014 and GM captures 20% of these sales.
The General Accountability Office, on the other hand, remains deeply pessimistic. It concluded in a December report (which a more recent April report has said nothing to contradict, despite media spin to the contrary) that: "The Treasury is unlikely to recover the entirety of its investment in Chrysler or GM, given that the companies' values would have to grow substantially more than they have in the past."
Mr. Whitacre's bailout payback ploy is a desperate attempt to win back the car-buying public deeply disgusted by the spectacle of GM rattling its tin-cup before Uncle Sam. But the fact of the matter is that the company is still deep in the hole. It might claw its way back – or it might not. But surely it's premature for its media boosters to pop open the champagne bottle without getting their story straight?
Shikha Dalmia is a senior analyst at Reason Foundation and a biweekly Forbes columnist
Thursday, April 29, 2010
In 2014, IRS will become health insurance enforcer...
http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/insurance/2010-04-29-healthirs28_CV_N.htm
IRS lacks clout to enforce mandatory health insurance
By Sandra Block, USA TODAY
The IRS processed more than 230 million tax returns last year, paid 127 million refunds and received about 68 million phone calls. The agency is responsible for enforcing a tax code that, at 71,000 pages, makes Anna Karenina look like a comic book.
Starting in 2014, the agency will have another task: making sure all Americans have health insurance. Under the law, Americans who can afford health insurance but refuse to buy it will face a fine of up to $695 or 2.5% of their income, whichever is higher. More than 4 million Americans could be subject to penalties of up to $1,000 by 2016 if they fail to obtain health insurance, the Congressional Budget Office said last week.
The IRS will be the enforcer — sort of.
HEALTH CARE LAW: Some trapped in pricey state plans
While the IRS can impose liens or levies, seize property or seek jail time against people who don't pay taxes, it's barred from taking such actions against taxpayers who ignore the insurance mandate. In the arsenal instead: the ability to withhold refunds from taxpayers who decline to pay the penalty, IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman said this month.
Still, compliance with the health reform law will be largely voluntary, says Timothy Jost, a law professor at Washington and Lee University. "By taking criminal sanctions and liens and levies off the table, the IRS' hands are tied, to a considerable extent."
The IRS is "being put in a position where it will be sending notices that will annoy people" and not much else, says James Maule, professor of law at Villanova University and author of the tax blog MauledAgain. "It's basically designed for failure."
Shulman said he believes most Americans will comply with the law. The experience of Massachusetts, which has required residents to have health insurance since 2006, would appear to support that view. In 2008, 98% of state tax filers who were required to provide health insurance information with their state tax returns met that filing requirement, and 96% had coverage, according to a preliminary report issued in December by the Massachusetts Department of Revenue.
But Massachusetts' health care law gives the Department of Revenue the authority to use its regular tax-collection powers to enforce the insurance mandate, says spokesman Robert Bliss. Through September 2009, the state had collected $12.9 million of the $16.4 million in penalties assessed in 2008.
'A dangerous expansion of the IRS' power'
In this political environment, even a defanged IRS stirs up powerful emotions. Among the concerns about the IRS' role in the health care reform law:
•The law will lead to a dramatic expansion of the IRS. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the IRS will need an additional $5 billion to $10 billion over the next 10 years to administer the health care law. That projection has fired up activists who believe the IRS should be downsized, or abolished.
Some Republican lawmakers have extrapolated from that estimate that the IRS will need to hire an additional 16,500 agents to enforce the health insurance mandate. Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., ranking minority member of the House Ways and Means Committee, called the law "a dangerous expansion of the IRS' power and reach into the lives of virtually every American."
The CBO report refers to the $10 billion figure as "administrative costs" and makes no reference to the number of employees the agency will need to hire. And enforcement is only one part of the IRS' responsibilities under the law. The agency will also be in charge of providing tax credits to small businesses, along with refundable tax credits to individuals who can't afford health insurance.
"The IRS is going to need additional resources, but in terms of health reform, probably the main focus is going to be on processing" the credits, Jost says.
The IRS has already started some of its administrative tasks. Last week, it began mailing postcards to more than 4 million small businesses and tax-exempt groups with information about a provision in the law that provides tax credits for small businesses. The tax credit, which takes effect this year, is designed to encourage small businesses to offer health insurance to their employees or keep the coverage they already have.
•The law will make it more difficult for the IRS to carry out its primary job of collecting taxes. Only 64% of taxpayers who called the IRS during last year's tax-filing season reached an IRS representative, according to a report by the IRS' national taxpayer advocate. The IRS' modest goal for this year was to answer 71% of taxpayer calls. Even more callers could have trouble getting through when the IRS takes on its obligations under the health care law, Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said at an April 15 Senate Finance Committee hearing.
"Taxpayers trying to do the right thing regarding their tax responsibilities shouldn't have to be put on hold — or have to call back — because the IRS is now answering questions about health insurance," Grassley said.
The new responsibilities could also force the IRS to cut back on complex audits of sophisticated tax-avoidance schemes, such as illegal offshore accounts, Maule says. To handle the administrative tasks associated with the law, the IRS may need to divert experienced IRS agents who typically conduct these audits, he says. "This is going to make it easier for people who want to play the audit lottery game to get away with it."
Another potential problem: Administering the health care law will strain the IRS' already outdated computer and data-storage systems, says Pete Sepp, spokesman for the National Taxpayers Union, an advocacy group that supports lower taxes. "The IRS customer-service front end is already sagging, and the back end is not looking so hot, either," he says.
•The IRS does a poor job of managing social programs. Critics of the legislation say problems with the Earned Income Tax Credit, a federal program that provides tax rebates to low-income working families, illustrate the pitfalls of putting the IRS in charge of administering health care reform. The EITC program "has one of the highest fraud and abuse rates of any tax provision out there," Grassley said at the April 15 hearing. In tax year 2006, the latest year available, IRS made $10 billion to $12 billion in erroneous EITC payments, according to a study by the Treasury Department's inspector general.
IRS officials argue that the two programs are vastly different. The health care subsidies will go directly to insurers, not taxpayers, giving individuals little incentive to cheat, says IRS spokesman Frank Keith.
Jost maintains that the tax credits could encourage compliance, because taxpayers who refuse to provide information about their health care coverage will be ineligible for federal health insurance subsidies. That subsidy "is going to be pretty significant for lower-income people," he says.
Under the law, millions of middle- and low-income taxpayers will be eligible for subsidies to help pay for their health insurance. Taxpayers with incomes of up to four times the poverty level — currently $43,320 for an individual and $88,200 for a family of four — would qualify.
Matching documents
Starting in 2014, insurers will be required to send the IRS a document showing that the taxpayer has insurance coverage. The IRS will match taxpayers' returns with information it receives from insurers, and individuals who don't have insurance will receive a letter explaining how much they owe in penalties.
Those who ignore the letter could have the penalty withheld from their refunds — but that will only be effective if they're due a refund. Self-employed taxpayers, who are among the individuals most likely to go without insurance, often don't get refunds because their wages aren't subject to withholding.
Still, Jost believes the actual number of insurance scofflaws will be relatively small. People who receive health insurance through their jobs — about 57% of workers — won't be affected. Taxpayers older than 65 won't be subject to the new requirement because they're covered by Medicare. And many self-employed people, along with workers who don't have employer-provided coverage, meet the income requirements for tax credits, so they'll have an incentive to get insurance, he says.
That leaves doctors, lawyers, accountants and other self-employed people with high incomes, Jost says. Many of these taxpayers have complex tax returns that include numerous tax deductions and credits, Jost says. "Unless they are just deeply principled people who think this is the greatest offense in the history of this country, they are not going to want to mix it up with the IRS," he says.
And what will happen to taxpayers who defy the mandate? Not much, Jost predicts:
"I think it's going to be a small number of wealthy people who are going to be determined to fight this, and the IRS will just ignore them."
Keith disputes the notion that taxpayers who disregard the law will get a free pass. The IRS will have up to 10 years to withhold refunds from individuals who owe penalties, he says. Even if they aren't ordinarily due a refund, he says, "any time they overpay, those monies will be available."
IRS lacks clout to enforce mandatory health insurance
By Sandra Block, USA TODAY
The IRS processed more than 230 million tax returns last year, paid 127 million refunds and received about 68 million phone calls. The agency is responsible for enforcing a tax code that, at 71,000 pages, makes Anna Karenina look like a comic book.
Starting in 2014, the agency will have another task: making sure all Americans have health insurance. Under the law, Americans who can afford health insurance but refuse to buy it will face a fine of up to $695 or 2.5% of their income, whichever is higher. More than 4 million Americans could be subject to penalties of up to $1,000 by 2016 if they fail to obtain health insurance, the Congressional Budget Office said last week.
The IRS will be the enforcer — sort of.
HEALTH CARE LAW: Some trapped in pricey state plans
While the IRS can impose liens or levies, seize property or seek jail time against people who don't pay taxes, it's barred from taking such actions against taxpayers who ignore the insurance mandate. In the arsenal instead: the ability to withhold refunds from taxpayers who decline to pay the penalty, IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman said this month.
Still, compliance with the health reform law will be largely voluntary, says Timothy Jost, a law professor at Washington and Lee University. "By taking criminal sanctions and liens and levies off the table, the IRS' hands are tied, to a considerable extent."
The IRS is "being put in a position where it will be sending notices that will annoy people" and not much else, says James Maule, professor of law at Villanova University and author of the tax blog MauledAgain. "It's basically designed for failure."
Shulman said he believes most Americans will comply with the law. The experience of Massachusetts, which has required residents to have health insurance since 2006, would appear to support that view. In 2008, 98% of state tax filers who were required to provide health insurance information with their state tax returns met that filing requirement, and 96% had coverage, according to a preliminary report issued in December by the Massachusetts Department of Revenue.
But Massachusetts' health care law gives the Department of Revenue the authority to use its regular tax-collection powers to enforce the insurance mandate, says spokesman Robert Bliss. Through September 2009, the state had collected $12.9 million of the $16.4 million in penalties assessed in 2008.
'A dangerous expansion of the IRS' power'
In this political environment, even a defanged IRS stirs up powerful emotions. Among the concerns about the IRS' role in the health care reform law:
•The law will lead to a dramatic expansion of the IRS. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the IRS will need an additional $5 billion to $10 billion over the next 10 years to administer the health care law. That projection has fired up activists who believe the IRS should be downsized, or abolished.
Some Republican lawmakers have extrapolated from that estimate that the IRS will need to hire an additional 16,500 agents to enforce the health insurance mandate. Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., ranking minority member of the House Ways and Means Committee, called the law "a dangerous expansion of the IRS' power and reach into the lives of virtually every American."
The CBO report refers to the $10 billion figure as "administrative costs" and makes no reference to the number of employees the agency will need to hire. And enforcement is only one part of the IRS' responsibilities under the law. The agency will also be in charge of providing tax credits to small businesses, along with refundable tax credits to individuals who can't afford health insurance.
"The IRS is going to need additional resources, but in terms of health reform, probably the main focus is going to be on processing" the credits, Jost says.
The IRS has already started some of its administrative tasks. Last week, it began mailing postcards to more than 4 million small businesses and tax-exempt groups with information about a provision in the law that provides tax credits for small businesses. The tax credit, which takes effect this year, is designed to encourage small businesses to offer health insurance to their employees or keep the coverage they already have.
•The law will make it more difficult for the IRS to carry out its primary job of collecting taxes. Only 64% of taxpayers who called the IRS during last year's tax-filing season reached an IRS representative, according to a report by the IRS' national taxpayer advocate. The IRS' modest goal for this year was to answer 71% of taxpayer calls. Even more callers could have trouble getting through when the IRS takes on its obligations under the health care law, Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said at an April 15 Senate Finance Committee hearing.
"Taxpayers trying to do the right thing regarding their tax responsibilities shouldn't have to be put on hold — or have to call back — because the IRS is now answering questions about health insurance," Grassley said.
The new responsibilities could also force the IRS to cut back on complex audits of sophisticated tax-avoidance schemes, such as illegal offshore accounts, Maule says. To handle the administrative tasks associated with the law, the IRS may need to divert experienced IRS agents who typically conduct these audits, he says. "This is going to make it easier for people who want to play the audit lottery game to get away with it."
Another potential problem: Administering the health care law will strain the IRS' already outdated computer and data-storage systems, says Pete Sepp, spokesman for the National Taxpayers Union, an advocacy group that supports lower taxes. "The IRS customer-service front end is already sagging, and the back end is not looking so hot, either," he says.
•The IRS does a poor job of managing social programs. Critics of the legislation say problems with the Earned Income Tax Credit, a federal program that provides tax rebates to low-income working families, illustrate the pitfalls of putting the IRS in charge of administering health care reform. The EITC program "has one of the highest fraud and abuse rates of any tax provision out there," Grassley said at the April 15 hearing. In tax year 2006, the latest year available, IRS made $10 billion to $12 billion in erroneous EITC payments, according to a study by the Treasury Department's inspector general.
IRS officials argue that the two programs are vastly different. The health care subsidies will go directly to insurers, not taxpayers, giving individuals little incentive to cheat, says IRS spokesman Frank Keith.
Jost maintains that the tax credits could encourage compliance, because taxpayers who refuse to provide information about their health care coverage will be ineligible for federal health insurance subsidies. That subsidy "is going to be pretty significant for lower-income people," he says.
Under the law, millions of middle- and low-income taxpayers will be eligible for subsidies to help pay for their health insurance. Taxpayers with incomes of up to four times the poverty level — currently $43,320 for an individual and $88,200 for a family of four — would qualify.
Matching documents
Starting in 2014, insurers will be required to send the IRS a document showing that the taxpayer has insurance coverage. The IRS will match taxpayers' returns with information it receives from insurers, and individuals who don't have insurance will receive a letter explaining how much they owe in penalties.
