Policy

SSSHHH! MORE MIDDLE EAST POLICY ON THE QT

Dave Davis Policy

For the first time in more than half of century, we have a chance to have a Middle East Policy based on the actual realities on the ground and our own interests and values. The cold war and the West’s dependence on Mideast Oil forced us to overlook the fact that underneath a thin veneer of modernity, the area was actually moving backwards towards an imagined Muslim World that never existed.  To curry favor with the various states we made alliances with leaders such as Sadat and Mubarak in Egypt who were less than democratic.  Monarchs from Morocco to Iran were supported.  As we did elsewhere in the world, we adopted alliances based on the enemy of my enemy is my friend policy.  Just like our World War II alliance with Stalin’s Russia, we chose what was perceived to be the lesser of evils.  Unfortunately, this forced us to overlook things that were abhorrent to Americans and/or policies that would be dangerous  to the world.  Beyond the basic lack of freedoms, two  areas we went along with, much to our future distress, were the endless life of the Palestinian Refugee Camps and the continuing march of Muslims towards extreme forms of their religion.

At the end the 1948 Arab-Israeli Conflict, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) was established to provide relief for 652,000 Arabs that fled the Israeli areas.  Today UNRWA provides education, health care and social services to the 5 million Arab refugees in 58 registered camps.  Over the same period approx. 850,000 Jews left Arab countries, the vast majority going to Israel.  None of these people or their descendents live in refugee camps, even though there were cultural differences between the Jews from the middle east and Africa and other Israelis, they were welcomed and integrated in Israel.  Why didn’t the Arab Nations also welcome and integrate their fellow Arabs?  Only Jordan granted citizenship to the Arab refugees living there.  While Palestinian refugees have worked in other Arab lands such as Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, Arab League instructions bar Arab States from granting citizenship.  Without citizenship, the refugees have been at the mercy of a change of winds in host countries.  For instance, Kuwait expelled Palestinian Refugees after the Gulf War.  Why wasn’t the fate of these poor trapped people handled differently?  Where was the U.S?  Instead of helping these people find new homes throughout the Arab World, we were paying the biggest share for UNRWA to maintain these camps.  We never put real pressure on the Arabs to do right by their brothers and sisters.  And they are their brothers and sisters.  Palestine was never a separate Arab Country.  It was always a part of a bigger entity.  Surely, Palestinian Arabs are closer culturally  to others in the Arab League, than the Jewish Middle East and African Refugees that went to Israel.  The Arabs other than Jordan shunned their humanitarian responsibilities and we felt it was in our interest to actually support this financially.

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STILL MORE DAVE’S PLAN Q & A

Dave Davis Policy

Q. You say that your plan will  cost even more than the ACA.  How do you propose to pay for it?

A. Funding for the ACA is supposed to pay for coverage of most of the currently uninsured.  For the moment we would leave funding as it is, knowing that it is probably  inadequate.  The reason is we really don’t know what our plan would cost.  Instead of presenting some computer printouts and pretending we have real figures, we took a different tack.  We already had a form of universal coverage before the ACA.  It’s just that by comparison with the rest of the world it was very high cost inefficient system.  Further it favored large companies over individuals and smaller entities, impeding labor mobility.  Instead we designed a system to achieve the lowest cost to our economy.  As a bonus we wanted the flexibility that would actually enhance economic growth.  Catastrophic policies without any bells and whistles sold nationwide without having to cover preexisting conditions.   Medical credit cards with little or no credit risk for providers.  Huge reduction in third-party pay and the attendant costly paperwork.  Every individual will have a financial incentive to find the best service and cost solution.  People no longer locked in jobs for fear of losing their health insurance. This should give leverage to employees to get wage increases based on employers benefit savings and increase their mobility.  If all these market incentives don’t reduce health care costs as a percentage of GDP, probably nothing would.

