This story about Ohio has nationwide application. That’s because Ohio’s media have been awfully quiet about the tax increases that will be necessary if the Buckeye State’s version of “universal health care” comes to pass. The bill was introduced on April 25, according to this Ohio Legislative Services Commission bill analysis, and has flown under the radar ever since. I expect that national Old Media scrutiny of the Second Coming of Hillarycare will also be minimal.

My interest in the so-called “Ohio Health Care Plan” was perked when I heard an ad from the Ohio Chapter of the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB) claiming that the plan would cost Ohio taxpayers $50 billion.

$50 billion. With a “b.” In one state.

That’s over $4,400 for every man, woman, and child in Ohio, or over $17,000 for a family of four.

A separate fiscal analysis by the Legislative Services Commission is pending, so I thought that the NFIB might be engaging in a bit of reckless hyperbole.

They are not.

A cruise through the state-related stats at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMMS) shows that total health care expenditures in Ohio from all sources (employees, employers, Medicare, and Medicaid) were $65.6 billion in 2004 (a very large JPEG copy of the relevant page that will open in a separate window is here). Add 20% or so to that $65.6 billion to account for health care inflation in the intervening years, and a good ballpark estimate for statewide health care expenditures in 2007 is $80 billion.

Now, about how much of that $80 billion is currently handled by Medicare and Medicaid? Here’s your answer, with the 2004 numbers coming from the same source (see this CMMS page for links to PDFs of State-by-State Medicaid and Medicare costs):

The NFIB’s $50 billion is right there in the red box.

So, based on estimated costs today, a truly universal, single-payer system, as is being proposed, would shift responsibility for all of the estimated $50.9 billion in payments currently being made by “-EEs, -ERs and others” to ….. the State of Ohio.

That means that the State of Ohio would have to raise taxes, revenues, fees, etc. by $50.9 billion a year (i.e., over $4,400 per person or over $17,000 for a family of four), so the State would have the money to pay for all of the services for which it has assumed responsibility.

A little context: The entire two-year 2007-2009 budget for the Buckeye State just passed by the General Assembly is $52 billion.

But you may be thinking, “Big deal. If employers and employees didn’t have to pay health insurance premiums, deductibles, copays, and direct costs (for self-insured employers), you’re just talking about a cost-shift.”

For that not to be a “big deal,” you’d need to have confidence that the government will be a more efficient provider of medical services than the private sector.

On the surface, it’s an appealing argument. After all, administrative services currently at all of the different providers might be consolidated into one leaner operation, management layers might be eliminated, etc.

The trouble is that reality differs — bigtime.

If the government were so much more efficient at providing medical services, it should have long since proven its efficiency in the provision of Medicare and Medicaid services. After all, you would think that once you get to a million members, economies of scale should have kicked in.

It hasn’t happened, even, as you’ll see, if you separate out the uninsured from the non-Medicare/Medicaid population:

(2004 is the latest year for which complete data is available. Cost per person for Medicare and Medicaid came from this Exhibit at Health Affairs, and total Ohio population in 2004 from the Census Bureau. The Total Spending numbers were already discussed above. All other items are calculated as expected. The calculated statewide cost per person is only $1 different from the figure at this link. The uninsured figure came from the Ohio Health Policy Review.)

Okay, you can argue that the Medicare difference is explainable, because it covers the higher-cost elderly. I doubt that this accounts for the entire difference, but I’ll let it go for the moment.

The Medicare justification isn’t available with Medicaid. And it doesn’t include amounts likely in the hundreds of millions, perhaps even billions, in cost-shifting from Medicaid to the rest of the population (this occurs in Medicare too).

Adverse selection? I’m not buying it. That argument has worn out its welcome, because for at least a decade, employers have been required to fully cover anyone who applies, regardless of pre-existing conditions, as long as that person had employer or other coverage when they applied for employment at their new company. Even pre-existing condition riders go away after 12 months.

So the promoters of the Ohio Health Care Plan want us to shift all insurance coverage from the lower-cost private sector to the higher-cost public sector. Costs will explode to the tune of billions of dollars — and that’s even before you consider the ramp-up in utilization when health care is perceived as a “free” good, or the increase in the number and types of conditions that will inevitably be covered.