Those who ignore the letter could have the penalty withheld from their refunds — but that will only be effective if they're due a refund. Self-employed taxpayers, who are among the individuals most likely to go without insurance, often don't get refunds because their wages aren't subject to withholding.
Still, Jost believes the actual number of insurance scofflaws will be relatively small. People who receive health insurance through their jobs — about 57% of workers — won't be affected. Taxpayers older than 65 won't be subject to the new requirement because they're covered by Medicare. And many self-employed people, along with workers who don't have employer-provided coverage, meet the income requirements for tax credits, so they'll have an incentive to get insurance, he says.
That leaves doctors, lawyers, accountants and other self-employed people with high incomes, Jost says. Many of these taxpayers have complex tax returns that include numerous tax deductions and credits, Jost says. "Unless they are just deeply principled people who think this is the greatest offense in the history of this country, they are not going to want to mix it up with the IRS," he says.
And what will happen to taxpayers who defy the mandate? Not much, Jost predicts:
"I think it's going to be a small number of wealthy people who are going to be determined to fight this, and the IRS will just ignore them."
Keith disputes the notion that taxpayers who disregard the law will get a free pass. The IRS will have up to 10 years to withhold refunds from individuals who owe penalties, he says. Even if they aren't ordinarily due a refund, he says, "any time they overpay, those monies will be available."
Monday, April 26, 2010
1970 Predictions From 1st Earth Day...
These are Predictions from the 1st Earth Day, made in 1970
"We have about five more years at the outside to do something."
- Kenneth Watt, ecologist
"Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind."
- George Wald, Harvard Biologist
"We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation."
- Barry Commoner, Washington University biologist
"Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to enhance existence but to save the race from intolerable deterioration and possible extinction."
- New York Times editorial, the day after the first Earth Day
"Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make. The death rate will increase until at least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during the next ten years."
- Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
"By...[1975] some experts feel that food shortages will have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the decade of the 1980s."
- Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
"It is already too late to avoid mass starvation."
- Denis Hayes, chief organizer for Earth Day
"Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread famines will begin in India ; these will spread by 1990 to include all of India , Pakistan , China and the Near East, Africa . By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions....By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine."
- Peter Gunter, professor, North Texas State University
"Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support...the following predictions: In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution...by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half...."
- Life Magazine, January 1970
"At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it's only a matter of time before light will be filtered out of the atmosphere and none of our land will be usable."
- Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
"Air pollution...is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone."
- Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
"We are prospecting for the very last of our resources and using up the nonrenewable things many times faster than we are finding new ones."
- Martin Litton, Sierra Club director
"By the year 2000, if present trends continue, we will be using up crude oil at such a rate...that there won't be any more crude oil. You'll drive up to the pump and say, `Fill 'er up, buddy,' and he'll say, `I am very sorry, there isn't any.'"
- Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
"Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, believes that in 25 years, somewhere between 75 and 80 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct." (even this was said in 1970)
- Sen. Gaylord Nelson (Al Gore must have read his book)
"The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years. If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age." - Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
I guess by now we are all supposed to be dead or at least gasping for breath. . “are we there yet?”
PS Challenge everything you read and half of that which you are told, irrespective of the source. In fact, the more credible the source, the more suspicious one should become. And yes, ride your bicycle more, turn off unused lights and don’t waste water. Oh, and one more thing, cut your toilet paper usage to one sheet per bowl movement. Now the smell will kill us.
"We have about five more years at the outside to do something."
- Kenneth Watt, ecologist
"Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind."
- George Wald, Harvard Biologist
"We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation."
- Barry Commoner, Washington University biologist
"Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to enhance existence but to save the race from intolerable deterioration and possible extinction."
- New York Times editorial, the day after the first Earth Day
"Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make. The death rate will increase until at least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during the next ten years."
- Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
"By...[1975] some experts feel that food shortages will have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the decade of the 1980s."
- Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
"It is already too late to avoid mass starvation."
- Denis Hayes, chief organizer for Earth Day
"Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread famines will begin in India ; these will spread by 1990 to include all of India , Pakistan , China and the Near East, Africa . By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions....By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine."
- Peter Gunter, professor, North Texas State University
"Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support...the following predictions: In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution...by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half...."
- Life Magazine, January 1970
"At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it's only a matter of time before light will be filtered out of the atmosphere and none of our land will be usable."
- Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
"Air pollution...is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone."
- Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
"We are prospecting for the very last of our resources and using up the nonrenewable things many times faster than we are finding new ones."
- Martin Litton, Sierra Club director
"By the year 2000, if present trends continue, we will be using up crude oil at such a rate...that there won't be any more crude oil. You'll drive up to the pump and say, `Fill 'er up, buddy,' and he'll say, `I am very sorry, there isn't any.'"
- Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
"Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, believes that in 25 years, somewhere between 75 and 80 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct." (even this was said in 1970)
- Sen. Gaylord Nelson (Al Gore must have read his book)
"The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years. If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age." - Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
I guess by now we are all supposed to be dead or at least gasping for breath. . “are we there yet?”
PS Challenge everything you read and half of that which you are told, irrespective of the source. In fact, the more credible the source, the more suspicious one should become. And yes, ride your bicycle more, turn off unused lights and don’t waste water. Oh, and one more thing, cut your toilet paper usage to one sheet per bowl movement. Now the smell will kill us.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Bryan Baumgart Unemployment encouraged! Incentives NOT to Work!!
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303828304575180243952375172.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_sections_opinion
APRIL 13, 2010.
Incentives Not to Work
Larry Summers v. Senate Democrats on jobless benefits.
"The second way government assistance programs contribute to long-term unemployment is by providing an incentive, and the means, not to work. Each unemployed person has a 'reservation wage'—the minimum wage he or she insists on getting before accepting a job. Unemployment insurance and other social assistance programs increase [the] reservation wage, causing an unemployed person to remain unemployed longer."
Any guess who wrote that? Milton Friedman, perhaps. Simon Legree? Sorry.
Full credit goes to Lawrence H. Summers, the current White House economic adviser, who wrote those sensible words in his chapter on "Unemployment" in the Concise Encyclopedia of Economics, first published in 1999.
Mr. Summers should give a tutorial to the U.S. Senate, which is debating whether to extend unemployment benefits for the fourth time since the recession began in early 2008. The bill pushed by Democrats would extend jobless payments to 99 weeks, or nearly two full years, at a cost of between $7 billion and $10 billion. As Mr. Summers suggests, rarely has there been a clearer case of false policy compassion.
View Full Image
Associated Press Larry Summers
.
Mr. Summers is merely reflecting what numerous economic studies have shown. Alan Reynolds of the Cato Institute has found that the average unemployment episode rose from 10 weeks before the recession to 19 weeks after Congress twice previously extended jobless benefits—to 79 from 26 weeks. Even as initial unemployment claims have fallen in recent months, the length of unemployment has risen. Mr. Reynolds estimates that the extensions of unemployment insurance and other federal policies have raised the official jobless rate by nearly two percentage points.
Or consider the Brookings Institution, whose panel on economic activity reported this March that jobless insurance extensions "correspond to between 0.7 and 1.8 percentage points of the 5.5 percentage point increase in the unemployment rate witnessed in the current recession."
Or perhaps the Senate should listen to another Obama Administration economist, Alan Krueger of the Treasury Department, who concluded in a 2008 study that "job search increases sharply in the weeks prior to benefit exhaustion." In other words, many unemployed workers don't start seriously looking for a job until they are about to lose their benefits.
And, sure enough, the share of unemployed workers who don't have a job for more than 26 weeks has steadily increased, reaching a record 44.1% in March. The average spell of unemployment is now 31 weeks, even though the economy is once again creating more new jobs than it is losing. Democrats are slowly converting unemployment insurance into a welfare program.
Despite all of this evidence, Democrats seem to think that extending jobless benefits for another 20 weeks is a big political winner. Iowa Senator Tom Harkin recently roared, "Is there any compassion at all left with Republicans for people whose checks are going to run out?" New York's Chuck Schumer calls Republicans "inhumane."
But do these Senators really think it's compassionate to give people an additional incentive to stay out of the job market, losing crucial skills and contacts? And how politically smart is it for Democrats to embrace policies that keep the jobless rate higher than it would otherwise be? How many Democrats share Mr. Harkin's apparent desire to defend a jobless rate near 9% (today it is 9.7%) in the fall election campaign.
We should add that Republicans would rather not fight on these incentive grounds and are instead opposing the new benefits only because Democrats refuse to pay for them and want to add to the deficit. In other words, the GOP is merely asking Democrats to live up to their own "pay as you go" fiscal promises, since the total bill for these jobless benefits has now hit nearly $90 billion.
If Republicans were really cynical, they'd let the new benefits pass and run against the higher jobless rate in the fall. In any case, no one should be surprised that when you subsidize people for not working, more people will choose not to work.
An earlier WSJ.com version of this editorial contained a quote from the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee's January minutes that was accurate but taken out of context. It was removed during the editing process and wasn't published in the print version of the Wall Street Journal. However, due to a production error, the quote made it into the initial online version of the editorial.
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Related Stories.Consider Government's Many Disincentives to Hiring21 hrs ago .Unemployment Benefits Aren't Keeping Us From WorkYesterday 12:01 A.M. .Don't Blame High Unemployment on the Unemployed4/16/2010 .Summers on Demand4/15/2010 .Don't Blame Extension of Jobless BenefitsYesterday 01:44 P.M. .The SEC vs. Goldman Yesterday 12:01 A.M. Subscriber Content Read Preview
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APRIL 13, 2010.
Incentives Not to Work
Larry Summers v. Senate Democrats on jobless benefits.
"The second way government assistance programs contribute to long-term unemployment is by providing an incentive, and the means, not to work. Each unemployed person has a 'reservation wage'—the minimum wage he or she insists on getting before accepting a job. Unemployment insurance and other social assistance programs increase [the] reservation wage, causing an unemployed person to remain unemployed longer."
Any guess who wrote that? Milton Friedman, perhaps. Simon Legree? Sorry.
Full credit goes to Lawrence H. Summers, the current White House economic adviser, who wrote those sensible words in his chapter on "Unemployment" in the Concise Encyclopedia of Economics, first published in 1999.
Mr. Summers should give a tutorial to the U.S. Senate, which is debating whether to extend unemployment benefits for the fourth time since the recession began in early 2008. The bill pushed by Democrats would extend jobless payments to 99 weeks, or nearly two full years, at a cost of between $7 billion and $10 billion. As Mr. Summers suggests, rarely has there been a clearer case of false policy compassion.
View Full Image
Associated Press Larry Summers
.
Mr. Summers is merely reflecting what numerous economic studies have shown. Alan Reynolds of the Cato Institute has found that the average unemployment episode rose from 10 weeks before the recession to 19 weeks after Congress twice previously extended jobless benefits—to 79 from 26 weeks. Even as initial unemployment claims have fallen in recent months, the length of unemployment has risen. Mr. Reynolds estimates that the extensions of unemployment insurance and other federal policies have raised the official jobless rate by nearly two percentage points.
Or consider the Brookings Institution, whose panel on economic activity reported this March that jobless insurance extensions "correspond to between 0.7 and 1.8 percentage points of the 5.5 percentage point increase in the unemployment rate witnessed in the current recession."
Or perhaps the Senate should listen to another Obama Administration economist, Alan Krueger of the Treasury Department, who concluded in a 2008 study that "job search increases sharply in the weeks prior to benefit exhaustion." In other words, many unemployed workers don't start seriously looking for a job until they are about to lose their benefits.
And, sure enough, the share of unemployed workers who don't have a job for more than 26 weeks has steadily increased, reaching a record 44.1% in March. The average spell of unemployment is now 31 weeks, even though the economy is once again creating more new jobs than it is losing. Democrats are slowly converting unemployment insurance into a welfare program.
Despite all of this evidence, Democrats seem to think that extending jobless benefits for another 20 weeks is a big political winner. Iowa Senator Tom Harkin recently roared, "Is there any compassion at all left with Republicans for people whose checks are going to run out?" New York's Chuck Schumer calls Republicans "inhumane."
But do these Senators really think it's compassionate to give people an additional incentive to stay out of the job market, losing crucial skills and contacts? And how politically smart is it for Democrats to embrace policies that keep the jobless rate higher than it would otherwise be? How many Democrats share Mr. Harkin's apparent desire to defend a jobless rate near 9% (today it is 9.7%) in the fall election campaign.
We should add that Republicans would rather not fight on these incentive grounds and are instead opposing the new benefits only because Democrats refuse to pay for them and want to add to the deficit. In other words, the GOP is merely asking Democrats to live up to their own "pay as you go" fiscal promises, since the total bill for these jobless benefits has now hit nearly $90 billion.
If Republicans were really cynical, they'd let the new benefits pass and run against the higher jobless rate in the fall. In any case, no one should be surprised that when you subsidize people for not working, more people will choose not to work.
An earlier WSJ.com version of this editorial contained a quote from the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee's January minutes that was accurate but taken out of context. It was removed during the editing process and wasn't published in the print version of the Wall Street Journal. However, due to a production error, the quote made it into the initial online version of the editorial.
Copyright 2009 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved
This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit
www.djreprints.com
More In Opinion
EmailPrinter FriendlyOrder ReprintsShare: facebook
Digg
StumbleUpon
Viadeo
Orkut
Yahoo! Buzz
Fark
del.icio.us
MySpace
.
Related Stories.Consider Government's Many Disincentives to Hiring21 hrs ago .Unemployment Benefits Aren't Keeping Us From WorkYesterday 12:01 A.M. .Don't Blame High Unemployment on the Unemployed4/16/2010 .Summers on Demand4/15/2010 .Don't Blame Extension of Jobless BenefitsYesterday 01:44 P.M. .The SEC vs. Goldman Yesterday 12:01 A.M. Subscriber Content Read Preview
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.New Data Will Give Clues To U.K. Election13 hrs ago . .