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MORE Q & A ON DAVE’S PLAN

Dave Davis Policy

Q.  How does this differ from Health Savings Accounts and very high deductible plans on the ACA exchanges?

A.  We think our plan would be much better at lowering costs.  The Catastrophic Policies would be cheaper because they could be bought Nationally with no payment defaults and stripped of any mandatory additions such as birth control or prostate tests.  You tailor you account to your individual needs.  Everything else in healthcare should be cheaper.  If a huge market with no credit risk or no third parties to add costs and paper work doesn’t lower costs than nothing will.  One caveat, however, is in the beginning with so many newly covered even 2 1/2 years might not give providers time to gear up.  That might result in some bottlenecks that might result in some temporarily higher prices or waiting times.  We don’t think the market will let that go on very long.  In any case  providers are dropping Medicaid patients now at an alarming rate and that would never get better.  Because surgeries are a big part of the Catastrophic Policies, one other thing we would like to see is a policy option that would cover accredited foreign providers to lower the premiums.  According to the Oct./Nov issue of AARP  magazine a heart bypass in the U.S. costs $88,000, In Costa Rica $31,500 and in India $14,400.  We saw a brand new hospital in India and when we asked about the surgeons we were told that every one of them had served on the staff of a major U.S. hospital.  Additionally this would put price pressure on our hospitals.  In any case each dollar in your PSA would buy more health care than if it was put in a Health Savings Account or an ACA  very high deductible plan does now.  We believe that the differences could be substantial.  As people’s accounts grow and innovation kicks in over time the problem as a percentage of GDP would shrink.  You can’t say that about any other plan we’ve seen. Continue reading →

DAVE’S PLAN Q & A

Dave Davis Dave's Healthcare Plan, Policy

Q.  Having already gone through the horrors of one botched roll out, how can you assure us that this won’t be another complicated mess?

A.  It’s an ill wind that doesn’t blow someone some good.  By building on some things already associated with the Affordable Care Act (ACA), subsidies, the individual mandate and the IRS, we think we can convert the Affordable Care Act (ACA)  to Dave’s Plan in 2 1/2 tax filing years without too much misery.  In the first year, the IRS would change their filling forms to include the individuals Personal Benefits Accounts (PBA) information and reporting requirements by financial institutions.  More importantly they would upgrade their payment software to incorporate the appropriate income and age levels for depositing the proper Medicaid and subsidy payments to the PBAs.  Governments both Federal and State would have to determine what they are paid out in the previous year on average for subsidies and Medicaid by income and age group and get the numbers to the IRS in time to incorporate them in the following year.  This could be a little tricky as medicaid varies between the states. However, in is this age of big data this shouldn’t be a problem. They should have this information anyway.  With the IRS organized, providers and financial institutions could start gearing up for the changes.  The institutions would have to incorporate payments for the qualified Catastrophic Policy whether they sold it or the account holder bought it elsewhere. Then their medical care only credit cards would have to be coordinated with providers probably through card companies (Visa, MasterCard etc.).  Businesses would have to decide whether to drop benefits and just be responsible for payroll deductions and transfer to the employee’s PBA or go to or maintain a contractual system where they where would remain responsible for Health and retirement.  If it’s the latter, the info would be included in their W2s.  Health Insurance policies wherever purchased for the next year would be extended to Oct. 15 of the following year (Approx 18mos.) Continue reading →

SSSHHH! A MIDDLE EAST POLICY ON THE QT

Dave Davis Policy

What are our real interests in the Middle East?  What would we find unacceptable?  Destruction of Israel?  Slaughter of the Kurds?  Annihilation of religious or ethnic minorities such as the Yesidis?  Closing of trade routes especially for oil?  Most people would probably agree on these.  Sure there are some isolationists that say none of this is our business.  That would be unrealistic.  Chase Yesidis up a mountain and public pressure demands we send in the planes and we do.  Nobody wants another Rwanda. Since the  beginning of the 19th century we have had warships with marines aboard protecting trade routes.  We’re not about to change now.  We feel a certain affinity towards the Israelis and the Kurds.  We have extended our protection to both for decades and that’s not going to change either.  What else?  Iran as Nuclear power is a problem we will deal with separately. Continue reading →