Divided We Fail
AARP launches nonpartisan effort urging health care and financial solutionsBy BILL SHEA, Messenger staff writer
Article Photos
While federal leaders struggle to fix a financial system that appears to be coming apart at the seams, a few grim economic facts that may hit closer to home remain under the radar for the moment.
For instance, an estimated 46 million Americans have no health insurance.
And some 22 percent of American workers report having no savings of any kind.
Those statistics were collected by the AARP as it tries to prod people of all political affiliations to join forces against the problems besetting health care and financial security.
The effort, called Divided We Fail, was introduced in Fort Dodge at a Monday evening dinner attended by about 40 people at Bonanza in the Crossroads Mall.
Bruce Koeppl, the Iowa state director for AARP, called it the largest effort the group has launched.
He said it's designed to help break political gridlock and produce solutions.
Koeppl said Divided We Fail won't give money to candidates or political action committees. Instead, it will rely on volunteers, he said.
''What we have is people power,'' he said. ''What we have is you.''
Koeppl summarized some potential solutions Monday evening, but added that Divided We Fail won't endorse any plan.
''I thought he brought out a lot of points,'' Ray Harris, of Fort Dodge, said after the nearly two-hour session.
Harris believes part of the solution is to give retirees more money through Social Security. The cost of utilities, housing and gasoline take most of the monthly benefits, he said. And he's not interested in any suggestion that the government doesn't have the money to increase benefits. The way he sees things, any government that can contemplate a Wall Street bailout costing billions can come up with more money for its senior citizens.
''I think the people in the stock market are getting too much money in their pocket,'' Harris said.
Koeppl said these health care reform options are likely to be debated:
Requiring people to have health insurance.
Using the tax system to help move the country away from the current practice of having insurance linked to a person's job.
Expanding Medicare to cover more people.
Providing incentives for preventive care.
Rewarding efficiency on the part of medical providers.
Massachusetts has a state law requiring its citizens to have health insurance. Koeppl said such a plan has been debated in Iowa, but hasn't been enacted because there's a shortage of affordable insurance options.
Koeppl said the concept of rewarding medical providers for efficiency is usually linked with a plan for an electronic medical records system that would enable doctors anywhere to get a patient's data. That, he said, won't solve the problem, although it could reduce administrative costs.
Koeppl expects these possibilities to be debated in the quest to address financial security issues:
Creating savings accounts for each newborn.
Expanding tax incentives that help people save money.
Automatic enrollment in Individual Retirement Accounts for workers who don't have 401(k) plans.
Requiring schools to teach students about savings, loans, mortgages and other financial basics.
Savings accounts for babies is an inviting option, Koeppl said, but it's an expensive one.
A bill requiring schools to teach financial basics was set aside in this year's legislative session over concerns about fitting that into already crowded curriculums, he added.
Contact Bill Shea at (515) 573-2141 or bshea@messengernews.net
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4fairness
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10-01-08 11:20 AM
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I agree with all of these posts. One of the reasons we don't have affordable health insurance is because of programs like Medicare and Title XIX which use our tax dollars to pay for others' health care. The process is so skewed that it can't be competitive anymore. Providers take such big hits from those welfare programs that they have to charge the other health companies more to make up for it and then the health companies have to charge more for their premiums. We've become a nanny nation where we look to the government to solve the problems they've created.
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Anderson
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10-01-08 12:14 AM
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AARP is controlled by socialist federal govt retirees and gets over $80 million from various federal programs to help promote its socialist agenda. What isn't noted in its propaganda is that some 12-15 million of the "uninsured" are illegal aliens and they, as do all others who aren't insured, have access to free medical care by just walking into any emergency room. (As an alternative to AARP, join USA United Seniors Association, Inc. / 1-800-8USA.USA) As for State medicine, I lived with it in Europe and it was usually satisfactory for routine treatments, but when they couldn't, or wouldn't, provide a needed service, I and my family were back in the States, along - I should note - with a number of top European govt leaders for whom I arranged treatment at top American clinics. Innovation seems nearly to stop when health care is nationalized.
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TheConservative
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09-30-08 9:43 PM
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Sorry, their name sounds good, but this is just another entity that wants bigger government, and more control over our lives by socializing our health care system. I want to know how many of the people who do not have health insurance have a cell phone, cable or satelite TV, a computer and the internet, and spend money on "wants", or personal gradification before they meet their "needs", or the needs of their families. I carry insurance for my family, because it is the responisble thing to do, and yes we make sacrifices in order to do so. Our country is not in a "crisis of health care", we are in a "crisis of greed and personal gradification" over personnal responsibility. And I for one do not want to have my money taken from me, so someone else can continue to engage in irresponsible activities. Our health care system is the best in the world, and we should not let the government screw it up!
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Xdodger76
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09-30-08 5:12 PM
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Out of the 301,139,947 Americans. I am not going to worry about a few who do not have insurance, because they choose not to work, choose not to study in school, choose not to show some ambition. Besides if they had time to show up for this and complain THEY HAVE TIME TO FIND A JOB!!!!
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jaybares
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09-30-08 7:38 AM
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What is the Business Roundtable and how would they fit in with AARP?
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kaleidoscope
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09-30-08 12:30 AM
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AARP embraces a socialist agenda while making billions off citizens aged 50+ from memberships and insurance policies. They spend millions on lobbying efforts promoting their agendas while hiding behind non-profit status.
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jaybares
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09-30-08 12:13 AM
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With all the discussion about "Bailouts", do we really want more bureauracy? Think your independence through.
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