Related Videos. 2/23/2010 AM Report: Jobless Rate Hits New High . 2/23/2010 AM Report: Job Losses Accelerate . 2/23/2010 News Hub: Health-Care Debate Moves to Senate Floor . .
.Back To . .
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US Faces Sever Shortage Of Doctors!
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304506904575180331528424238.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsSecond
APRIL 12, 2010.
Medical Schools Can't Keep Up
As Ranks of Insured Expand, Nation Faces Shortage of 150,000 Doctors in 15 Years.
By SUZANNE SATALINE And SHIRLEY S. WANG
The new federal health-care law has raised the stakes for hospitals and schools already scrambling to train more doctors.
Experts warn there won't be enough doctors to treat the millions of people newly insured under the law. At current graduation and training rates, the nation could face a shortage of as many as 150,000 doctors in the next 15 years, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.
That shortfall is predicted despite a push by teaching hospitals and medical schools to boost the number of U.S. doctors, which now totals about 954,000.
The greatest demand will be for primary-care physicians. These general practitioners, internists, family physicians and pediatricians will have a larger role under the new law, coordinating care for each patient.
The U.S. has 352,908 primary-care doctors now, and the college association estimates that 45,000 more will be needed by 2020. But the number of medical-school students entering family medicine fell more than a quarter between 2002 and 2007.
Related VideoMedical Training in Second Life (04/12/10)Getting Doctors, Hospitals to Use Electronic Medical Records (01/26/09)Faces of Health Care: A Doctor is in the House (12/22/09).
A shortage of primary-care and other physicians could mean more-limited access to health care and longer wait times for patients.
Proponents of the new health-care law say it does attempt to address the physician shortage. The law offers sweeteners to encourage more people to enter medical professions, and a 10% Medicare pay boost for primary-care doctors.
Meanwhile, a number of new medical schools have opened around the country recently. As of last October, four new medical schools enrolled a total of about 190 students, and 12 medical schools raised the enrollment of first-year students by a total of 150 slots, according to the AAMC. Some 18,000 students entered U.S. medical schools in the fall of 2009, the AAMC says.
But medical colleges and hospitals warn that these efforts will hit a big bottleneck: There is a shortage of medical resident positions. The residency is the minimum three-year period when medical-school graduates train in hospitals and clinics.
There are about 110,000 resident positions in the U.S., according to the AAMC. Teaching hospitals rely heavily on Medicare funding to pay for these slots. In 1997, Congress imposed a cap on funding for medical residencies, which hospitals say has increasingly hurt their ability to expand the number of positions.
Medicare pays $9.1 billion a year to teaching hospitals, which goes toward resident salaries and direct teaching costs, as well as the higher operating costs associated with teaching hospitals, which tend to see the sickest and most costly patients.
Doctors' groups and medical schools had hoped that the new health-care law, passed in March, would increase the number of funded residency slots, but such a provision didn't make it into the final bill.
"It will probably take 10 years to even make a dent into the number of doctors that we need out there," said Atul Grover, the AAMC's chief advocacy officer.
While doctors trained in other countries could theoretically help the primary-care shortage, they hit the same bottleneck with resident slots, because they must still complete a U.S. residency in order to get a license to practice medicine independently in the U.S. In the 2010 class of residents, some 13% of slots are filled by non-U.S. citizens who completed medical school outside the U.S.
One provision in the law attempts to address residencies. Since some residency slots go unfilled each year, the law will pool the funding for unused slots and redistribute it to other institutions, with the majority of these slots going to primary-care or general-surgery residencies. The slot redistribution, in effect, will create additional residencies, because previously unfilled positions will now be used, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
From the ArchiveOpinion: How to Fix the Doctor Shortage (01/04/10)Health Blog: Would Adding Residency Slots Solve the Primary-Care Shortage? (11/27/09)Opinion: The Coming Shortage of Doctors (11/06/09)Health Blog: Obama: 'Severe Shortage' of Primary Care Doctors (08/11/09).
Some efforts by educators are focused on boosting the number of primary-care doctors. The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences anticipates the state will need 350 more primary-care doctors in the next five years. So it raised its class size by 24 students last year, beyond the 150 previous annual admissions.
In addition, the university opened a satellite medical campus in Fayetteville to give six third-year students additional clinical-training opportunities, said Richard Wheeler, executive associate dean for academic affairs. The school asks students to commit to entering rural medicine, and the school has 73 people in the program.
Journal Communitydiscuss..“ As a specialist physician I will suggest that until primary care physicians can earn 70-80% of what most specialists make without killing themselves, there will be no incentive for the best and the brightest to go into primary care. ”
.—Michael Brennan.
"We've tried to make sure the attitude of students going into primary care has changed," said Dr. Wheeler. "To make sure primary care is a respected specialty to go into."
Montefiore Medical Center, the university hospital for Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, has 1,220 residency slots. Since the 1970s, Montefiore has encouraged residents to work a few days a week in community clinics in New York's Bronx borough, where about 64 Montefiore residents a year care for pregnant women, deliver children and provide vaccines. There has been a slight increase in the number of residents who ask to join the program, said Peter Selwyn, chairman of Montefiore's department of family and social medicine.
One is Justin Sanders, a 2007 graduate of the University of Vermont College of Medicine who is a second-year resident at Montefiore. In recent weeks, he has been caring for children he helped deliver. He said more doctors are needed in his area, but acknowledged that "primary-care residencies are not in the sexier end. A lot of these [specialty] fields are a lot sexier to students with high debt burdens."
APRIL 12, 2010.
Medical Schools Can't Keep Up
As Ranks of Insured Expand, Nation Faces Shortage of 150,000 Doctors in 15 Years.
By SUZANNE SATALINE And SHIRLEY S. WANG
The new federal health-care law has raised the stakes for hospitals and schools already scrambling to train more doctors.
Experts warn there won't be enough doctors to treat the millions of people newly insured under the law. At current graduation and training rates, the nation could face a shortage of as many as 150,000 doctors in the next 15 years, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.
That shortfall is predicted despite a push by teaching hospitals and medical schools to boost the number of U.S. doctors, which now totals about 954,000.
The greatest demand will be for primary-care physicians. These general practitioners, internists, family physicians and pediatricians will have a larger role under the new law, coordinating care for each patient.
The U.S. has 352,908 primary-care doctors now, and the college association estimates that 45,000 more will be needed by 2020. But the number of medical-school students entering family medicine fell more than a quarter between 2002 and 2007.
Related VideoMedical Training in Second Life (04/12/10)Getting Doctors, Hospitals to Use Electronic Medical Records (01/26/09)Faces of Health Care: A Doctor is in the House (12/22/09).
A shortage of primary-care and other physicians could mean more-limited access to health care and longer wait times for patients.
Proponents of the new health-care law say it does attempt to address the physician shortage. The law offers sweeteners to encourage more people to enter medical professions, and a 10% Medicare pay boost for primary-care doctors.
Meanwhile, a number of new medical schools have opened around the country recently. As of last October, four new medical schools enrolled a total of about 190 students, and 12 medical schools raised the enrollment of first-year students by a total of 150 slots, according to the AAMC. Some 18,000 students entered U.S. medical schools in the fall of 2009, the AAMC says.
But medical colleges and hospitals warn that these efforts will hit a big bottleneck: There is a shortage of medical resident positions. The residency is the minimum three-year period when medical-school graduates train in hospitals and clinics.
There are about 110,000 resident positions in the U.S., according to the AAMC. Teaching hospitals rely heavily on Medicare funding to pay for these slots. In 1997, Congress imposed a cap on funding for medical residencies, which hospitals say has increasingly hurt their ability to expand the number of positions.
Medicare pays $9.1 billion a year to teaching hospitals, which goes toward resident salaries and direct teaching costs, as well as the higher operating costs associated with teaching hospitals, which tend to see the sickest and most costly patients.
Doctors' groups and medical schools had hoped that the new health-care law, passed in March, would increase the number of funded residency slots, but such a provision didn't make it into the final bill.
"It will probably take 10 years to even make a dent into the number of doctors that we need out there," said Atul Grover, the AAMC's chief advocacy officer.
While doctors trained in other countries could theoretically help the primary-care shortage, they hit the same bottleneck with resident slots, because they must still complete a U.S. residency in order to get a license to practice medicine independently in the U.S. In the 2010 class of residents, some 13% of slots are filled by non-U.S. citizens who completed medical school outside the U.S.
One provision in the law attempts to address residencies. Since some residency slots go unfilled each year, the law will pool the funding for unused slots and redistribute it to other institutions, with the majority of these slots going to primary-care or general-surgery residencies. The slot redistribution, in effect, will create additional residencies, because previously unfilled positions will now be used, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
From the ArchiveOpinion: How to Fix the Doctor Shortage (01/04/10)Health Blog: Would Adding Residency Slots Solve the Primary-Care Shortage? (11/27/09)Opinion: The Coming Shortage of Doctors (11/06/09)Health Blog: Obama: 'Severe Shortage' of Primary Care Doctors (08/11/09).
Some efforts by educators are focused on boosting the number of primary-care doctors. The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences anticipates the state will need 350 more primary-care doctors in the next five years. So it raised its class size by 24 students last year, beyond the 150 previous annual admissions.
In addition, the university opened a satellite medical campus in Fayetteville to give six third-year students additional clinical-training opportunities, said Richard Wheeler, executive associate dean for academic affairs. The school asks students to commit to entering rural medicine, and the school has 73 people in the program.
Journal Communitydiscuss..“ As a specialist physician I will suggest that until primary care physicians can earn 70-80% of what most specialists make without killing themselves, there will be no incentive for the best and the brightest to go into primary care. ”
.—Michael Brennan.
"We've tried to make sure the attitude of students going into primary care has changed," said Dr. Wheeler. "To make sure primary care is a respected specialty to go into."
Montefiore Medical Center, the university hospital for Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, has 1,220 residency slots. Since the 1970s, Montefiore has encouraged residents to work a few days a week in community clinics in New York's Bronx borough, where about 64 Montefiore residents a year care for pregnant women, deliver children and provide vaccines. There has been a slight increase in the number of residents who ask to join the program, said Peter Selwyn, chairman of Montefiore's department of family and social medicine.
One is Justin Sanders, a 2007 graduate of the University of Vermont College of Medicine who is a second-year resident at Montefiore. In recent weeks, he has been caring for children he helped deliver. He said more doctors are needed in his area, but acknowledged that "primary-care residencies are not in the sexier end. A lot of these [specialty] fields are a lot sexier to students with high debt burdens."
Bryan thinks Civil War Looming...(my likely scenarios)
Millitias with WMD's planning assaults. Bricks and threats and assaults on Congressman! It is clear there are MANY more examples of movement toward a looming civil war.
Gov. Perry of Texas claims succession is a possibility he is considering. 17 other states follow Texas by declaring sovereignty! Over 30 states file lawsuits against federal gov't. regarding the healthcare bill. Many soldiers including officers refuse deployment based on Obama's citizenship (or lack of proof thereof). The extreme division Obama has brought...proof in the polls, tea party movement, etc. I'm telling you...and I've been saying it for quite some time...I'm pretty confident we are heading to a civil war. Not like the one in the history books. The millitary is too powerful for our militias and I highly doubt the fed. gov't. is dumb enough to attempt to go door to door (it's been tough cranking in Iraq and would be FAR tougher here). But I see no reason why self sufficient states such as Texas and Alaska couldn't succeed and refuse federal taxes and lead the way for 30-40 more red states. For the most part it could be done without too much bloodshed but it would leave our country split in two! Then the "blue" country would attempt to keep businesses there and tax the crap out of them to provide entitlements and handouts for all the moochers that would come a runnin to the state for free food, shelter, clothing, healthcare, education, cell phones, abortions, etc. And the "RED" country would go back to what our forefathers intended and you better believe all the businesses and doctors, etc. would relocate there! The "RED" country could drill for it's own oil off the coast of Texas and Alaska and LA., etc. It would THRIVE and DOMINATE and the "blue" country would fall to it's own liberal policies pretty quickly kind of like the USSR in the cold war. It probably wouldn't be long before they would be asking to join the "RED" country again!
Gov. Perry of Texas claims succession is a possibility he is considering. 17 other states follow Texas by declaring sovereignty! Over 30 states file lawsuits against federal gov't. regarding the healthcare bill. Many soldiers including officers refuse deployment based on Obama's citizenship (or lack of proof thereof). The extreme division Obama has brought...proof in the polls, tea party movement, etc. I'm telling you...and I've been saying it for quite some time...I'm pretty confident we are heading to a civil war. Not like the one in the history books. The millitary is too powerful for our militias and I highly doubt the fed. gov't. is dumb enough to attempt to go door to door (it's been tough cranking in Iraq and would be FAR tougher here). But I see no reason why self sufficient states such as Texas and Alaska couldn't succeed and refuse federal taxes and lead the way for 30-40 more red states. For the most part it could be done without too much bloodshed but it would leave our country split in two! Then the "blue" country would attempt to keep businesses there and tax the crap out of them to provide entitlements and handouts for all the moochers that would come a runnin to the state for free food, shelter, clothing, healthcare, education, cell phones, abortions, etc. And the "RED" country would go back to what our forefathers intended and you better believe all the businesses and doctors, etc. would relocate there! The "RED" country could drill for it's own oil off the coast of Texas and Alaska and LA., etc. It would THRIVE and DOMINATE and the "blue" country would fall to it's own liberal policies pretty quickly kind of like the USSR in the cold war. It probably wouldn't be long before they would be asking to join the "RED" country again!
