While state Senate Democrats in Wisconsin consider reintroducing their costly government health care program that had an original price tag of $15.2 billion, Massachusetts’ similar plan continues to spiral out of control.

The New York Times reports, “Threatened first by rapid early enrollment in its new subsidized insurance program and now by a withering economy, the state’s pioneering overhaul has entered a second, more challenging phase. Thanks to new taxes and fees imposed last year, the health plan’s jittery finances have stabilized for the moment. But government and industry officials agree that the plan will not be sustainable over the next 5 to 10 years if they do not take significant steps to arrest the growth of health spending.”

Massachusetts spends 33 percent more per person on health care than the national average.

Read more in the New York Times.

Legislative Democrats plan to reintroduce their government health care program that had a price tag of $15.2 billion during the last legislative session. A new report by the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute (WPRI) says the plan would result in a huge influx of the uninsured.

The WPRI reports:

“An influx into the state of Wisconsin of health care–seeking persons, many of whom may have chronic, serious, and costly health care problems, would result in a significant, unbudgeted burden on Wisconsin taxpayers, as well as the possibility of reduced health care quality as measures are taken to help control cost overruns. Troubling on its own, this will be even more problematic in an era of projected multi-billion dollar deficits.”

I have opposed and will continue to oppose the Democrats’ government health care plan that amounts to the largest tax increase in the history of America.

Here is the full WPRI report and a Journal Sentinel article.

Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan and Peter Wehner, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and a former deputy assistant to President George W. Bush write in an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal that America is witnessing a major change in the relationship between government and our economy. Ryan and Wehner call it, “a new era of government activism.”

There has already been a never-before-seen infusion of sizeable government relief packages. Government health care will now become the main objective of the change from a market-driven to a socialistic economic system.

As dependence on health care from the government grows, so does a bond between the recipients and government. Ryan and Wehner fear that any talk of fiscal belt tightening or tax cuts will result in hoots and hollers that such actions will impair health care.

The writers offer an alternative to socialized medicine:

“Tax credits, high-risk pools, insurance choice and regulatory reform can form the basis of a transformation from today's enormously costly and inefficient third-party system into one driven by ownership, choice and competition. And at the nucleus of this redesigned system will be the patient-doctor relationship.”

If this approach is unsuccessful and government dependence increases, Ryan and Wehner foresee America moving from a limited to a full-blown welfare state.

Their column is an interesting read.

During the previous legislative session, I strongly opposed the Senate Democrats’ $15.2 billion government health care plan.  As expected, Democrats plan to reintroduce another budget-busting proposal.

State Senator John Erpenbach told WCLO Radio in Janesville there might be some changes, but the enormous price tag remains the same. 

While Wisconsin proposes government health care that will result in the largest tax increase in American history, other states are cutting back on health care.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services ranks Wisconsin health care at number two in the nation.

Do we really want to toss out our health care system and convert it into a government health care program?

Here are more details in the Stevens Point Journal.

State Senate Democrats have been pushing to implement a multi-billion dollar government health care plan in Wisconsin.

Thankfully, their efforts have been unsuccessful.

Government health care is failing in Massachusetts where patients are having difficulty finding doctors. Patients fortunate enough to find a physician then experience long waits for appointments. One physician’s next opening for a physical is early May — of 2009.

The New York Times has the story.

The state Senate committee on Health, Human Services, Insurance, and Job Creation that I serve on holds a public hearing today on the Senate Democrats’ government health care plan.

The plan is very similar to the proposal Senate Democrats attempted to put in the 2007-09 state budget. That plan was rejected.

The latest version of the Senate Democrats’ government health care plan is Senate Bill 562 (SB 562). Based on a memo on the proposal I requested and received from the Legislative Fiscal Bureau, the plan is just as troubling as last year’s proposal.

The price tag is $15.2 billion, the largest tax increase in the history of the United States.