This is madness.

Now to the Second Coming of Hillarycare. If the tax increases required in just one state for the Ohio Health Care Plan will be over $50 billion, how can Hillary Clinton credibly claim that her “universal” health care scheme will only “cost” $110 billion, $370 per person? Why is Old Media not challenging a number that, based on applying Ohio’s plan to the rest of the country, appears to be off by at least a factor of 10?

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

I’m a day late on this, but the 83rd Ohio Politics Carnival, compiled by Jill “NASCAR” Zimon of Writes Like She Talks, is here, and it’s packed.

UPDATE: Gosh, I missed Boring Made Dull’s 34th on Econ and Social Policy, which is here. I’ve put in a submission for the next one, something I’ve been very remiss about lately.

Justin at Right on the Right has photos from the Gathering of Eagles III in Washington this past weekend, including pics of him with Michelle Malkin and N.Z. Bear. Nothing like rubbing it in.

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Maggie Thurber says “Sen. Voinovich missed an opportunity” as he toured the flooded areas of Northwest Ohio earlier this week. Voinovich bashed the President for supposedly shortchanging infrastructure while spending the money instead on the Iraq War.

Maggie reminds Mr. Voinovich that he has no room to whine. She shows that in his Transportation Bill-related votes, Voinovich was “basically agreeing that $8 billion in pork was more important than other priorities of the federal government - like the Army Corps of Engineers which he says is short money and engineers.”

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Big World Blog caught the news about Lincoln Chafee, the former Senator from Rhode Island known around here as Lincoln Chapstick. It seems that Mr. Chafee has “disaffiliated” himself from the Republican Party. This only makes official what has been known for years, and makes those who lavishly supported him in the 2006 GOP primary over genuine Republican Steve Laffey — up to and including President Bush and supposed genius Karl Rove — look even more foolish.

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Brian at One Oar tells us how those new-fangled high-tech security visas are being compromised using low-tech methods. He is very right to sound the alarm over the lack of security at our southern border. Six years after 9/11, it’s beyond inexcusable.

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Large Bill may someday be Large Disabled Bill. That depends on how large “Large” is, and on whether or not presidential candidate Bill Richardson’s idea of, uh, expanding the definition of a “disability” in the Americans with Disabilities Act to include obesity is ever adopted.

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Gosh, I can’t keep up with everything — King’s Right Site correctly warns about the impact of the revival of Shamnesty known as the DREAM Act. I have contacted the offices of both of Ohio’s Senators to object — have you?

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From Interested-Participant — “Deported Alien Returns, Kills Cop.” What will it take to stop the madness?

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Brain Shavings’ second attempt to get Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown to denounce MoveOn.org’s “Betray Us” ad got a canned non-response. Mr. Brown’s e-mail volume from the Puddle Pirate is therefore about to triple.

Larry Velequette’s report in the Blade (”Welfare’s $21-a-week food limit daunting challenge for Lucas County officials”) is here:

Here is my e-mail:

Dear Mr. Vellequette and Ms. McLaughlin,

Mr. Vellequette’s September 19 report on the Toledo-area version of the Food Stamp Challenge was incorrect on basic facts, and requires correction.

Fundamentally, $21 a week per person is NOT what “the U.S. government believes is adequate” for Food Stamp program beneficiaries “to feed themselves,” as Mr. Vellequette reported.

Instead, the following lists what the government, in essence, believes is adequate. It is based on information at this USDA link (scroll to bottom):

This table is consistent with, though not identical to, what USDA analysis has shown is needed to feed families of various sizes under a “Thrifty Plan”:
http://www.cnpp.usda.gov/Publications/FoodPlans/2007/CostofFoodJul07.pdf

The $21 per person per week being used in the Food Stamp Challenge is actually the average benefit AFTER taking into account resources that a person or family are expected to spend on food out of their own income and assets. This is based on an analysis of each family’s situation. The USDA web site describes the process in more detail.