A rant from Bryan on Obamacare:
Just wanted to throw in my 2 cents (I know again) for what it's worth on the recent passage of the healthcare bill. I know some of you tend to be more liberal and favor the democrats side so I want to be as sensitive as possible even though I'm REALLY ticked about what was allowed to happen through shady backroom deals, threats and intimidation.
First of all, I want to say that the problem of being denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions is something I can relate to since Type 1 diabetes runs in the family. Therefore, insurance for my family has always been a problem.
Everyone agrees that there needs to be some changes made to health insurance, but it is clear that the problems such as pre-existing conditions could have been addressed without infringing on all of our individual rights, putting the government in charge of yet another basic need (and we all know how crappy the quality of government run programs are) and raising our taxes and our children and grandchildren's taxes to pay for this almost $1 trillion dollar program! (Do you have any idea just how much a trillion dollars is?) (Can you think of even ONE government run program that isn't now in debt, and the quality isn't terrible?...post office, medicaid, medicare, social security, public education, etc.) According to FactCheck.org all of our insurance pemiums are to go up now anyway!!
Sure there are a few good things in the bill, but there are TONS more of terrible things in it. I want the good things just like you, such as not being denied because of pre-existing conditions and lowering premiums, etc. It's just that it was pretty obvious that all of that (and much more that needed to be fixed) could have been done without hurting our country the way this will!
This rediculous bill doesn't even address most of the most problamatic issues with our healthcare system, such as tort reform to deal with the frivolous lawsuits that run our medical costs up and in turn insurance premiums through the roof! So many problems and very few addressed and at what cost? Our freedoms!!! Over 30 states now have filed lawsuits so far because our Constitution protects us from being forced by the government to purchase something we don't want (such as crappy gov't. insurance). This is the first time in American history that we are now required to purchase something from the government or face criminal penalities. It was going to be up to 10 years in prison but was now dropped to fines and penalties.
There is a reason that in the latest cnn polls before the bill passed, only 25% of voters wanted it to pass. The rest of us all wanted to start over and do it right. Did you know that Obama himself admitted he didn't know what was in the bill and wouldn't until later after he signed it. His actuary admitted he didn't have time to read it yet either. There is a reason that obama, pelosi, reid and congress have dropped to the lowest levels in polls to date! 29% for Obama, 11% for congress, 11% for pelosi, 8% for reid! There is a reason that it took shady deals such as the cornhusker kickback, louisiana purchase, extra water allotments to senators in california, extra money for airports for Stupak (the pro-life democrat in charge of the group of 12 holding out), threats to charge ethics violations on dems that vote "no", refusal to campaign for any dem voting "no", etc. etc. etc. In short: They criminally used OUR taxpayer money to buy off votes to pass a bill we OPPOSED!!! How can anyone be ok with that?
And how can anyone in their right mind continue to support this President who has broken EVERY promise he has ever made! And the greed for power is unrivaled! Lets take a look at his Presidency so far:
He has now taken control of the healthcare industry (which alone is 1/6 of economy), housing industry, majority of banking industry, auto industry, student loan industry (yes he snuck that one into the healthcare bill...putting the gov;t. in charge of the student loan industry and putting over 30,000 bankers out of jobs). Next he will push Cap & Trade before Nov. elections which will raise our utility bills through the roof and give him partial control over all sectors of industry. From there...who knows, if he can before Nov. election he would probably shoot for the oil industry, and then food, grocery, etc. Prince Obama has now made himself the closest thing the US has ever had to a dictator! Only diff: we are now ruled by several (obama, reid, pelosi) instead of just one. But don't be fooled...they all answer to the Prince!
What else has he done since taking office? Oh yeah...broke his promise to bring home troops and end war...to date he has depolyed more troops than he has brought home! He broke his capaign promise where he said he was against spending freezes but then recently calling for a spending freeze (to look good) but then passing an almost $1 trillion dollar healthcare package anyway. He has called for increased funding for nuclear program. He has not dealt with Iran's nuke development but instead condemns Israel and refused to let them do what is in their best interest of national security! He condemns them for wanting to protect themselves from Iran who has vowed to remove Israel from the face of the earth. He has broken promises on transparency by refusing to put bills up for public viewing for 5 days before signing, refusing tv coverage over healthcare, stimulus, bailouts, etc. and refusing to post where our tax dollars (bailout $) has gone. He ignored promises of bi-partisanship and unity(we are now more divided than our country has EVER been), and called for secret meeting with democrats and without inviting republicans, ignored the will of the people that elected him by passing HUGE spending bills and raising taxes against the wishes of the people (stimulus, bailouts, healthcare). Only 25% of voters wanted healthcare bill passed! Instead of curbing spending he has voted to raise the debt limit several times so he could spend more. Reaching the new debt limit and voting to raise it even further several times now. He has already spent more than every President in US history combined (even adjusted for inflation). He has increased spending in EVERY category except for education where funding has been cut and many schools closed and teachers laid off (including here in OPS). We now spend more paying off our interest on our debt (mostly to China) than we spend on any other program period, including welfare, social security, the wars, etc.!!! He promised to cut pork barrel spending but the stimulus bill was lined with more pork than any other bill in US history! This healthcare bill had plenty too! He has made shady backroom deals and used threats and intimidation to pass unpopular bills against the wishes of the people who elected him! Not one promise kept so far!!!
Worst President in US history?! YOU DECIDE!!!
And back to health insurance...do you realize that currently those who truly can't affored health insurance are covered under Medicaid and Medicare and it is illegal to turn anyone (even illegal aliens) away from the ER. There is a tremendous number of free healthcare clinics all over. Almost ALL of the uninsured in the US is either eligible for Medicare but chooses not to enroll, or can afford health insurance but choose not to get it. It WAS there choice because we USED TO BE a free country! Not any longer. http://visionsfromthehorizon.blogspot.com/2008/04/who-are-uninsured-in-america.html This democratic party has become the most racist party I have ever seen. Making a ton of our minority population (among others) competely dependent on them for their basic needs (food, shelter, clothing, cell phones, healthcare, etc.) The people are now incapable, afraid to, or unmotivated to actually pull themselves up and reach their potential. The democrats extended unemployment benefits from 22 weeks to 99 weeks now. That is over TWO years you are allowed to sit there and get paid for not doing work from tax money stole from those that DO work. What happened to "Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day, teach him how to fish and he'll eat forever"?!!!!
And what next anyway? We keep spending OUR tax money bailing out failing companies instead of forcing them to make changes and get better or go under and be replaced by better companies. What next? Oil prices too high so use our tax dollars to take over all the oil companies so you can control prices? Then electric and gas companies? Then grocery stores? Farms? You know?!!!! He already took over housing, banking, auto, school loans, healthcare, and already controlled retirement, education, some of healthcare, post office, etc. Where does it stop? You can't see how we are slowly becoming a socialist nation? And with more and more wealth being redistributed...a communist nation?! I looked at current tax rates which are now to go WAY up under Obama and I see that out of our paychecks we currently have to give 27% to the federal gov't. (27 cents out of every dollar we make) and we give a little over 6% to the state of Nebraska. That means that we give over 33 cents out of every dollar we make right up front. Then we get charged an additional almost 7% on every dollar we spend (sales tax) and even more than that on every dollar we save (property tax, retirement account tax, death tax, etc.) Then we have other taxes on EVERYTHING from phone bills, internet, gasolines, our food being heated or served, or any other service, etc., etc.
Accounts Receivable Tax, Building Permit Tax, Cable Television Tax, Capital Gains Tax, CDL license Tax, Cigarette Tax, Corporate Income Tax, Court Fines (indirect taxes), Dog License Tax, Federal Income Tax, Federal Unemployment Tax (FUTA), Fishing License Tax, Food License Tax, Fuel permit tax, Gasoline Tax (42 cents per gallon)(State MA 28 cents), Hunting License Tax, Inheritance Tax Interest expense (tax on the money), Inventory tax IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax), IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax), Liquor Tax, Local Income Tax, Luxury Taxes, Marriage License Tax, Medicare Tax, Property Tax, Real Estate Tax, Septic Permit Tax, Service Charge Taxes, Social Security Tax, Road Usage Taxes Truckers) (Added to delivery charge), Sales Taxes, Recreational Vehicle Tax, Road Toll Booth Taxes, School Tax, State Income Tax, State Unemployment Tax (SUTA), Telephone federal excise tax, Telephone federal universal service fee tax, Telephone federal, state and local surcharge taxes, Telephone minimum usage surcharge tax, Telephone recurring and non-recurring charges tax, Telephone state and local tax, Telephone usage charge tax, Toll Bridge Taxes, Toll Tunnel Taxes, Traffic Fines (indirect taxation), Trailer registration tax, Utility Taxes, Vehicle License Registration Tax, Vehicle Sales Tax (Every time sold & re-sold), Watercraft registration Tax, Well Permit Tax, Workers Compensation Tax
COMMENTS:
Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago and our nation was the most prosperous in the world, had absolutely no national debt, had the largest middle class in the world and Mom stayed home to raise the kids. What the hell happened???
***It seems to me that after considering ALL this we are lucky to keep even 25 or 30 cents out of every dollar we make! The government takes the other 70 to 75 cents out of each dollar made yet that still isn't enough! (and if you are hard working enough to make more than we do, you pay MUCH more than 27% in federal income tax!) And it is ALL being raised under Obama's watch!
Can you honestly tell me that just because he is a democrat or whatever else it is about him that appeals to you (that he gives nice speeches about unity or bi-partisanship or hope or change) or whatever....can you honestly tell me that you are okay with what he is doing? According to articles I have read, this Cap & trade he is going to pass next will raise your electic and utility bills by AT LEAST 300%!!! How much more are you willing to take from this clown?! It's not a Republican vs. Democrat thing! You know as well as I do, that the Democrats are COOKED in the next couple of elections. This country is all but certain to have a Republican President with likely a supermajority in the house and senate.
Interest on your school loans is being raised to help fund this healthcare by the way. And the quality of healthcare is already beginning it's decline as it did in Canada and UK. Their is a reason one of Canada's Premier's came to Florida for his heart sugery and claimed, "just because I went into politics doesn't mean I gave up my right to choose the best healthcare available for myself and my family." The quality dip is beginning. Wal-greens has stated it will not accept any new medicaid, and the MAYO clinic which Obama called, "a national model for efficient health care" began dropping medicare patients and won't accept any new ones. You will see more and more of the same just as in Canada and UK. There will be a shortage of doctors and clinics and hospitals and pharmacies as like in Canada you will have a 3 year wait for hip sugery or you will have to pay to fly somewhere else with better healthcare! Heck...Hawaii attempted Gov't. Healthcare just for children and it went bankrupt within 7 months. What makes us think it will succeed on a national level?! We can only hope it DOESN'T succeed! It's time to drop the apathy on this one before it's too late. Maybe even help "Atlas to shrug" by ushering up a movement to get as many folks as possible to visit their doctors as often as possible for nothing to bankrupt this program as quickly as possible before it causes any permanant damage! Then we can go back and start some REAL reform on healthcare without putting one more of our basic needs into the hands of the government!
Bryan
First of all, I want to say that the problem of being denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions is something I can relate to since Type 1 diabetes runs in the family. Therefore, insurance for my family has always been a problem.
Everyone agrees that there needs to be some changes made to health insurance, but it is clear that the problems such as pre-existing conditions could have been addressed without infringing on all of our individual rights, putting the government in charge of yet another basic need (and we all know how crappy the quality of government run programs are) and raising our taxes and our children and grandchildren's taxes to pay for this almost $1 trillion dollar program! (Do you have any idea just how much a trillion dollars is?) (Can you think of even ONE government run program that isn't now in debt, and the quality isn't terrible?...post office, medicaid, medicare, social security, public education, etc.) According to FactCheck.org all of our insurance pemiums are to go up now anyway!!
Sure there are a few good things in the bill, but there are TONS more of terrible things in it. I want the good things just like you, such as not being denied because of pre-existing conditions and lowering premiums, etc. It's just that it was pretty obvious that all of that (and much more that needed to be fixed) could have been done without hurting our country the way this will!
This rediculous bill doesn't even address most of the most problamatic issues with our healthcare system, such as tort reform to deal with the frivolous lawsuits that run our medical costs up and in turn insurance premiums through the roof! So many problems and very few addressed and at what cost? Our freedoms!!! Over 30 states now have filed lawsuits so far because our Constitution protects us from being forced by the government to purchase something we don't want (such as crappy gov't. insurance). This is the first time in American history that we are now required to purchase something from the government or face criminal penalities. It was going to be up to 10 years in prison but was now dropped to fines and penalties.
There is a reason that in the latest cnn polls before the bill passed, only 25% of voters wanted it to pass. The rest of us all wanted to start over and do it right. Did you know that Obama himself admitted he didn't know what was in the bill and wouldn't until later after he signed it. His actuary admitted he didn't have time to read it yet either. There is a reason that obama, pelosi, reid and congress have dropped to the lowest levels in polls to date! 29% for Obama, 11% for congress, 11% for pelosi, 8% for reid! There is a reason that it took shady deals such as the cornhusker kickback, louisiana purchase, extra water allotments to senators in california, extra money for airports for Stupak (the pro-life democrat in charge of the group of 12 holding out), threats to charge ethics violations on dems that vote "no", refusal to campaign for any dem voting "no", etc. etc. etc. In short: They criminally used OUR taxpayer money to buy off votes to pass a bill we OPPOSED!!! How can anyone be ok with that?