The Senate Democrats’ proposal also includes an un-elected Board that would have wide-ranging authority. According to a memo I received from the Legislative Fiscal Bureau, here are the details about the responsibilities of the un-elected Board:


“Board Membership. Create the Health Wisconsin Authority (Authority) as a public bodycorporate and politic, the Board of Trustees (Board) of which would consist of: (a) five non-voting members, including the Secretary of Employee Trust Funds, who would serve as the initial chairperson until the Board elects a chairperson from its voting members, and four representatives from the Authority's health care advisory committee who are health care personnel and administrators and who would be selected as Board members by the health care advisory committee; and (b) 16 voting members, nominated by the Governor and appointed with the advice and consent of the Senate, comprised of: (1) four members selected from a list submitted by statewide labor or union coalitions, one of which would be a public employee; (2) four members selected from a list submitted by statewide business and employer organizations, one of which would be a public employer; (3) one member selected from a list submitted by statewide public school teacher labor organizations; (4) one member selected from a list submitted by statewide small business organizations; (5) two members who are farmers, selected from a list submitted by statewide general farm organizations; (6) one member who is a self-employed person; and (7) three members selected from a list submitted by statewide health care consumer organizations. Specify that Board members would serve staggered terms of six years each. Authorize the Board to appoint an Executive Director, who would serve at the Board’s pleasure, and whose compensation would be determined by the Board.

Board Responsibilities. Charge the Board with the duty to establish, fund, and administer a health care system in Wisconsin that would ensure that all eligible persons have access to high quality, timely, and affordable health care. Direct the Board, in carrying out that duty, to seek to attain the following goals: (a) that every Wisconsin resident has access to affordable, comprehensive health care services; (b) that health care reform would maintain and improve the choice of health care providers and high quality health care services in Wisconsin; and (c) that health care reform would implement cost containment strategies that retain and assure affordable coverage for all Wisconsin residents.

Require the Board to do the following: (a) provide for mechanisms to enroll into the Healthy Wisconsin Plan (plan) every eligible Wisconsin resident; (b) create a program for consumer protection and a process to resolve disputes with providers; (c) establish an independent and binding appeals process for resolving disputes over eligibility and other determinations made by the Board, and entitle individuals adversely affected by any such determination to judicial review of the determination; (d) submit an annual report on the Board’s activities to the Governor and each house of the Legislature; (e) contract for annual, independent program evaluations and financial audits that measure the extent to which the plan is achieving its statutorily-defined goals; (f) accept bids from health care networks, or make payments to fee-for-service providers, upon consulting with the Department of Employee Trust Funds to determine the most effective and efficient way to purchase health care benefits; and (g) audit health care networks and providers to determine if their services meet the plan’s statutory objectives and criteria.

Vest the Board with all powers necessary or convenient to carry out the plan’s statutory purposes and provisions. Specify that those powers would include, but not be limited to, the power to establish the Authority’s annual budget and monitor its fiscal management, to execute contracts, to employ any officers, agents, and employees it may require, to sue and to be sued, to borrow money as necessary on a short-term basis to address cash flow issues, and to compel witnesses to attend meetings and to testify upon any necessary matter concerning the plan.”


The Senate Democrats’ costly plan would likely bankrupt the state and establish an astonishing bureaucracy with little accountability. An un-elected Board would have the power to set health care costs and determine the type and amount of health care services.

SB 562, like the Great Lakes Compact legislation is on the fast track. I will be voting against the proposal.

The state of California has dealt a serious setback to the concept of government health care.

A state Senate committee defeated a proposal by the Governor that would have provided health insurance to millions of uninsured Californians.

Senators could not support the sweeping plan knowing the state must deal with a $14.5 billion deficit.

As I have blogged in the past, California is one of a few heavily-populated states considering picking up the large tab for government health care. Illinois and Pennsylvania also reviewed the idea, but failed to pass any plan. Now California is struggling to reach consensus, and that scenario is an omen for government health care.

The California plan is similar to the current program operating in Massachusetts that is experiencing all kinds of problems, including the recent revelation that spending for the plan will increase by $400 million this year. Massachusetts taxpayers will bear the burden of paying for the increase.