This means that the statement in Mr. Vellequette’s report about what “the U.S. government believes is adequate to feed” Food Stamp participants is false beyond redemption. Therefore, the entire premise behind the Food Stamp Challenge, both locally and nationally, is irretrievably flawed.

Food Stamp Challenge organizers and participants have not attempted to identify any shortcomings in the needs-based formula, nor are they attempting to prove that the amounts in the table above are not enough to buy food. Challengers who are single, like Commissioner Konop, should be trying to spend less than $35.67 during their Challenge week. Three-person families like Wozniaks should be trying to stay within $93.90 (3 x $31.30), not $63. Perhaps with $94 (almost 50% more) to work with, Ms. Wozniak will be less “frightened.”

The Blade should also know that a couple in Colorado spent a whole month living within the (incorrect) $21 per person per week. Ari and Jenny Armstrong succeeded, with very careful but not heroic efforts. They have posted a complete log of how they spent only $159 in a August — well under $3 per person per day, and $125 less than the $284 the Food Stamp program would have allowed:
Liberty Food Challenge Log

As you can see, Mr. Armstrong is copied on this e-mail. I am certain that he would be very willing to share his insights on how he and his wife did what county commissioners appear to believe is impossible. Armstrong’s report has money-saving insights that could benefit all of your readers, even beyond the 67,000-plus Lucas County residents Mr. Vellequette reported as being on Food Stamps.

The Blade owes its readers a comprehensive correction. Further, your newspaper owes Lucas County Commissioners, as well as those promoting the Food Stamp Challenge locally and nationally, quite a few follow-up questions.

Regards,

Tom Blumer
BizzyBlog.com

UPDATE: At Maggie Thurber’s suggestion, a copy of this letter, with appropriate introduction, was also sent to each of Toledo’s four network-affiliated TV stations (ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox).

You want offensive cartoons? I’ll give you offensive cartoons — Here’s just one (others are at the link):

According to the linked article, the cartoon “was prepared specifically for the official Palestinian Authority daily.”

We (the US, the EU, the UN, and others) are nuts to give any kind of financial support to people who would publish crap like this in their “state-sponsored” publications — and we unfortunately do. Companies like Intel, which early last year announced plans to set up a technological center in the Gaza Strip at the Islamic University of Gaza (I couldn’t determine the current status of the project involved), need a corporate brain scan.

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Related — “Muslim Brotherhood’s papers detail plan to seize U.S.” (HT NixGuy):

Amid the mountain of evidence released in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing trial, the most provocative has turned out to be a handful of previously classified evidence detailing Islamist extremists’ ambitious plans for a U.S. takeover.

A knot of terrorism researchers say the memos and audiotapes, many translated from Arabic and containing detailed strategies by the international Islamist group the Muslim Brotherhood, are proof that extremists have long sought to replace the Constitution with Shariah, or Islamic law.

Meanwhile, in Ohio, Governor Ted Strickland (I am moving towards calling him “Stricklandhimmi”) toasts CAIR, an unindicted co-conspirator in the same Holy Land Foundation case, while an adviser to Columbus Mayor Michael Coleman invites a 9/11 denier, David Ray Griffin, to speak — at a supposedly mainstream church. Organizations like CAIR and “truthers” like Griffin, Patrick Poole notes, “are still received and defended by the political power-brokers in Central Ohio and the Columbus establishment media.” The former need to be booted out of office. The latter deserve subscription cancellations on a massive level.

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Tim Montgomerie’s Britain and America blog on Rudy Giuliani, SarBox, and initial public offerings, or IPOs (HT Patrick Ruffini via a Brain Shavings e-mail):

A key reason for Giuliani’s visit is to extract money from the wealthy and growing American population that can be found in London. Huge numbers of American businessmen and firms operate in London - the numbers have allegedly been swollen by people escaping the regulatory insensitivity of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Some London politicians have suggested that a statue of Senator Sarbanes and Representative Oxley be erected in the booming Docklands area of Britain’s capital city as a cheeky thank you for the business that (disputedly) has migrated across the Atlantic as a consequence of their lawmaking.

The “disputedly” link makes a pretty weak case, in my opinion:

According to the study, authored by experts at Ohio State University and the University of Toronto, more stringent corporate governance rules as stipulated by Sarbanes-Oxley are not responsible for any mass departure of NYSE firms to London.

