One of the topics discussed in the Vice Presidential Debate between Senator Joe Biden and Governor Sarah Palin was the issue of Health Care. It really was no surprise to me that Governor Palin managed to misrepresent the health care plans of both John McCain and Barack Obama.
Palin claimed McCain’s health care plan would be “budget neutral,” costing the government nothing.
From FactCheck.org:
Palin: He’s proposing a $5,000 tax credit for families so that they can get out there and they can purchase their own health care coverage. That’s a smart thing to do. That’s budget neutral. That doesn’t cost the government anything … a $5,000 health care credit through our income tax, that’s budget neutral.
The McCain campaign hasn’t released an estimate of how much the plan would cost, but independent experts contradict Palin’s claim of a cost-free program.
The Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center estimates that McCain’s plan, which at its peak would cover 5 million of the uninsured, would increase the deficit by $1.3 trillion over 10 years. Obama’s plan, which would cover 34 million of the uninsured, would cost $1.6 trillion over that time period.
The nonpartisan U.S. Budget Watch’s fiscal voter guide estimates that McCain’s tax credit would increase the deficit by somewhere between $288 billion to $364 billion by the year 2013, and that making employer health benefits taxable would bring in between $201 billion to $274 billion in revenue. That nets out to a shortfall of somewhere between $14 billion to $163 billion – for that year alone.
Palin also said that Obama’s plan would be “universal government run” health care and that health care would be “taken over by the feds.” That’s not the case at all. As we’ve said before, Obama’s plan would not replace or remove private insurance, or require people to enroll in a public plan. It would increase the offerings of publicly funded health care.
The Obama-Biden plan provides affordable, accessible health care for all Americans, builds on the existing health care system, and uses existing providers, doctors and plans to implement the plan. Under the Obama-Biden plan, patients will be able to make health care decisions with their doctors, instead of being blocked by insurance company bureaucrats.
Under the plan, if you like your current health insurance, nothing changes, except your costs will go down by as much as $2,500 per year.
If you don’t have health insurance, you will have a choice of new, affordable health insurance options.
Here is an overview of Barack Obama’s Health Care plan. Read it for yourself.
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Who gives a rip about facts?
Palin is hot !!