Support for government health care could be dwindling. The New York Times says the overall issue of health care is not as critical to Americans. A New York Times/CBS News poll taken this month showed that only seven percent of those surveyed believed health care was the country’s most pressing problem.  Health care came in third behind the economy and the Iraq War.

State Senate Democrats have pledged they will resurrect their $15.2 billion government health care plan in the current legislative session. The proposal was rejected, and wisely so, during last year’s state budget deliberations. Wisconsin should once again examine what is happening in the state of Massachusetts as a learning experience that government health care is a fiscal disaster.

The Boston Globe is reporting the cost of Massachusetts’ health care program has increased astronomically. Spending on the program will increase by more than $400 million next year. The Globe says it is “one of the largest increases in the $28.2 billion state budget the governor proposed.”

The reason for the large increase in the cost is simple and not surprising. The number of people registering for government health care is far greater than previous estimates. State and federal taxpayers are now responsible for practically all of the unexpected sticker shock.

The Globe reports, “The long-term cost of the insurance initiative continues to concern policy makers and analysts, who are worried that it may become unaffordable. This year the state is expected to exceed the initial budget for the health insurance initiative by about $245 million, and next year's budget would boost spending by another $400 million.”

There is a great deal of uncertainty swirling around the Massachusetts government health care debacle. The announcement of the plan resulted in far more people signing up that drove up the cost substantially that the state may be unable to pay. Wisconsin would be wise to learn a valuable lesson from Massachusetts and refuse to go down the same nightmarish path of government  health care.

I’ve written extensively about my opposition to the state Senate Democrats’ $15.2 billion government health care plan that wisely was rejected last year.

Senate Democrats promise to bring the plan back this legislative session.

Wisconsin isn’t the only state toying with the idea of taxpayer-funded health care for all. Stateline.org has a comprehensive look at some of the key government health care efforts being closely watched in other states.

The liberal city of San Francisco was ready this month to implement a groundbreaking health insurance law. The law would have required that employers cover their workers or pay a fee. The provision was considered critical to the city’s goal of providing coverage to all 82,000 uninsured adult residents.

The law would have been the first of its kind in the country.

A federal judge called the city ordinance, “laudable,” but said it was in conflict with a 1974 federal law that prohibits state and local governments from regulating the benefits of employees.U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White’s ruling, if not overturned, will force the city of San Francisco to scale back its plans to give health coverage to all uninsured residents not already covered by the state of California’s Medi-Cal program for the poor or by Medicare for the elderly. A city official was quoted in the San Francisco Chronicle that if the employer fee was struck down, city officials would limit the expanded enrollment to residents who make no more than three times the federal poverty level, or about $32,000 a year for an individual.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, “The ordinance, enacted last year, established a $200 million-a-year program to care for the uninsured. More than three-quarters of the money was to come from city tax dollars and patient premiums, and the rest from the employer fee that was the subject of White’s ruling. Private employers with at least 20 employees and nonprofits with at least 50 employees were to be given two choices: provide health coverage, at spending levels set by the ordinance, or pay a fee to support the city health program, which was budgeted at $200 million a year. White said the ordinance would regulate employer health plans by requiring businesses to spend certain amounts on each employee - changing their existing, federally governed plans - or pay a fee.”

The judge’s ruling could have an impact on other state and local plans to provide government health insurance. In Wisconsin, state Senate Democrats were unsuccessful last year in their attempt to implement a $15.2 billion government health care plan, but are promising to resurrect the plan this year.

As state Senate Democrats pledge to resurrect their failed proposal to enact government health care in Wisconsin, we need only look to Massachusetts to learn valuable lessons about this flawed idea.

Jacob Goldstein writes in the Wall Street Journal that, “Massachusetts’s universal health-care plan is turning out to be more expensive than predicted. Now the state is looking at cutting payments to docs and hospitals next year to make ends meet.”