And how can anyone in their right mind continue to support this President who has broken EVERY promise he has ever made! And the greed for power is unrivaled! Lets take a look at his Presidency so far:
He has now taken control of the healthcare industry (which alone is 1/6 of economy), housing industry, majority of banking industry, auto industry, student loan industry (yes he snuck that one into the healthcare bill...putting the gov;t. in charge of the student loan industry and putting over 30,000 bankers out of jobs). Next he will push Cap & Trade before Nov. elections which will raise our utility bills through the roof and give him partial control over all sectors of industry. From there...who knows, if he can before Nov. election he would probably shoot for the oil industry, and then food, grocery, etc. Prince Obama has now made himself the closest thing the US has ever had to a dictator! Only diff: we are now ruled by several (obama, reid, pelosi) instead of just one. But don't be fooled...they all answer to the Prince!
What else has he done since taking office? Oh yeah...broke his promise to bring home troops and end war...to date he has depolyed more troops than he has brought home! He broke his capaign promise where he said he was against spending freezes but then recently calling for a spending freeze (to look good) but then passing an almost $1 trillion dollar healthcare package anyway. He has called for increased funding for nuclear program. He has not dealt with Iran's nuke development but instead condemns Israel and refused to let them do what is in their best interest of national security! He condemns them for wanting to protect themselves from Iran who has vowed to remove Israel from the face of the earth. He has broken promises on transparency by refusing to put bills up for public viewing for 5 days before signing, refusing tv coverage over healthcare, stimulus, bailouts, etc. and refusing to post where our tax dollars (bailout $) has gone. He ignored promises of bi-partisanship and unity(we are now more divided than our country has EVER been), and called for secret meeting with democrats and without inviting republicans, ignored the will of the people that elected him by passing HUGE spending bills and raising taxes against the wishes of the people (stimulus, bailouts, healthcare). Only 25% of voters wanted healthcare bill passed! Instead of curbing spending he has voted to raise the debt limit several times so he could spend more. Reaching the new debt limit and voting to raise it even further several times now. He has already spent more than every President in US history combined (even adjusted for inflation). He has increased spending in EVERY category except for education where funding has been cut and many schools closed and teachers laid off (including here in OPS). We now spend more paying off our interest on our debt (mostly to China) than we spend on any other program period, including welfare, social security, the wars, etc.!!! He promised to cut pork barrel spending but the stimulus bill was lined with more pork than any other bill in US history! This healthcare bill had plenty too! He has made shady backroom deals and used threats and intimidation to pass unpopular bills against the wishes of the people who elected him! Not one promise kept so far!!!
Worst President in US history?! YOU DECIDE!!!
And back to health insurance...do you realize that currently those who truly can't affored health insurance are covered under Medicaid and Medicare and it is illegal to turn anyone (even illegal aliens) away from the ER. There is a tremendous number of free healthcare clinics all over. Almost ALL of the uninsured in the US is either eligible for Medicare but chooses not to enroll, or can afford health insurance but choose not to get it. It WAS there choice because we USED TO BE a free country! Not any longer. http://visionsfromthehorizon.blogspot.com/2008/04/who-are-uninsured-in-america.html This democratic party has become the most racist party I have ever seen. Making a ton of our minority population (among others) competely dependent on them for their basic needs (food, shelter, clothing, cell phones, healthcare, etc.) The people are now incapable, afraid to, or unmotivated to actually pull themselves up and reach their potential. The democrats extended unemployment benefits from 22 weeks to 99 weeks now. That is over TWO years you are allowed to sit there and get paid for not doing work from tax money stole from those that DO work. What happened to "Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day, teach him how to fish and he'll eat forever"?!!!!
And what next anyway? We keep spending OUR tax money bailing out failing companies instead of forcing them to make changes and get better or go under and be replaced by better companies. What next? Oil prices too high so use our tax dollars to take over all the oil companies so you can control prices? Then electric and gas companies? Then grocery stores? Farms? You know?!!!! He already took over housing, banking, auto, school loans, healthcare, and already controlled retirement, education, some of healthcare, post office, etc. Where does it stop? You can't see how we are slowly becoming a socialist nation? And with more and more wealth being redistributed...a communist nation?! I looked at current tax rates which are now to go WAY up under Obama and I see that out of our paychecks we currently have to give 27% to the federal gov't. (27 cents out of every dollar we make) and we give a little over 6% to the state of Nebraska. That means that we give over 33 cents out of every dollar we make right up front. Then we get charged an additional almost 7% on every dollar we spend (sales tax) and even more than that on every dollar we save (property tax, retirement account tax, death tax, etc.) Then we have other taxes on EVERYTHING from phone bills, internet, gasolines, our food being heated or served, or any other service, etc., etc.
Accounts Receivable Tax, Building Permit Tax, Cable Television Tax, Capital Gains Tax, CDL license Tax, Cigarette Tax, Corporate Income Tax, Court Fines (indirect taxes), Dog License Tax, Federal Income Tax, Federal Unemployment Tax (FUTA), Fishing License Tax, Food License Tax, Fuel permit tax, Gasoline Tax (42 cents per gallon)(State MA 28 cents), Hunting License Tax, Inheritance Tax Interest expense (tax on the money), Inventory tax IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax), IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax), Liquor Tax, Local Income Tax, Luxury Taxes, Marriage License Tax, Medicare Tax, Property Tax, Real Estate Tax, Septic Permit Tax, Service Charge Taxes, Social Security Tax, Road Usage Taxes Truckers) (Added to delivery charge), Sales Taxes, Recreational Vehicle Tax, Road Toll Booth Taxes, School Tax, State Income Tax, State Unemployment Tax (SUTA), Telephone federal excise tax, Telephone federal universal service fee tax, Telephone federal, state and local surcharge taxes, Telephone minimum usage surcharge tax, Telephone recurring and non-recurring charges tax, Telephone state and local tax, Telephone usage charge tax, Toll Bridge Taxes, Toll Tunnel Taxes, Traffic Fines (indirect taxation), Trailer registration tax, Utility Taxes, Vehicle License Registration Tax, Vehicle Sales Tax (Every time sold & re-sold), Watercraft registration Tax, Well Permit Tax, Workers Compensation Tax
COMMENTS:
Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago and our nation was the most prosperous in the world, had absolutely no national debt, had the largest middle class in the world and Mom stayed home to raise the kids. What the hell happened???
***It seems to me that after considering ALL this we are lucky to keep even 25 or 30 cents out of every dollar we make! The government takes the other 70 to 75 cents out of each dollar made yet that still isn't enough! (and if you are hard working enough to make more than we do, you pay MUCH more than 27% in federal income tax!) And it is ALL being raised under Obama's watch!
Can you honestly tell me that just because he is a democrat or whatever else it is about him that appeals to you (that he gives nice speeches about unity or bi-partisanship or hope or change) or whatever....can you honestly tell me that you are okay with what he is doing? According to articles I have read, this Cap & trade he is going to pass next will raise your electic and utility bills by AT LEAST 300%!!! How much more are you willing to take from this clown?! It's not a Republican vs. Democrat thing! You know as well as I do, that the Democrats are COOKED in the next couple of elections. This country is all but certain to have a Republican President with likely a supermajority in the house and senate.
Interest on your school loans is being raised to help fund this healthcare by the way. And the quality of healthcare is already beginning it's decline as it did in Canada and UK. Their is a reason one of Canada's Premier's came to Florida for his heart sugery and claimed, "just because I went into politics doesn't mean I gave up my right to choose the best healthcare available for myself and my family." The quality dip is beginning. Wal-greens has stated it will not accept any new medicaid, and the MAYO clinic which Obama called, "a national model for efficient health care" began dropping medicare patients and won't accept any new ones. You will see more and more of the same just as in Canada and UK. There will be a shortage of doctors and clinics and hospitals and pharmacies as like in Canada you will have a 3 year wait for hip sugery or you will have to pay to fly somewhere else with better healthcare! Heck...Hawaii attempted Gov't. Healthcare just for children and it went bankrupt within 7 months. What makes us think it will succeed on a national level?! We can only hope it DOESN'T succeed! It's time to drop the apathy on this one before it's too late. Maybe even help "Atlas to shrug" by ushering up a movement to get as many folks as possible to visit their doctors as often as possible for nothing to bankrupt this program as quickly as possible before it causes any permanant damage! Then we can go back and start some REAL reform on healthcare without putting one more of our basic needs into the hands of the government!
Bryan
Monday, March 22, 2010
Roll Call on the Healthcare Vote: (AKA: Who to vote out in the next election)
A "yes" vote is a vote to pass the bill.
Voting yes were 219 Democrats and 0 Republicans.
Voting no were 34 Democrats and 178 Republicans.
There are 4 vacancies in the 435-member House.
ALABAMA
Democrats - Bright, N; Davis, N.
Republicans - Aderholt, N; Bachus, N; Bonner, N; Griffith, N; Rogers, N.
ALASKA
Republicans - Young, N.
ARIZONA
Democrats - Giffords, Y; Grijalva, Y; Kirkpatrick, Y; Mitchell, Y; Pastor, Y.
Republicans - Flake, N; Franks, N; Shadegg, N.
ARKANSAS
Democrats - Berry, N; Ross, N; Snyder, Y.
Republicans - Boozman, N.
CALIFORNIA
Democrats - Baca, Y; Becerra, Y; Berman, Y; Capps, Y; Cardoza, Y; Chu, Y; Costa, Y; Davis, Y; Eshoo, Y; Farr, Y; Filner, Y; Garamendi, Y; Harman, Y; Honda, Y; Lee, Y; Lofgren, Zoe, Y; Matsui, Y; McNerney, Y; Miller, George, Y; Napolitano, Y; Pelosi, Y; Richardson, Y; Roybal-Allard, Y; Sanchez, Linda T., Y; Sanchez, Loretta, Y; Schiff, Y; Sherman, Y; Speier, Y; Stark, Y; Thompson, Y; Waters, Y; Watson, Y; Waxman, Y; Woolsey, Y.
Republicans - Bilbray, N; Bono Mack, N; Calvert, N; Campbell, N; Dreier, N; Gallegly, N; Herger, N; Hunter, N; Issa, N; Lewis, N; Lungren, Daniel E., N; McCarthy, N; McClintock, N; McKeon, N; Miller, Gary, N; Nunes, N; Radanovich, N; Rohrabacher, N; Royce, N.
COLORADO
Democrats - DeGette, Y; Markey, Y; Perlmutter, Y; Polis, Y; Salazar, Y.
Republicans - Coffman, N; Lamborn, N.
CONNECTICUT
Democrats - Courtney, Y; DeLauro, Y; Himes, Y; Larson, Y; Murphy, Y.
DELAWARE
Republicans - Castle, N.
FLORIDA
Democrats - Boyd, Y; Brown, Corrine, Y; Castor, Y; Grayson, Y; Hastings, Y; Klein, Y; Kosmas, Y; Meek, Y; Wasserman Schultz, Y.
Republicans - Bilirakis, N; Brown-Waite, Ginny, N; Buchanan, N; Crenshaw, N; Diaz-Balart, L., N; Diaz-Balart, M., N; Mack, N; Mica, N; Miller, N; Posey, N; Putnam, N; Rooney, N; Ros-Lehtinen, N; Stearns, N; Young, N.
GEORGIA
Democrats - Barrow, N; Bishop, Y; Johnson, Y; Lewis, Y; Marshall, N; Scott, Y.
Republicans - Broun, N; Deal, N; Gingrey, N; Kingston, N; Linder, N; Price, N; Westmoreland, N.
HAWAII
Democrats - Hirono, Y.
IDAHO
Democrats - Minnick, N.
Republicans - Simpson, N.
ILLINOIS
Democrats - Bean, Y; Costello, Y; Davis, Y; Foster, Y; Gutierrez, Y; Halvorson, Y; Hare, Y; Jackson, Y; Lipinski, N; Quigley, Y; Rush, Y; Schakowsky, Y.
Republicans - Biggert, N; Johnson, N; Kirk, N; Manzullo, N; Roskam, N; Schock, N; Shimkus, N.
INDIANA
Democrats - Carson, Y; Donnelly, Y; Ellsworth, Y; Hill, Y; Visclosky, Y.
Republicans - Burton, N; Buyer, N; Pence, N; Souder, N.
IOWA
Democrats - Boswell, Y; Braley, Y; Loebsack, Y.
Republicans - King, N; Latham, N.
KANSAS
Democrats - Moore, Y.
Republicans - Jenkins, N; Moran, N; Tiahrt, N.
KENTUCKY
Democrats - Chandler, N; Yarmuth, Y.
Republicans - Davis, N; Guthrie, N; Rogers, N; Whitfield, N.
LOUISIANA
Democrats - Melancon, N.
Republicans - Alexander, N; Boustany, N; Cao, N; Cassidy, N; Fleming, N; Scalise, N.
MAINE
Democrats - Michaud, Y; Pingree, Y.
MARYLAND
Democrats - Cummings, Y; Edwards, Y; Hoyer, Y; Kratovil, N; Ruppersberger, Y; Sarbanes, Y; Van Hollen, Y.
Republicans - Bartlett, N.
MASSACHUSETTS
Democrats - Capuano, Y; Delahunt, Y; Frank, Y; Lynch, N; Markey, Y; McGovern, Y; Neal, Y; Olver, Y; Tierney, Y; Tsongas, Y.
MICHIGAN
Democrats - Conyers, Y; Dingell, Y; Kildee, Y; Kilpatrick, Y; Levin, Y; Peters, Y; Schauer, Y; Stupak, Y.
Republicans - Camp, N; Ehlers, N; Hoekstra, N; McCotter, N; Miller, N; Rogers, N; Upton, N.
MINNESOTA
Democrats - Ellison, Y; McCollum, Y; Oberstar, Y; Peterson, N; Walz, Y.
Republicans - Bachmann, N; Kline, N; Paulsen, N.
MISSISSIPPI
Democrats - Childers, N; Taylor, N; Thompson, Y.
Republicans - Harper, N.
MISSOURI
Democrats - Carnahan, Y; Clay, Y; Cleaver, Y; Skelton, N.
