Scott Brown: Obamacare beneficiary

[Torie]

The failure to means test all of these goodies is one of the major reason the US is in the fiscal soup that it is in. The Tories read the memo in Britain, but it appears both parties in the US are illiterate.

Wouldn't it be better to keep taxes relatively lower, and higher income folks' snouts more out of the public trough, than the reverse?  The worst of all worlds of course is what we have now: relatively lower taxes, and entitlements gone means test-less wild.

[Torie]

Wouldn't it be better to keep taxes relatively lower, and higher income folks' snouts more out of the public trough, than the reverse?  The worst of all worlds of course is what we have now: relatively lower taxes, and entitlements gone means test-less wild.

I don't consider Ayla Brown to be a high income person. She has access to a fair bit of family support, but she's not rich herself. Scott Brown isn't wealthy by Senate standards, although he and his wife are probably 1% because he had a book deal and she's a news anchor.

Well if she qualifies for a subsidy to buy health insurance, fine. If the youngs were not expected to cross subsidize the olds, since most youngs are healthy, the insurance would be cheap. Yes, there will be an expense hit to cover impecunious uninsured sicks. There is no way to "finesse" that. Just why should youngs be tied to the hip of their parents anyway? Doesn't that send the wrong message?  Suppose the parents don't have health insurance?

Oh, I understand very well Lief the Dem brief for handing out goodies to the rich. I put that brief in the shredder, and then incinerated the paper shavings, decades ago.  It's unprincipled, and economically inefficient, and a dishonorable way to prop up of the popularity of entitlement programs one cannot afford in my opinion. Thank you.

[Torie]

Oh, I understand very well Lief the Dem brief for handing out goodies to the rich. I put that brief in the shredder, and then incinerated the paper shavings, decades ago.  It's unprincipled, and economically inefficient, and a dishonorable way to prop up of the popularity of entitlement programs one cannot afford in my opinion. Thank you.

Not sure I understood you. Do you disagree that what I posited will happen will actually happen if these programs are made means-tested? Or do you simply not care?

I prefer to fashion programs propping up the social safety net that are the most economically efficient in moving money to those who really need it with the least economic distortion, and the most meritorious on their merits, as opposed to worrying about posited middle class greed undermining their support. I think better of the voters than that. In short, I think the Dem "fear mongering" on this is more of a rhetorical tactic to keep in place their favored regime, than something that would actually happen.

[Torie]

Oh, I understand very well Lief the Dem brief for handing out goodies to the rich. I put that brief in the shredder, and then incinerated the paper shavings, decades ago.  It's unprincipled, and economically inefficient, and a dishonorable way to prop up of the popularity of entitlement programs one cannot afford in my opinion. Thank you.

Not sure I understood you. Do you disagree that what I posited will happen will actually happen if these programs are made means-tested? Or do you simply not care?

I prefer to fashion programs propping up the social safety net that are the most economically efficient in moving money to those who really need it with the least economic distortion, and the most meritorious on their merits, as opposed to worrying about posited middle class greed undermining their support. I think better of the voters than that. In short, I think the Dem "fear mongering" on this is more of a rhetorical tactic to keep in place their favored regime, than something that would actually happen.

Out of curiosity, why do you think the Democrats favor this regime, and what aspects of the Democratic platform do you think might suffer without it absent the middle-class resentment issue?

It is a way to "explain" why the programs need to be so expensive (cut off the middle class parts and the programs will die, and that would be cruel and wrong), and sure, at the margins they think it might buy off some more votes from some of the underserving un-poor (much of the money just going out of one pocket into another, with some just lost through the cracks).  I know, it seems kind of insane, but the Left in general seem to loathe means testing, and that includes the Dems. Labor in Britain seems the same way, from my sense of things watching Prime Minister's question time.

[Torie]

How exactly is keeping kids on their parent's insurance a bad idea? You do realize that they are getting a much better deal than on the open insurance market where they are an individual as opposed to getting covered by a company that negotiates it's insurance rates. Are you in favor of exchanges where a huge group can be set up to lower costs for everybody? If you don't understand what a ripoff trying to buy health insurance is individually, then you are oblivious.

Buying individual insurance is the cheapest route of all - if you are healthy - and particularly if you are young and healthy. The issue is about how best to to cover uninsured sicks who cannot afford to pay full freight to secure health insurance on their own, in the most cost effective way. Failing to separate the two issues clearly, and deal with them separately, is one of the reasons I suspect for so much of the confusion, and rather poor choices of options actually.

[Torie]

Don't Dems favor the EITC? That's means tested by definition.

Yes, Dems are not Satan. They are right once in awhile.   There is a fair amount of Pub support for the EITC as well, and certainly from this Pub. Hey, it's a negative income tax, which Milton Friedman was hawking before you were born. What could have a more distinguished Pub provenance than that?

[Torie]

How exactly is keeping kids on their parent's insurance a bad idea? You do realize that they are getting a much better deal than on the open insurance market where they are an individual as opposed to getting covered by a company that negotiates it's insurance rates. Are you in favor of exchanges where a huge group can be set up to lower costs for everybody? If you don't understand what a ripoff trying to buy health insurance is individually, then you are oblivious.

Buying individual insurance is the cheapest route of all - if you are healthy - and particularly if you are young and healthy. The issue is about how best to to cover uninsured sicks who cannot afford to pay full freight to secure health insurance on their own, in the most cost effective way. Failing to separate the two issues clearly, and deal with them separately, is one of the reasons I suspect for so much of the confusion, and rather poor choices of options actually.

Yes, assuming insurance companies are offering much lower rates to youngs (and this is complicated by state insurance laws of course) they do get a decent deal. Of course not as good as they would be if they could get insurance through an employer, or a large public university or through their parents.

No, an employer pays more per person with group insurance vis a vis an individual policy for a healthy person. That is because the insurance company has to take the good with the bad. I walked all though this on a personal level.