Goldstein points out that in Massachusetts, everyone is required to purchase health insurance. A plan containing subsidies to the poor has been, not surprisingly, more popular than predicted, so popular that the costs are now 20 per cent higher than Massachusetts budgeted. The Boston Globe reports the price tag for government health care in Massachusetts could be as high as $619 million for the current fiscal year, $147 million over budget.

Because the cost is so high, a board that oversees the health plans has given its approval to cuts of three to five percent in reimbursements to health-care providers caring for those in the subsidized plan. The board has yet to decide whether it should raise co-pays and other out-of-pocket costs for those with income above the poverty level. The Boston Globe reports doctor visits, prescription drugs and hospital care cost much less for those with subsidized insurance than for those that have private insurance.

Hillary Clinton and John Edwards want such a plan for the entire country. Senate Democrats in Wisconsin want such a plan for our state that would impose the largest tax increase in the history of the United States.

The end result would be higher taxes, higher premiums, and health care rationing.

No thank you.

Democrats who control the state Senate aren’t happy unless they’re coming up with new ways to reach into your pockets and take away more of your hard-earned money.

Remember “Healthy Wisconsin,” the Senate Democrats’ incredibly expensive government health care plan proposed in the state budget? The plan became the target of national ridicule.

In an editorial in July titled, “Cheese Headcases,” the Wall Street Journal wrote:

“Wow, is "free" health care expensive. The plan would cost an estimated $15.2 billion, or $3 billion more than the state currently collects in all income, sales and corporate income taxes. It represents an average of $510 a month in higher taxes for every Wisconsin worker.

Employees and businesses would pay for the plan by sharing the cost of a new 14.5% employment tax on wages. Wisconsin businesses would have to compete with out-of-state businesses and foreign rivals while shouldering a 29.8% combined federal-state payroll tax, nearly double the 15.3% payroll tax paid by non-Wisconsin firms for Social Security and Medicare combined.

This employment tax is on top of the $1 billion grab bag of other levies that Democratic Governor Jim Doyle proposed and the tax-happy Senate has also approved, including a $1.25 a pack increase in the cigarette tax, a 10% hike in the corporate tax, and new fees on cars, trucks, hospitals, real estate transactions, oil companies and dry cleaners. In all, the tax burden in the Badger State could rise to 20% of family income, which is slightly more than the average federal tax burden.

As if that's not enough, the health plan includes a tax escalator clause allowing an additional 1.5 percentage point payroll tax to finance higher outlays in the future. This could bring the payroll tax to 16%.”

The plan did not make its way into the final state budget. But Senate Democrats aren’t giving up on their plan to mandate government health care. Senate Majority Leader Russ Decker told the Wausau Daily Herald that their government health care plan will be re-introduced early next year.

According to the Wausau Daily Herald, “The plan would group employer-sponsored health insurance into one pool, thereby spreading risk among a larger population and lowering costs for employers and workers alike. Those who are self-employed would be able to buy in as well. The plan would be funded through a $15 billion payroll tax.”

That’s not all.

Senator Decker also told the newspaper that Senate Democrats will introduce a measure exempting the first $60,000 of a home's value from local school taxes.

The Daily Herald reports, “That would ease the burden on low- and middle-income folks but bring less money to school districts. To make up for the loss, tax rates on home values above $60,000 would be raised -- a rate that also would apply to commercial and industrial properties. For example, the owner of a $150,000 home would pay no taxes on the first $60,000 of the home's value, but a higher rate on the remaining $90,000 of value.”

That could result in a huge tax increase for Wisconsin homeowners who already pay some of the highest, if not the highest property taxes in the nation.

The Senate Democrats see government spending, tax increases, and government mandates as the solution to every problem. It appears their goal is to see the day that Wisconsin ranks number 1 in all forms of taxes. We must do everything possible to make sure that does not happen.

Guess again.

Momentum is slowly building in the high-profile state of California to enact government health care.