Republicans - Akin, N; Blunt, N; Emerson, N; Graves, N; Luetkemeyer, N.
MONTANA
Republicans - Rehberg, N.
NEBRASKA
Republicans - Fortenberry, N; Smith, N; Terry, N.
NEVADA
Democrats - Berkley, Y; Titus, Y.
Republicans - Heller, N.
NEW HAMPSHIRE
Democrats - Hodes, Y; Shea-Porter, Y.
NEW JERSEY
Democrats - Adler, N; Andrews, Y; Holt, Y; Pallone, Y; Pascrell, Y; Payne, Y; Rothman, Y; Sires, Y.
Republicans - Frelinghuysen, N; Garrett, N; Lance, N; LoBiondo, N; Smith, N.
NEW MEXICO
Democrats - Heinrich, Y; Lujan, Y; Teague, N.
NEW YORK
Democrats - Ackerman, Y; Arcuri, N; Bishop, Y; Clarke, Y; Crowley, Y; Engel, Y; Hall, Y; Higgins, Y; Hinchey, Y; Israel, Y; Lowey, Y; Maffei, Y; Maloney, Y; McCarthy, Y; McMahon, N; Meeks, Y; Murphy, Y; Nadler, Y; Owens, Y; Rangel, Y; Serrano, Y; Slaughter, Y; Tonko, Y; Towns, Y; Velazquez, Y; Weiner, Y.
Republicans - King, N; Lee, N.
NORTH CAROLINA
Democrats - Butterfield, Y; Etheridge, Y; Kissell, N; McIntyre, N; Miller, Y; Price, Y; Shuler, N; Watt, Y.
Republicans - Coble, N; Foxx, N; Jones, N; McHenry, N; Myrick, N.
NORTH DAKOTA
Democrats - Pomeroy, Y.
OHIO
Democrats - Boccieri, Y; Driehaus, Y; Fudge, Y; Kaptur, Y; Kilroy, Y; Kucinich, Y; Ryan, Y; Space, N; Sutton, Y; Wilson, Y.
Republicans - Austria, N; Boehner, N; Jordan, N; LaTourette, N; Latta, N; Schmidt, N; Tiberi, N; Turner, N.
OKLAHOMA
Democrats - Boren, N.
Republicans - Cole, N; Fallin, N; Lucas, N; Sullivan, N.
OREGON
Democrats - Blumenauer, Y; DeFazio, Y; Schrader, Y; Wu, Y.
Republicans - Walden, N.
PENNSYLVANIA
Democrats - Altmire, N; Brady, Y; Carney, Y; Dahlkemper, Y; Doyle, Y; Fattah, Y; Holden, N; Kanjorski, Y; Murphy, Patrick, Y; Schwartz, Y; Sestak, Y.
Republicans - Dent, N; Gerlach, N; Murphy, Tim, N; Pitts, N; Platts, N; Shuster, N; Thompson, N.
RHODE ISLAND
Democrats - Kennedy, Y; Langevin, Y.
SOUTH CAROLINA
Democrats - Clyburn, Y; Spratt, Y.
Republicans - Barrett, N; Brown, N; Inglis, N; Wilson, N.
SOUTH DAKOTA
Democrats - Herseth Sandlin, N.
TENNESSEE
Democrats - Cohen, Y; Cooper, Y; Davis, N; Gordon, Y; Tanner, N.
Republicans - Blackburn, N; Duncan, N; Roe, N; Wamp, N.
TEXAS
Democrats - Cuellar, Y; Doggett, Y; Edwards, N; Gonzalez, Y; Green, Al, Y; Green, Gene, Y; Hinojosa, Y; Jackson Lee, Y; Johnson, E. B., Y; Ortiz, Y; Reyes, Y; Rodriguez, Y.
Republicans - Barton, N; Brady, N; Burgess, N; Carter, N; Conaway, N; Culberson, N; Gohmert, N; Granger, N; Hall, N; Hensarling, N; Johnson, Sam, N; Marchant, N; McCaul, N; Neugebauer, N; Olson, N; Paul, N; Poe, N; Sessions, N; Smith, N; Thornberry, N.
UTAH
Democrats - Matheson, N.
Republicans - Bishop, N; Chaffetz, N.
VERMONT
Democrats - Welch, Y.
VIRGINIA
Democrats - Boucher, N; Connolly, Y; Moran, Y; Nye, N; Perriello, Y; Scott, Y.
Republicans - Cantor, N; Forbes, N; Goodlatte, N; Wittman, N; Wolf, N.
WASHINGTON
Democrats - Baird, Y; Dicks, Y; Inslee, Y; Larsen, Y; McDermott, Y; Smith, Y.
Republicans - Hastings, N; McMorris Rodgers, N; Reichert, N.
WEST VIRGINIA
Democrats - Mollohan, Y; Rahall, Y.
Republicans - Capito, N.
WISCONSIN
Democrats - Baldwin, Y; Kagen, Y; Kind, Y; Moore, Y; Obey, Y.
Republicans - Petri, N; Ryan, N; Sensenbrenner, N.
WYOMING
Republicans - Lummis, N.
Voting yes were 219 Democrats and 0 Republicans.
Voting no were 34 Democrats and 178 Republicans.
There are 4 vacancies in the 435-member House.
ALABAMA
Democrats - Bright, N; Davis, N.
Republicans - Aderholt, N; Bachus, N; Bonner, N; Griffith, N; Rogers, N.
ALASKA
Republicans - Young, N.
ARIZONA
Democrats - Giffords, Y; Grijalva, Y; Kirkpatrick, Y; Mitchell, Y; Pastor, Y.
Republicans - Flake, N; Franks, N; Shadegg, N.
ARKANSAS
Democrats - Berry, N; Ross, N; Snyder, Y.
Republicans - Boozman, N.
CALIFORNIA
Democrats - Baca, Y; Becerra, Y; Berman, Y; Capps, Y; Cardoza, Y; Chu, Y; Costa, Y; Davis, Y; Eshoo, Y; Farr, Y; Filner, Y; Garamendi, Y; Harman, Y; Honda, Y; Lee, Y; Lofgren, Zoe, Y; Matsui, Y; McNerney, Y; Miller, George, Y; Napolitano, Y; Pelosi, Y; Richardson, Y; Roybal-Allard, Y; Sanchez, Linda T., Y; Sanchez, Loretta, Y; Schiff, Y; Sherman, Y; Speier, Y; Stark, Y; Thompson, Y; Waters, Y; Watson, Y; Waxman, Y; Woolsey, Y.
Republicans - Bilbray, N; Bono Mack, N; Calvert, N; Campbell, N; Dreier, N; Gallegly, N; Herger, N; Hunter, N; Issa, N; Lewis, N; Lungren, Daniel E., N; McCarthy, N; McClintock, N; McKeon, N; Miller, Gary, N; Nunes, N; Radanovich, N; Rohrabacher, N; Royce, N.
COLORADO
Democrats - DeGette, Y; Markey, Y; Perlmutter, Y; Polis, Y; Salazar, Y.
Republicans - Coffman, N; Lamborn, N.
CONNECTICUT
Democrats - Courtney, Y; DeLauro, Y; Himes, Y; Larson, Y; Murphy, Y.
DELAWARE
Republicans - Castle, N.
FLORIDA
Democrats - Boyd, Y; Brown, Corrine, Y; Castor, Y; Grayson, Y; Hastings, Y; Klein, Y; Kosmas, Y; Meek, Y; Wasserman Schultz, Y.
Republicans - Bilirakis, N; Brown-Waite, Ginny, N; Buchanan, N; Crenshaw, N; Diaz-Balart, L., N; Diaz-Balart, M., N; Mack, N; Mica, N; Miller, N; Posey, N; Putnam, N; Rooney, N; Ros-Lehtinen, N; Stearns, N; Young, N.
GEORGIA
Democrats - Barrow, N; Bishop, Y; Johnson, Y; Lewis, Y; Marshall, N; Scott, Y.
Republicans - Broun, N; Deal, N; Gingrey, N; Kingston, N; Linder, N; Price, N; Westmoreland, N.
HAWAII
Democrats - Hirono, Y.
IDAHO
Democrats - Minnick, N.
Republicans - Simpson, N.
ILLINOIS
Democrats - Bean, Y; Costello, Y; Davis, Y; Foster, Y; Gutierrez, Y; Halvorson, Y; Hare, Y; Jackson, Y; Lipinski, N; Quigley, Y; Rush, Y; Schakowsky, Y.
Republicans - Biggert, N; Johnson, N; Kirk, N; Manzullo, N; Roskam, N; Schock, N; Shimkus, N.
INDIANA
Democrats - Carson, Y; Donnelly, Y; Ellsworth, Y; Hill, Y; Visclosky, Y.
Republicans - Burton, N; Buyer, N; Pence, N; Souder, N.
IOWA
Democrats - Boswell, Y; Braley, Y; Loebsack, Y.
Republicans - King, N; Latham, N.
KANSAS
Democrats - Moore, Y.
Republicans - Jenkins, N; Moran, N; Tiahrt, N.
KENTUCKY
Democrats - Chandler, N; Yarmuth, Y.
Republicans - Davis, N; Guthrie, N; Rogers, N; Whitfield, N.
LOUISIANA
Democrats - Melancon, N.
Republicans - Alexander, N; Boustany, N; Cao, N; Cassidy, N; Fleming, N; Scalise, N.
MAINE
Democrats - Michaud, Y; Pingree, Y.
MARYLAND
Democrats - Cummings, Y; Edwards, Y; Hoyer, Y; Kratovil, N; Ruppersberger, Y; Sarbanes, Y; Van Hollen, Y.
Republicans - Bartlett, N.
MASSACHUSETTS
Democrats - Capuano, Y; Delahunt, Y; Frank, Y; Lynch, N; Markey, Y; McGovern, Y; Neal, Y; Olver, Y; Tierney, Y; Tsongas, Y.
MICHIGAN
Democrats - Conyers, Y; Dingell, Y; Kildee, Y; Kilpatrick, Y; Levin, Y; Peters, Y; Schauer, Y; Stupak, Y.
Republicans - Camp, N; Ehlers, N; Hoekstra, N; McCotter, N; Miller, N; Rogers, N; Upton, N.
MINNESOTA
Democrats - Ellison, Y; McCollum, Y; Oberstar, Y; Peterson, N; Walz, Y.
Republicans - Bachmann, N; Kline, N; Paulsen, N.
MISSISSIPPI
Democrats - Childers, N; Taylor, N; Thompson, Y.
Republicans - Harper, N.
MISSOURI
Democrats - Carnahan, Y; Clay, Y; Cleaver, Y; Skelton, N.
Republicans - Akin, N; Blunt, N; Emerson, N; Graves, N; Luetkemeyer, N.
MONTANA
Republicans - Rehberg, N.
NEBRASKA
Republicans - Fortenberry, N; Smith, N; Terry, N.
NEVADA
Democrats - Berkley, Y; Titus, Y.
Republicans - Heller, N.
NEW HAMPSHIRE
Democrats - Hodes, Y; Shea-Porter, Y.
NEW JERSEY
Democrats - Adler, N; Andrews, Y; Holt, Y; Pallone, Y; Pascrell, Y; Payne, Y; Rothman, Y; Sires, Y.
Republicans - Frelinghuysen, N; Garrett, N; Lance, N; LoBiondo, N; Smith, N.
NEW MEXICO
Democrats - Heinrich, Y; Lujan, Y; Teague, N.
NEW YORK
Democrats - Ackerman, Y; Arcuri, N; Bishop, Y; Clarke, Y; Crowley, Y; Engel, Y; Hall, Y; Higgins, Y; Hinchey, Y; Israel, Y; Lowey, Y; Maffei, Y; Maloney, Y; McCarthy, Y; McMahon, N; Meeks, Y; Murphy, Y; Nadler, Y; Owens, Y; Rangel, Y; Serrano, Y; Slaughter, Y; Tonko, Y; Towns, Y; Velazquez, Y; Weiner, Y.
Republicans - King, N; Lee, N.
NORTH CAROLINA
Democrats - Butterfield, Y; Etheridge, Y; Kissell, N; McIntyre, N; Miller, Y; Price, Y; Shuler, N; Watt, Y.
Republicans - Coble, N; Foxx, N; Jones, N; McHenry, N; Myrick, N.
NORTH DAKOTA
Democrats - Pomeroy, Y.
OHIO
Democrats - Boccieri, Y; Driehaus, Y; Fudge, Y; Kaptur, Y; Kilroy, Y; Kucinich, Y; Ryan, Y; Space, N; Sutton, Y; Wilson, Y.
Republicans - Austria, N; Boehner, N; Jordan, N; LaTourette, N; Latta, N; Schmidt, N; Tiberi, N; Turner, N.
OKLAHOMA
Democrats - Boren, N.
Republicans - Cole, N; Fallin, N; Lucas, N; Sullivan, N.
OREGON
Democrats - Blumenauer, Y; DeFazio, Y; Schrader, Y; Wu, Y.
Republicans - Walden, N.
PENNSYLVANIA
Democrats - Altmire, N; Brady, Y; Carney, Y; Dahlkemper, Y; Doyle, Y; Fattah, Y; Holden, N; Kanjorski, Y; Murphy, Patrick, Y; Schwartz, Y; Sestak, Y.
Republicans - Dent, N; Gerlach, N; Murphy, Tim, N; Pitts, N; Platts, N; Shuster, N; Thompson, N.
RHODE ISLAND
Democrats - Kennedy, Y; Langevin, Y.
SOUTH CAROLINA
Democrats - Clyburn, Y; Spratt, Y.
Republicans - Barrett, N; Brown, N; Inglis, N; Wilson, N.
SOUTH DAKOTA
Democrats - Herseth Sandlin, N.
