Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee voted Thursday to encourage
limits on the compensation of insurance executives, responding to
charges that expanding health insurance coverage would enrich insurance
companies.
Here is more and I thank Yana for the pointer.
Great! This way the extra profits will go right into the pockets of the shareholders, not the workers, at the insurance companies. Democracy is awesome.
Lame. Our Congress doesn’t have the guts to pass real reform and institute a public health insurance option, so they fall back on this stupid, unfair, and unproductive tactic.
If I read this correctly the only change is that they’re going to cap tax deduction at $500k instead of $1m. Given the size of the executive compensation packages people might actually want to limit, this will have little effect on them. Instead, it will mean that companies will try to get by with fewer executives, and they will face marginally higher tax rates.
Our country is going crazy. Wage and price controls but call it a banana split.
Looks like some in Congress were angry that they lost the public option so they went and kicked the insurance executives.
Or look at this article, where the Obama administration will step into the patient doctor relationship with all kinds of federal oversight. So we will save on health care because the Federal government will create an even larger bureaucracy then the existing insurance companies to interfere with the patient doctor relationship?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125444082517257805.html
Or this, where the increased regulatory hurdles will just force insurance companies out of sectors of the market.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125443003194657369.html?mod=WSJ_hps_sections_news
Folks this is socialism by regulatory fiat.
How about requiring that insurance company executives receive heatlh insurance via the policies they write for the rest of their lives (rather than Medicare)?
I know and share the deep suspicion of government setting compensation caps. But, let’s get real – can anyone tell me what value added they believe insurers actually provide? I’m talking about the value added of private insurers, not the value of having insurance.
Wage and price controls here we come. Wheeeeee!!! This has worked so well in the past.
Seriously though, how can any honest economist in the Obama administration choose to continue to work for these fools, and thus endorse by implication, if this comes to pass?
Also, with wage and price controls in the pipeline, how can anyone expect that we will continue to get the positive externalities from private medical innovation that have enriched all of us over the past generation?
So, you really didn’t expect this kind of stuff from Obama?
This is not a rhetorical question. I actually want to know. You really didn’t think this kind of destructive government power grab was going to happen?
Why not?
There is a real brain trust at work in Washington. Why don’t they just abolish shareholders and be done with it?
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