Stateline.org reports, “California has 6.6 million uninsured – more than any state – and a third of those reside in Los Angeles County, according to the California HealthCare Foundation, a nonprofit group that studies the state’s health-care delivery and financing. A trendsetting state on issues from cleaning up smog to banning toxic plastics in toys, California now could become a prime test bed for universal health care.”

Here is the stateline.org report.

Think it couldn’t happen here?

Senate Democrats vow to return with another catastrophically expensive government health care plan.

Government health care was rejected during the budget process and it must be defeated when the plan resurfaces.

The latest results of an annual study that examines patient outcomes at 5,000 hospitals across the nation show the best care was found in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin.

The 10th annual Health Grades Hospital Quality in America Study released last week ranked the best and worst regions and states in the country for hospital care.

Here is the story with more details and the complete study.

The study is yet another perfect example of why Wisconsin doesn’t need government health care.

News reports about Senate Democrats taking their $15.2 billion government health care plan off the state budget negotiating table are misleading and confusing.

The fact is the Senate Democrats offered to take their government health care proposal off the table IF Republicans would agree to other big tax increases. A state government health care plan isn’t going away. In typical Democrat fashion, they will work incrementally and incessantly, continuing to bring the plan back again and again.

I’ve written extensively about the problematic Senate Democrat plan. Los Angeles radio talk show host Frank Pastore provides another take, likening government health to an all-you can–eat buffet. Pastore writes in a column:

“There’s one fundamental dynamic that must be changed in our health care system, whether we go the liberal or the conservative route, and it has to do with basic human nature.

If something is free, it will be undervalued, underappreciated, taken for granted with a sense of entitlement, over-consumed, and ultimately wasted before finally being rationed. Think of those cafeteria-style restaurants with an all-you-can-eat buffet. Would we get healthier people and waste less food by giving them a “Free Buffet Coupon” every day for dinner or a $20 bill and the choice of ordering off a menu and keeping the change?

Obviously, someone does pay for the “free” healthcare provided to the poor: the American taxpayer.

But, instead of taxpayers handing a “Free Buffet Coupon” directly to the cashier for all the poor, what we’ve got to do is provide the poor—and all health care consumers—with a greater sense of ownership, individual responsibility and choice to eliminate the incentive to overeat and waste food.

The best way to do this is with money, either in the form of cash or credit.

After all, if we want people to save for college or retirement, we offer them a tax-free IRA.

If we want people to buy houses, we allow them to deduct the mortgage interest from their taxable income.

And, if we want people to save money for health care, we should let them open a tax-free Health Savings Account.

And, if we want them to buy health insurance, we should allow them to deduct the health insurance premiums.

Put simply, if we want people to lead healthier lives, we need to give them the incentive to do so.”

Here is Pastore’s column in its entirety.

It is appropriately entitled, “No More Free Lunch at the Health Care Buffet,” because free health care is far from free.

The Coalition for America’s Families has produced a spot criticizing the Senate Democrats’ $15.2 billion government health care plan.

The Senate Democrats’ proposed $15.2 billion government health care plan would provide abortions on demand at taxpayer cost. Wisconsin taxpayers should know that under the Senate Democrats’ government health care plan, they would be subsidizing abortions on demand, anytime, anywhere, no questions asked.

Senate Democrats touting their Healthy Wisconsin proposal claim people in Wisconsin should receive the same coverage state employees get. The state employee Standard Plan for health coverage covers all legal abortions. Also, the HMO plans for state employees use the state employee Uniform Benefits Plan that covers therapeutic abortions.

I contacted the Wisconsin Legislative Council (WLC) to ask the following:

1. What abortion coverage is currently available under the state employee health plans?

2. In particular, what does “therapeutic abortions” mean under the Uniform Benefits plan (see page D-18) used by HMOs that provide health insurance coverage for state employees? What specific abortions would be covered, or not covered?

3. Do any of the health insurance providers for state employee health plans provide more abortion coverage than they are currently required to provide?