TENNESSEE
Democrats - Cohen, Y; Cooper, Y; Davis, N; Gordon, Y; Tanner, N.
Republicans - Blackburn, N; Duncan, N; Roe, N; Wamp, N.
TEXAS
Democrats - Cuellar, Y; Doggett, Y; Edwards, N; Gonzalez, Y; Green, Al, Y; Green, Gene, Y; Hinojosa, Y; Jackson Lee, Y; Johnson, E. B., Y; Ortiz, Y; Reyes, Y; Rodriguez, Y.
Republicans - Barton, N; Brady, N; Burgess, N; Carter, N; Conaway, N; Culberson, N; Gohmert, N; Granger, N; Hall, N; Hensarling, N; Johnson, Sam, N; Marchant, N; McCaul, N; Neugebauer, N; Olson, N; Paul, N; Poe, N; Sessions, N; Smith, N; Thornberry, N.
UTAH
Democrats - Matheson, N.
Republicans - Bishop, N; Chaffetz, N.
VERMONT
Democrats - Welch, Y.
VIRGINIA
Democrats - Boucher, N; Connolly, Y; Moran, Y; Nye, N; Perriello, Y; Scott, Y.
Republicans - Cantor, N; Forbes, N; Goodlatte, N; Wittman, N; Wolf, N.
WASHINGTON
Democrats - Baird, Y; Dicks, Y; Inslee, Y; Larsen, Y; McDermott, Y; Smith, Y.
Republicans - Hastings, N; McMorris Rodgers, N; Reichert, N.
WEST VIRGINIA
Democrats - Mollohan, Y; Rahall, Y.
Republicans - Capito, N.
WISCONSIN
Democrats - Baldwin, Y; Kagen, Y; Kind, Y; Moore, Y; Obey, Y.
Republicans - Petri, N; Ryan, N; Sensenbrenner, N.
WYOMING
Republicans - Lummis, N.
Saturday, March 06, 2010
UK HEALTHCARE: Neglected by 'lazy' nurses, man, 22, dying of thirst rang the police to beg for water
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1255858/Neglected-lazy-nurses-Kane-Gorny-22-dying-thirst-rang-police-beg-water.html
By Emily Andrews
06th March 2010
A man of 22 died in agony of dehydration after three days in a leading teaching hospital.
Kane Gorny was so desperate for a drink that he rang police to beg for their help.
They arrived on the ward only to be told by doctors that everything was under control.
The next day his mother Rita Cronin found him delirious and he died within hours.
She said nurses had failed to give him vital drugs which controlled fluid levels in his body. 'He was totally dependent on the nurses to help him and they totally betrayed him.'
A coroner has such grave concerns about the case that it has been referred to police.
Sources say they are investigating the possibility of a corporate manslaughter charge against St George's Hospital in Tooting, South London.
Mr Gorny, from Balham, worked for Waitrose and had been a keen footballer and runner until he was diagnosed with a brain tumour the year before his death.
The medication he took caused his bones to weaken and he was admitted to St George's for a hip replacement in May last year. The operation left him immobile and unable to get out of bed.
His 50-year-old mother says that he needed to take drugs three times a day to regulate his hormones. Doctors had told him that without the drugs he would die.
Although he had stressed to staff how important his medication was, she said, no one gave him the drugs.
She said that two days after his hip operation, while Miss Cronin was at work, he became severely dehydrated but his requests for water were refused.
He became aggressive and nurses called in security guards to restrain him.
After they had left, he rang the police from his bed to demand their help.
Miss Cronin, who is divorced from her son's father Peter, said: 'The police told me he'd said, "Please help me. All I want is a drink and no one is helping me".
'By this time my son was confused due to his lack of medication and I think the nurses just ignored him because they thought he was just being badly behaved.
'They were lazy, careless and hadn't bothered to check his charts and see his medication was essential.'
That evening, Miss Cronin visited him. She said: 'I told Kane to behave himself because I thought he had been causing trouble - and I feel so bad about that now. I thought maybe he was having a bad reaction to the morphine he was on but in fact it was because he had not had his medication.'
The next morning she visited him before going to work. 'He was delirious and his mouth was open,' she said. 'I gave him a drink of Ribena.
'I told three nurses there was something wrong with my son and they said, "He's fine" and walked off. I started to cry and a locum doctor who was there told me not to worry.
'Eventually the ward doctor came round, took one look at Kane and started shouting for help.'
Miss Cronin was asked to leave her son's bedside. 'He died an hour later,' she said. 'I didn't even realise he was dying. I didn't even have a chance to say goodbye.'
The death certificate said Mr Gorny had died because of a 'water deficit' and 'hypernatraemia' - a medical term for dehydration.
His mother added: 'When I went back to the hospital I was told that all the nurses had been offered counselling as they were so traumatised, but nothing was offered to me.
'The whole thing is a disgrace. This hospital has a brilliant reputation and boasts of its excellent standards and safety record.
'But as soon as my son walked into that ward, his death warrant was signed. Of the 32 people who were involved in my son's care, every one made a mistake that ultimately led to his death, from the consultant to the care assistant.
'There has been an internal investigation but St George's never made it public and it was a whitewash-After his death the hospital never phoned me or wrote to me to apologise. How could this happen in the 21st century?'
A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: 'Detectives from the Homicide and Serious Crime Command are investigating the death of Kane Gorny at St George's Hospital after this was referred to us by Westminster Coroner's Court.'
A spokesman for St George's Hospital said: 'We are extremely sorry about the death of Kane Gorny and understand the distress that this has caused to his family.
'A full investigation was carried out and new procedures introduced to ensure that such a case cannot happen in future.
'We have written to the family to explain the actions that have been taken and to answer their concerns about Mr Gorny's care. The family has also been invited to meet with trust staff to discuss the case in detail.'
The tragedy emerged a week after a report into hundreds of deaths at Stafford Hospital revealed the appalling quality of care given by many of the nurses.
This week a task force called on nurses to sign a public pledge that they will treat everyone with compassion and dignity.
By Emily Andrews
06th March 2010
A man of 22 died in agony of dehydration after three days in a leading teaching hospital.
Kane Gorny was so desperate for a drink that he rang police to beg for their help.
They arrived on the ward only to be told by doctors that everything was under control.
The next day his mother Rita Cronin found him delirious and he died within hours.
She said nurses had failed to give him vital drugs which controlled fluid levels in his body. 'He was totally dependent on the nurses to help him and they totally betrayed him.'
A coroner has such grave concerns about the case that it has been referred to police.
Sources say they are investigating the possibility of a corporate manslaughter charge against St George's Hospital in Tooting, South London.
Mr Gorny, from Balham, worked for Waitrose and had been a keen footballer and runner until he was diagnosed with a brain tumour the year before his death.
The medication he took caused his bones to weaken and he was admitted to St George's for a hip replacement in May last year. The operation left him immobile and unable to get out of bed.
His 50-year-old mother says that he needed to take drugs three times a day to regulate his hormones. Doctors had told him that without the drugs he would die.
Although he had stressed to staff how important his medication was, she said, no one gave him the drugs.
She said that two days after his hip operation, while Miss Cronin was at work, he became severely dehydrated but his requests for water were refused.
He became aggressive and nurses called in security guards to restrain him.
After they had left, he rang the police from his bed to demand their help.
Miss Cronin, who is divorced from her son's father Peter, said: 'The police told me he'd said, "Please help me. All I want is a drink and no one is helping me".
'By this time my son was confused due to his lack of medication and I think the nurses just ignored him because they thought he was just being badly behaved.
'They were lazy, careless and hadn't bothered to check his charts and see his medication was essential.'
That evening, Miss Cronin visited him. She said: 'I told Kane to behave himself because I thought he had been causing trouble - and I feel so bad about that now. I thought maybe he was having a bad reaction to the morphine he was on but in fact it was because he had not had his medication.'
The next morning she visited him before going to work. 'He was delirious and his mouth was open,' she said. 'I gave him a drink of Ribena.
'I told three nurses there was something wrong with my son and they said, "He's fine" and walked off. I started to cry and a locum doctor who was there told me not to worry.
'Eventually the ward doctor came round, took one look at Kane and started shouting for help.'
Miss Cronin was asked to leave her son's bedside. 'He died an hour later,' she said. 'I didn't even realise he was dying. I didn't even have a chance to say goodbye.'
The death certificate said Mr Gorny had died because of a 'water deficit' and 'hypernatraemia' - a medical term for dehydration.
His mother added: 'When I went back to the hospital I was told that all the nurses had been offered counselling as they were so traumatised, but nothing was offered to me.
'The whole thing is a disgrace. This hospital has a brilliant reputation and boasts of its excellent standards and safety record.
'But as soon as my son walked into that ward, his death warrant was signed. Of the 32 people who were involved in my son's care, every one made a mistake that ultimately led to his death, from the consultant to the care assistant.
'There has been an internal investigation but St George's never made it public and it was a whitewash-After his death the hospital never phoned me or wrote to me to apologise. How could this happen in the 21st century?'
A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: 'Detectives from the Homicide and Serious Crime Command are investigating the death of Kane Gorny at St George's Hospital after this was referred to us by Westminster Coroner's Court.'
A spokesman for St George's Hospital said: 'We are extremely sorry about the death of Kane Gorny and understand the distress that this has caused to his family.
'A full investigation was carried out and new procedures introduced to ensure that such a case cannot happen in future.
'We have written to the family to explain the actions that have been taken and to answer their concerns about Mr Gorny's care. The family has also been invited to meet with trust staff to discuss the case in detail.'
The tragedy emerged a week after a report into hundreds of deaths at Stafford Hospital revealed the appalling quality of care given by many of the nurses.
This week a task force called on nurses to sign a public pledge that they will treat everyone with compassion and dignity.
Monday, March 01, 2010
American reliance on government at all-time high
"for the first time since the Great Depression, Americans took more aid from the government than they paid in taxes."
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/01/americans-reliance-on-government-at-all-time-high/
March 1, 2010
Patrice Hill
The so-called "Great Recession" has left Americans depending on the government dole like never before.
Without record levels of welfare, unemployment and other government benefits as well as tax cuts last year, the income of U.S. households would have plunged by an astonishing $723 billion — more than four times the record $167 billion drop reported last month by the Commerce Department.
Moreover, for the first time since the Great Depression, Americans took more aid from the government than they paid in taxes.
The figures show the devastating results of the massive job losses last year and indicate that the economic recovery that began last summer is tenuous and has a long way to go before many Americans resume life as normal, analysts said.
Economic growth typically depends on consumer spending, which is fed by wages, rents, interest and other forms of income. But the tentative revival of consumer spending in the second half of last year appears to have been fed largely by an extraordinary flood of government spending, as growth in other kinds of income has disappeared.
"Governmental support was critical in keeping the economy, particularly consumer spending, from completely collapsing during the crisis," said Harm Bandholz, an economist at Unicredit Markets. He said he is concerned that so much of the economic rebound is a result of government spending rather than a revival of private income and jobs. That situation is unsustainable, he said, because the government has had to borrow massively to prop up the economy and cannot continue that binge for long.
While wages and other job-related income fell by a record $206 billion last year to $7.84 trillion, transfer payments from the government such as unemployment checks and Social Security burgeoned by $231 billion to $2.1 trillion. Meanwhile, the amount of taxes that individual Americans paid plummeted by $325 billion to $2.1 trillion as a result of middle-class tax cuts and because nearly 6 million people were thrown out of work and are no longer paying payroll taxes.
Commerce economists said last year's unprecedented drop of $256 billion in private wages — the mainstay of consumers in ordinary times — was particularly dramatic, and was more than 40 times larger than the drop in wages during the entire 2001 recession.
Equally dramatic, a measure of income that closely tracks the ravages of the recession also plummeted by an unprecedented $384 billion. That measure excludes transfer payments and adjusts for inflation. It has stabilized at $9.1 trillion since the middle of last year, in a sign that the worst of the job and income losses are over.
While most of the government benefits — including Social Security, welfare, Medicaid, food stamps and regular unemployment benefits — are sent automatically to those who qualify, Congress is debating an extension of some benefits enacted as part of the stimulus package last year. Those include jobless benefits and health insurance subsidies for the unemployed.
The Senate on Friday failed to pass an extension of jobless benefits for up to 99 weeks for workers in states with high unemployment rates. Long-term jobless benefits expired Sunday, leaving many Americans dependent on those payments in limbo. With more than 8 million workers laid off during the recession, unemployment benefits have quadrupled from $34 billion in January 2008 to $124 billion at the end of last year.
"Millions of Americans are now relying on unemployment benefits as their only source of income other than food stamps," said Ross Eisenbrey, vice president of the Economic Policy Institute. "They are unable to find work because there are more than six job seekers for every opening. There is literally nothing that most of these workers can do to get a job today. Unemployment benefits are often the only way they can make ends meet for their families and keep a roof over their heads."
The proposed extension in long-term jobless aid was held up Friday by Sen. Jim Bunning, Kentucky Republican, who objected that it added $10 billion to the budget deficit. As a result of record U.S. government borrowing, total debt in the United States has soared to an all-time high of 370 percent of yearly economic output, far exceeding its peak of 300 percent during the Great Depression.
"If we cant find $10 billion somewhere for a bill that everybody in this body supports, we will never pay for anything," Mr. Bunning said.
Democrats vowed to renew the unemployment aid this week to minimize disruption for more than 1 million jobless people who would begin to exhaust their extended benefits on Monday.
"The simple fact of the matter is that this is an emergency situation and should be treated as such," said Senate Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin, Illinois Democrat. "The most vulnerable families in America are going to suffer because of this political decision by one senator. … We will be back, we will try to get this done. And to those families: Hang in there."
