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January 07, 2010 06:05 PM UTC

Coffman Says Single-Payer Government Health Care "Works"

  • 27 Comments
  • by: davidsirota

(“Super Robot GOP Talking Point” Mike Coffman may not understand what he just said. – promoted by Colorado Pols)

There’s no other way to read this story from Politics Daily and the Denver Post than to read it as Colorado Republican Rep. Mike Coffman admitting that government-sponsored single-payer health care “works”:

Coffman, a former Marine who keeps buff at age 54, was jogging on the golf course bordering his home in Aurora, Colo., when he stumbled on a rock or some other obstruction hidden in the snow. He fell, cracking his ankle.

The congressman and his wife went to an urgent care clinic in a strip mall, where he paid $30 for a temporary cast and a prescription, and later he went to the famed Steadman Hawkins Clinic in Vail, where he paid $350 for an expert opinion, he told The Denver Post.

“I successfully tested our health care system,” he said, with a laugh. “It works,”‘ he told the Post.

Of course the health care system worked for him, many Coloradans undoubtedly thought when they read the item in Saturday’s Post. Coffman, a Republican member of Congress who voted against the health care reform bill in the House last year, is covered by the Cadillac of American health-care plans, the Federal Employees Health Benefits (FEHB) Plan.

That’s why his X-ray, temporary cast and prescription cost him only $30. But if he didn’t have insurance — like some 45 million Americans — the tab most likely would be closer to $375 ($150 for the visit, $150 for the splint, and $75 for the X-ray, according to prices quoted at a popular downtown Denver urgent-care clinic).

The FEHB is a single-payer government-sponsored health care system. The federal government is the single payer in that system.* And as Coffman says very explicitly, “It works.”

So why is Coffman, all Republican lawmakers, and a big chunk of Democratic lawmakers, so opposed to single payer that they ruled it “off the table” as part of the debate over national health care? Why aren’t all Americans entitled to the very same health care system as members of Congress, if those members of Congress acknowledge their system “works”?

(h/t Steve Benen at the Washington Monthly)

* NOTE: The FEHB is one form of single-payer – a form where the government is the single payer, but pays to insurance companies which administer benefits. There are other forms of single-payer where the government pays directly to health care providers (this is, for instance, the VA system). The point here is not to debate which of the forms are better – only to point out that the FEHB is a government-sponsored single-payer system – ie.  the single payer is the government. It is exactly the kind of system that – if expanded to let everyone in – could be a single-payer system for the nation. And it’s a system that Coffman says “works” – even as he rails on government health care.

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27 thoughts on “Coffman Says Single-Payer Government Health Care “Works””

  1. Having gone to Congressman Coffman’s first town hall, I can tell you that in this instance he was simply being funny and making light of his situation. I think of any members of Congress, Coffman has been the most rational and consistent. At his town hall, he said the answer to healthcare reform probably lies somewhere in the middle. He was opposed to a single payer system, but supported an alternative bill that included covering pre-existing conditions. The man has balls and held 4 different town halls that night so he could see the almost 2,000 people that showed up. (There was so much interest because he was the 1st member of Colorado’s delegation to hold a public town hall.) He gave both sides an equal opportunity to speak which I greatly appreciated. He also introduced an amendment that said if the single payer bill passes then federal officials should be required to take the plan as well. (If it’s good enough for the American people, it should be good enough for Congress and the President.)Attacking someone without accurately portraying the facts is way more hypocritical than Coffman’s funny.    

    1. but accessing the health industry is not such a laughing matter if you are not a congressman.  

      A single payer system by definition would give the same benefits to members of congress so his amendments is what is more commonly known as “showboating.”

      1. in how the single-payer system, if it had been passed, would have actually worked. However, President Obama’s bill called for the public option to be a “choice” that competed with private insurance. He stated that if people were happy with their existing plans, then they would be able to keep them. I say I agree with you because any time the private sector tries to compete with the government, the government wins. This is because the government can give itself tax deductions, subsidies, etc. that private companies can’t. So eventually, yes there would have been just one single-payer system as the government run system would force private companies out of business as they wouldn’t be able to fairly compete because of the facts mentioned above. However, if you take the President at his word and believe that people would have been able to keep their insurance if desired, then in theory, there is a need for Coffman’s amendment.

        1. Fed Ex, UPS.

          So now that we have disposed of that fallacy, let’s return to the fundamental one: If a private sector company can’t do the job as well as the government why should I be denied my choice to take a different alternative?  You are denying me my choice now, which you argue trumps the possibility that at some point you may or may not have fewer options.

    2. But I don’t think it’s fair for him to say because his great plan worked well for him, that the rest of us are fine. Now if they opened that plan up to anyone who wanted in – then he would have a fair point.

          2. Like a lot of big companies and plans negotiated by powerful unions, the feds’ plans are too rich. If you imposed those benefits on all, people who now buy affordable catastrophic health insurance wouldn’t be able to afford health insurance.

            That’s what you’ll get in Obama’s health care bill—unaffordable mandated benefits.

    3. There is a huge difference between an employer-backed plan like the one that coverers members of congress and other federal employees and a single-payer plan that covers everyone in the country as in Canada.

      The headline is getting a lot of attention, but it’s a dishonest analogy.

  2. but I suggest you visit factcheck.org

    Health Care for Members of Congress?

    August 25, 2009

    Q: What type of health insurance do members of Congress receive? Is it a single-payer, government-run system?

    A: Members of Congress are covered by private insurance under the same system that covers all federal workers.