4. How many abortions have been paid for persons covered by the state employee health plans in the last few years?

The WLC contacted the Department of Employee Trust Funds (DETF) and informed me the state contracts with health plans to provide a uniform benefit package. That uniform benefit package includes therapeutic abortions, and the DETF does not define the term therapeutic abortion. Then-Attorney General Jim Doyle in 1995 wrote that one possible definition from a medical textbook relates to the health of the mother, cases of rape, and deformed children. However, DETF has not defined the term. DETF does not have information on the number of abortions that have been paid for with regard to persons covered under state employee health plans.

This is deeply disturbing. The state pays for unrestricted abortions and either fails to keep records or has never kept track of the number of abortions or the cost of the abortions it provides. State taxpayers are covering the cost of abortions. There must be transparency, and it is sorely lacking. Where is the oversight?

Regardless of a stance on abortion, this should be alarming to Wisconsinites. If the Senate Democrats’ government health care proposal replaces the current health care system, taxpayers will be forced to fund abortions.

Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce (WMC) has released a poll showing Wisconsinites do not favor government health care as proposed by state Senate Democrats’.

WMC reports, “The survey found 64 percent of voters support market-based health care reform. And, 54 percent of voters disapprove of the government-run health care plan passed in the Senate, with opposition centered on the potential for health care rationing and waiting lists; higher taxes; and various labor market distortions.”

To read more details, here is the WMC press release on the poll and a memo by Public Opinion Strategies that conducted the poll.

Calling it scary, I blogged that, “The Senate Democrats’ government health care plan, Healthy Wisconsin, includes sweeping new taxing authority. The plan calls for the creation of a 16-member board.”

Just how scary would this new taxing authority be? Imagine an unelected board with the power to raise taxes by $20-billion.

In one of its latest reports, “Taxing: Who gets to decide?” the non-partisan Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance (WTA) provides more details about the troubling taxing authority that would be created under the Senate Democrats’ Healthy Wisconsin plan.

The WTA reports:

Healthy Wisconsin” (HW)—has generated much debate because it would effectively end private health insurance offered through employers and impose major new payroll taxes on employers and employees.

However, the governance and funding aspects of HW have received scant attention. This is somewhat surprising, for the proposal includes a rarity in Wisconsin—an unelected board with taxing powers. The board’s charge is also broad: to establish and administer “a health care system in the state that ensures that all eligible persons have access to high quality, timely, and affordable health care.”

All 16 voting members of the new Board of Trustees would be appointed by the governor. Given that HW legislation explicitly specifies board membership, it is unlikely that it would include any elected public officials. Board membership would consist of:

Four members each selected by labor unions and by business and employer organizations (including one public employer);

• Three nominated by health-care consumer groups;

• Two nominated by farm groups; and

• One each selected by the statewide teachers’ union, small business organizations, and from the ranks of the self-employed.

Among its many duties, the board would be authorized to fund the plan by imposing a 2% to 4% wage tax on employees, a 9% to 10% wage tax on the self-employed, a 9% to 12% wage tax on employers, and a 10% income tax on those without social security wages.

According to the proposal, “the board may annually increase or decrease” these assessments, although the percentage increase cannot exceed the rate of medical inflation.

What is staggering is the magnitude of the board’s potential revenue. The WTA continues:

Initially put at $15.2b in 2007 dollars, given prevailing trends in wages and health costs, its taxing authority could approach $20b in three to five years. The taxing authority of the unelected HW board would exceed that of any public body, elected or unelected. Specifically, the board’s $15.2b in payroll taxes would surpass the taxes imposed by elected officials at the state ($13.92b), school ($3.59b), municipal ($2.35b), and county ($1.96b) levels.

Such astounding taxing authority is unparalleled in the history of the state of Wisconsin. The unelected board established under the senate Democrats’ government health care would ultimately have the ability to raise more taxes than anyone else in Wisconsin. This proposal would be a complete disaster for over-burdened Wisconsin taxpayers not able and not willing to afford such an outrageously expensive proposition.