The massive shift into dependence on the government, while essential in promoting an economic revival last year, has postponed a reckoning for many consumers who went too far into debt to maintain their lifestyles during the boom years, Mr. Bandholz said.
While the government was lavishing aid, banks were cutting credit to consumers by a record $250 billion, nearly as much as the amount consumers gained from government transfer payments.
"This shift only postpones a solution to the problem" by substituting government debt for consumer debt, Mr. Bandholz said. "These elevated debt loads will at least result in sluggish growth rates for the time being — and if the problem is not tackled with determination, it might very well lead to another crisis."
Some economists say the big shift toward dependence on government spending and borrowing is only temporary.
"Sure, temporary government transfers played a role this past year. But that's OK," said Bernard Baumohl, chief global economist at the Economic Outlook Group. He noted that Americans also accumulated a record amount of savings last year as they stowed away funds out of fear of losing their jobs.
The increase in savings now enables many consumers to increase spending, while the 90 percent of workers who still have jobs can spend more because they are accumulating more income from overtime hours, he said.
"It's a combination and interaction of all these forces — not just one — that will promote more future spending by households and keep the economy going later without government aid," he said.
Jobless benefits and other welfare spending for the unemployed will start to decline when job growth returns. Many economists predict that employment will increase this spring or summer in the next stage of the recovery. Because of bleak job prospects during the recession, some people were forced to go more permanently on the government dole.
In particular, many workers who were nearing retirement age and got laid off started drawing Social Security benefits. The number of retirees taking Social Security at age 62 grew by a record 19 percent in the past year, helping to push up Social Security outlays by $100 billion. Analysts expect those spending levels to stay high and continue to increase as more baby boomers retire.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/01/americans-reliance-on-government-at-all-time-high/
March 1, 2010
Patrice Hill
The so-called "Great Recession" has left Americans depending on the government dole like never before.
Without record levels of welfare, unemployment and other government benefits as well as tax cuts last year, the income of U.S. households would have plunged by an astonishing $723 billion — more than four times the record $167 billion drop reported last month by the Commerce Department.
Moreover, for the first time since the Great Depression, Americans took more aid from the government than they paid in taxes.
The figures show the devastating results of the massive job losses last year and indicate that the economic recovery that began last summer is tenuous and has a long way to go before many Americans resume life as normal, analysts said.
Economic growth typically depends on consumer spending, which is fed by wages, rents, interest and other forms of income. But the tentative revival of consumer spending in the second half of last year appears to have been fed largely by an extraordinary flood of government spending, as growth in other kinds of income has disappeared.
"Governmental support was critical in keeping the economy, particularly consumer spending, from completely collapsing during the crisis," said Harm Bandholz, an economist at Unicredit Markets. He said he is concerned that so much of the economic rebound is a result of government spending rather than a revival of private income and jobs. That situation is unsustainable, he said, because the government has had to borrow massively to prop up the economy and cannot continue that binge for long.
While wages and other job-related income fell by a record $206 billion last year to $7.84 trillion, transfer payments from the government such as unemployment checks and Social Security burgeoned by $231 billion to $2.1 trillion. Meanwhile, the amount of taxes that individual Americans paid plummeted by $325 billion to $2.1 trillion as a result of middle-class tax cuts and because nearly 6 million people were thrown out of work and are no longer paying payroll taxes.
Commerce economists said last year's unprecedented drop of $256 billion in private wages — the mainstay of consumers in ordinary times — was particularly dramatic, and was more than 40 times larger than the drop in wages during the entire 2001 recession.
Equally dramatic, a measure of income that closely tracks the ravages of the recession also plummeted by an unprecedented $384 billion. That measure excludes transfer payments and adjusts for inflation. It has stabilized at $9.1 trillion since the middle of last year, in a sign that the worst of the job and income losses are over.
While most of the government benefits — including Social Security, welfare, Medicaid, food stamps and regular unemployment benefits — are sent automatically to those who qualify, Congress is debating an extension of some benefits enacted as part of the stimulus package last year. Those include jobless benefits and health insurance subsidies for the unemployed.
The Senate on Friday failed to pass an extension of jobless benefits for up to 99 weeks for workers in states with high unemployment rates. Long-term jobless benefits expired Sunday, leaving many Americans dependent on those payments in limbo. With more than 8 million workers laid off during the recession, unemployment benefits have quadrupled from $34 billion in January 2008 to $124 billion at the end of last year.
"Millions of Americans are now relying on unemployment benefits as their only source of income other than food stamps," said Ross Eisenbrey, vice president of the Economic Policy Institute. "They are unable to find work because there are more than six job seekers for every opening. There is literally nothing that most of these workers can do to get a job today. Unemployment benefits are often the only way they can make ends meet for their families and keep a roof over their heads."
The proposed extension in long-term jobless aid was held up Friday by Sen. Jim Bunning, Kentucky Republican, who objected that it added $10 billion to the budget deficit. As a result of record U.S. government borrowing, total debt in the United States has soared to an all-time high of 370 percent of yearly economic output, far exceeding its peak of 300 percent during the Great Depression.
"If we cant find $10 billion somewhere for a bill that everybody in this body supports, we will never pay for anything," Mr. Bunning said.
Democrats vowed to renew the unemployment aid this week to minimize disruption for more than 1 million jobless people who would begin to exhaust their extended benefits on Monday.
"The simple fact of the matter is that this is an emergency situation and should be treated as such," said Senate Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin, Illinois Democrat. "The most vulnerable families in America are going to suffer because of this political decision by one senator. … We will be back, we will try to get this done. And to those families: Hang in there."
The massive shift into dependence on the government, while essential in promoting an economic revival last year, has postponed a reckoning for many consumers who went too far into debt to maintain their lifestyles during the boom years, Mr. Bandholz said.
While the government was lavishing aid, banks were cutting credit to consumers by a record $250 billion, nearly as much as the amount consumers gained from government transfer payments.
"This shift only postpones a solution to the problem" by substituting government debt for consumer debt, Mr. Bandholz said. "These elevated debt loads will at least result in sluggish growth rates for the time being — and if the problem is not tackled with determination, it might very well lead to another crisis."
Some economists say the big shift toward dependence on government spending and borrowing is only temporary.
"Sure, temporary government transfers played a role this past year. But that's OK," said Bernard Baumohl, chief global economist at the Economic Outlook Group. He noted that Americans also accumulated a record amount of savings last year as they stowed away funds out of fear of losing their jobs.
The increase in savings now enables many consumers to increase spending, while the 90 percent of workers who still have jobs can spend more because they are accumulating more income from overtime hours, he said.
"It's a combination and interaction of all these forces — not just one — that will promote more future spending by households and keep the economy going later without government aid," he said.
Jobless benefits and other welfare spending for the unemployed will start to decline when job growth returns. Many economists predict that employment will increase this spring or summer in the next stage of the recovery. Because of bleak job prospects during the recession, some people were forced to go more permanently on the government dole.
In particular, many workers who were nearing retirement age and got laid off started drawing Social Security benefits. The number of retirees taking Social Security at age 62 grew by a record 19 percent in the past year, helping to push up Social Security outlays by $100 billion. Analysts expect those spending levels to stay high and continue to increase as more baby boomers retire.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
NHS Hospital caused ‘unimaginable suffering’
An independent inquiry found that the NHS Trust stopped providing safe care because they were preoccupied with government targets and cutting costs.
British Health System Nightmare: Hospital 'caused unimaginable suffering'...
Patients left 'unwashed in their own filth for month'...
Wards were left bloody, discarded needl...es; Sick drink water from flower vases...
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article7039285.ece
David Rose, Health Correspondent Patients were routinely neglected or left “sobbing and humiliated” by staff at an NHS trust where at least 400 deaths have been linked to appalling care.
An independent inquiry found that managers at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust stopped providing safe care because they were preoccupied with government targets and cutting costs.
The inquiry report, published yesterday by Robert Francis, QC, included proposals for tough new regulations that could lead to managers at failing NHS trusts being struck off.
Staff shortages at Stafford Hospital meant that patients went unwashed for weeks, were left without food or drink and were even unable to get to the lavatory. Some lay in soiled sheets that relatives had to take home to wash, others developed infections or had falls, occasionally fatal. Many staff did their best but the attitude of some nurses “left a lot to be desired”.
The report, which follows reviews by the Care Quality Commission and the Department of Health, said that “unimaginable” suffering had been caused. Regulators said last year that between 400 and 1,200 more patients than expected may have died at the hospital from 2005 to 2008.
Andy Burnham, the Health Secretary, said there could be “no excuses” for the failures and added that the board that presided over the scandal had been replaced. An undisclosed number of doctors and at least one nurse are being investigated by the General Medical Council and Nursing and Midwifery Council.
Mr Burnham said it was a “longstanding anomaly” that the NHS did not have a robust way of regulating managers or banning them from working, as it does with doctors or nurses. “We must end the situation where a senior NHS manager who has failed in one job can simply move to another elsewhere,” he added. “This is not acceptable to the public and not conducive to promoting accountability and high professional standards.”
A system of professional accreditation for senior managers would be considered and the Mid Staffordshire trust might lose its foundation status.
Some NHS chief executives have received six-figure redundancy packages or moved to other trusts despite poor performance. Martin Yeates, the former chief executive at Mid Staffordshire, received pay rises that took his annual salary to £180,000, while standards at the trust deteriorated.
The Liberal Democrats claimed that he had also received a payoff of more than £400,000 after stepping down last March, though Mr Burnham said he had received “no more than his contractual entitlement”.
The Care Quality Commission, the NHS regulator, said that the trust under its new management was now “safe to provide services”. But it still had concerns about staffing, patient welfare, the availability and suitability of equipment at the trust, and how it monitored and dealt with complaints. The inquiry made 18 recommendations for the trust and the wider health service, which the Government accepted in full. They include a new review of how regulators and regional health authorities monitor NHS hospitals and a report on “early-warning systems” to identify failing trusts.
But the families of those who died or suffered poor care branded the inquiry a “whitewash” and repeated calls for a full public investigation. The Conservatives accused ministers of trying to blame managers rather than taking responsibility for problems with national targets.
Julie Bailey, who founded the victims’ campaign group Cure the NHS after her mother died at Stafford Hospital, said that the handling of the scandal was disgraceful and unacceptable.
“It is time that the public were told the truth about the very large number of excess deaths in NHS care and the very large number of avoidable but deadly errors that occur every day.”
The NHS Confederation, which represents health trusts, said: “The responsibility for the way this hospital was run rests with its board, management and staff but, as the report says, the framework of targets, regulatory systems and policy priorities it worked within are also very important.”
British Health System Nightmare: Hospital 'caused unimaginable suffering'...
Patients left 'unwashed in their own filth for month'...
Wards were left bloody, discarded needl...es; Sick drink water from flower vases...
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article7039285.ece
David Rose, Health Correspondent Patients were routinely neglected or left “sobbing and humiliated” by staff at an NHS trust where at least 400 deaths have been linked to appalling care.
An independent inquiry found that managers at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust stopped providing safe care because they were preoccupied with government targets and cutting costs.
The inquiry report, published yesterday by Robert Francis, QC, included proposals for tough new regulations that could lead to managers at failing NHS trusts being struck off.
Staff shortages at Stafford Hospital meant that patients went unwashed for weeks, were left without food or drink and were even unable to get to the lavatory. Some lay in soiled sheets that relatives had to take home to wash, others developed infections or had falls, occasionally fatal. Many staff did their best but the attitude of some nurses “left a lot to be desired”.
The report, which follows reviews by the Care Quality Commission and the Department of Health, said that “unimaginable” suffering had been caused. Regulators said last year that between 400 and 1,200 more patients than expected may have died at the hospital from 2005 to 2008.
Andy Burnham, the Health Secretary, said there could be “no excuses” for the failures and added that the board that presided over the scandal had been replaced. An undisclosed number of doctors and at least one nurse are being investigated by the General Medical Council and Nursing and Midwifery Council.
Mr Burnham said it was a “longstanding anomaly” that the NHS did not have a robust way of regulating managers or banning them from working, as it does with doctors or nurses. “We must end the situation where a senior NHS manager who has failed in one job can simply move to another elsewhere,” he added. “This is not acceptable to the public and not conducive to promoting accountability and high professional standards.”
A system of professional accreditation for senior managers would be considered and the Mid Staffordshire trust might lose its foundation status.
Some NHS chief executives have received six-figure redundancy packages or moved to other trusts despite poor performance. Martin Yeates, the former chief executive at Mid Staffordshire, received pay rises that took his annual salary to £180,000, while standards at the trust deteriorated.
The Liberal Democrats claimed that he had also received a payoff of more than £400,000 after stepping down last March, though Mr Burnham said he had received “no more than his contractual entitlement”.
The Care Quality Commission, the NHS regulator, said that the trust under its new management was now “safe to provide services”. But it still had concerns about staffing, patient welfare, the availability and suitability of equipment at the trust, and how it monitored and dealt with complaints. The inquiry made 18 recommendations for the trust and the wider health service, which the Government accepted in full. They include a new review of how regulators and regional health authorities monitor NHS hospitals and a report on “early-warning systems” to identify failing trusts.
But the families of those who died or suffered poor care branded the inquiry a “whitewash” and repeated calls for a full public investigation. The Conservatives accused ministers of trying to blame managers rather than taking responsibility for problems with national targets.
Julie Bailey, who founded the victims’ campaign group Cure the NHS after her mother died at Stafford Hospital, said that the handling of the scandal was disgraceful and unacceptable.
“It is time that the public were told the truth about the very large number of excess deaths in NHS care and the very large number of avoidable but deadly errors that occur every day.”
The NHS Confederation, which represents health trusts, said: “The responsibility for the way this hospital was run rests with its board, management and staff but, as the report says, the framework of targets, regulatory systems and policy priorities it worked within are also very important.”
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