    FULL ANSWER

    Members of Congress have good health insurance by any standard, but it’s not free and not reserved only for them – and it’s not government insurance. House and Senate members are allowed to purchase private health insurance offered through the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, which covers more than 8 million other federal employees, retirees and their families.

    It’s not a “single-payer” system where the government acts as the one and only health insurance company. As President Bush’s chief of personnel Kay Coles James said in 2003, while lecturing at the conservative Heritage Foundation, “the FEHB program is not centralized, government-run health care.” It has drawn praise both from conservatives and liberals, including President Obama, who held it up as a model for his own health care proposals.

    http://factcheck.org/2009/08/h…

      1. In other words most large companies self insure – that means they pay all the medical costs for their employees and an insurance company administers the plan.  I have such a gold plated plan now.  It’s the best on the market and I don’t know of anyone who has a better plan than me except for federal workers but and this is a huge but large fortunes 50 companies are figuring they can also increase their bottom line by denying claims and for the past few years I have seen a increase in prescriptions not being paid, labs my doctor ordered not covered and medical bills denied.  And there is no appeal process. This will only get worse as our country continues to give handouts to the very richest among us.  

        The reason single payer makes sense from a cost avoidance perspective is that you eliminate all the administrative costs of denying claims and you standardize the process.  When you consider the huge amount of waste – financially, emotionally and physically that goes into denying claims and gaming patients and doctors you save a boat load of money which could then be used for patient care.  

        2. And they prevent the fraud that Medicare and Medicaid allow. The reason insurers police claims so tightly is that lots of patients cheat with help from their physicians.

          If there were no cheaters, you wouldn’t be so frustrated.

          Blame the cheaters who force insurers to be tough, not the insurers who are trying to keep health insurance as affordable as possible.

          1. Fraud and the paying of legitimate claims are two different issues. As a former auditor for the DHHS/OIG/OA I audited providers cost reports. And we went through those cost reports with a fine tooth comb.  After all the unallowable costs were removed we determined a rate they would be reimbursed. That was the rate they were paid per treatment.  This was done once every other year to determine based on allowable costs the reimbursement rate for a procedure.  If they submitted claims for treatments that never happened then the guys with the guns would get involved and arrests were made.  They were the investigative arm of the OIG and called the Office of Investigations. There are many ways the government audits their costs and this is one way that works quite well because the government only has to perform this audit once every two years.

            It is a fact that Medicare’s administrative costs (Medicare is a single payer system) run about 3% and it is another fact that private insurance companies administrative costs including those costs to deny claims runs about 31%. Add to that their profits which will ski rocket after this new legislation is passed and you have a whopping 41% (assuming 10% in profits) going to non-patient care.  How do you justify those costs?

            I have been in private industry for most of my career (and mostly for fortunes 50 companies) and I can assure you they are not efficient.  They make their profits through predatory capitalism and forcing consumers to pay the maximum for their products by eliminating competition and planned obsolesce.  And they are expert at privatizing their losses and socializing their losses as we see now with the banks but another good example is LTD insurance companies who take your money for years and then when you get sick they refuse to pay forcing their now disabled clients to go on SSD where we as taxpayers have to foot the bill.  All of this is a scam on the American people and it you fall for it Another skeptic I would say you need to become more skeptical about what you are digesting as propaganda.  

            1. You are the one spouting talking points in ignorance.

              So you audited once every two years and insurers check every claim. It’s well known that fraudsters get away with filing false claims to Medicare and get away with billions every year.

              You’re even getting the left’s claims that private insurers’ admin costs are 31% wrong.

              And your ideology keeps you from thinking clearly. You may have worked for large organizations, but its prety clear, I think, that you didn’t know what was going on under your nose.

              Like a grunt in a fox hole, a girl in a cubicle has no way of knowing what the generals know.

  3. …before it could even begin.  FEHB might be a single-payer in that it’s paid for by a, well, a single payer.  But it’s paid to private insurance companies, and most importantly, IT WOULD BE ABSOLUTELY INSANE TO EXPAND THE COST to every American.  We would be broke as a joke within six months.  I mean broke, broke.  Not the kind of broke we are right now where none of the money we’re spending actually exists.

      2. …can you re-word that first part for me?

        I would have no beefs with a public option and I assume it would work fine but for three things.  For starters, the government already pays for all or part of the health care/insurance of 85 million people, and another 20 million or so are eligible.  That means over 1/3 of Americans are already being subsidized by the government, and they want to spend hundreds of billions more dollars on subsidizing the cost of insurance for people.  Like taxes in general, soon you’re going to have more people on the dole than off it.  So you might say that nobody is getting “free” coverage and that it is “paid for” by premiums, but the government spending has to end somewhere.

        Also, I take Jan Schakowsky, Barney Frank, Howard Dean, et al at their word when they say a public option would lead to single payer.  There is no such thing as competition when one of the players is also the referee.  And last but not least, any program run by the government carries with it an implicit guarantee that taxpayers will pick up the bill if it ever falls short of breaking even.  And once it’s there, politicians can do all sorts of things to shift the burden on taxpayers from direct (premiums) to indirect (taxes) that make it that much more expensive.

  4. LTC Coffman’s family was covered by TriCare Prime while he was deployed in Iraq, and any other time he was activated for Federal Service.

    I’m still trying to find any comments or critiques of said EVIL GOV’T SINGLE-PAYER PLAN by him, either during or after his deployment.

    Must not be so bad or intrusive after all….

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