Instead, the study suggests that there are simply fewer companies of the type that would typically pursue an NYSE listing.

First of all, the NYSE is not the only USA location for an IPO to list. There’s this entity called NASDAQ, where the large majority of IPOs are first listed — outfits like, oh, Microsoft and Google.

Second, many startup companies that might have structured themselves for an IPO are instead working to get bought out by bigger companies because of burdensome SarBox regs relating to going public.
Previous related post: Dec. 4, 2006 — London and Hong Kong “Heart” Sarbanes Oxley

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Jesse Jackson gets his 7,546th free pass from the press (bold are mine):

Jackson sharply criticized presidential hopeful and Illinois Sen. Barack Obama for “acting like he’s white” in what Jackson said has been a tepid response to six black juveniles’ arrest on attempted-murder charges in Jena, La. Jackson, who also lives in Illinois, endorsed Obama in March, according to The Associated Press.

….. Later, Jackson said he did not recall making the “acting like he’s white” comment about Obama, stressing he only wanted to point out the candidates had not seized on an opportunity to highlight the disproportionate criminal punishments black youths too often face.

So reporter Roddie Burris lets Jackson back away from a racist comment because he doesn’t “recall” it. Nobody, not even Al Sharpton, gets kid-glove treatment like JJ. Unbelievable.

From Chicago, and throughout the USA:

September 11, 2007
Cronicled in Tribune, Lilly Jaffe’s treatment has made 13 lives better — and perhaps many more one day

This is a story of 13 people with a rare form of diabetes, the doctors who changed their lives and the Tribune science writer who helped them all before he died.

The chain of events started last Sept. 11, when the Tribune published a story about Lilly Jaffe, a 6-year-old with Type 1 diabetes who had needed insulin shots her whole life. Doctors at the University of Chicago weaned her from insulin after realizing she had a recently discovered genetic defect that they could correct with pills.

The Jaffe family considered her therapy a medical miracle.

Lilly’s story brought hundreds of inquiries to the U. of C. team from families who hoped their diabetic children could be treated the same way. That turned up 13 patients with the same rare mutation that Lilly has, as well as others with a different genetic variant the scientists had never seen before.

On Monday, the U. of C. doctors published a paper on that new genetic cause of diabetes in the online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Patients with that rare mutation still need insulin, though the team hopes the condition could yield insights into more common forms of diabetes.

For the 13 patients who showed up with the other, readily treatable mutation, life will never be the same. They give part of the credit to Peter Gorner, the award-winning Tribune reporter who wrote Lilly’s story while battling advanced lung cancer.

The treatment for Lilly’s form of diabetes has transformed Lauren Moore, 4, of Orlando. Lauren’s parents got the Tribune article from a Chicago relative and felt chills as they read it, hoping that Lauren was one of the rare patients like Lilly.

They began arrangements for genetic tests the next day. An e-mail from the U. of C. a couple of weeks later relayed the good news: Lauren had the same treatable problem as Lilly.

“I don’t remember the last time I cried that hard,” said Lauren’s mother, Melissa.

After a five-day treatment in Chicago last year, Lauren’s parents put away her insulin pump for good. They said they feel a deep debt to the U. of C. doctors and to Gorner, who died in June.

“The fact that he wrote that article had a profound effect on our entire family,” said Lauren’s mother. “I feel our goal now is to find other people with the same condition.”

400 to 2,000 with mutation

The vast majority of America’s 1 million Type I diabetes patients cannot benefit from the therapy that helped Lauren and Lilly. Experts believe that only 400 to 2,000 people in the U.S. have the crucial mutation that caused their disorder. But for those patients, most of whom believe they have ordinary diabetes, the new treatment can end a lifetime of shots and worry about how foods will affect their blood-sugar levels.

“Although the numbers are small, the impact for those patients is enormous,” said Andrew Hattersley, a professor of molecular medicine at Peninsula Medical School in Britain. Hattersley discovered the disease-causing mutation in 2004 and has treated some 200 patients in Britain.

Go here for the rest of the story.