It would appear there is a building argument against the "Free market economy" as opposed to the free enterprise economy of 40 years ago. The definition of which is the management of the economy by private individuals. We now see the effects of that in the loss in the wealth of average Americans of 25% that continues even today.
We see Goldman Sachs quite profitable while the unemployment rate continues to climb, it was Goldman Sachs that was instrumental in removing the regulations that protected Main Street, people like Bush. Gramm and Greenspan were enablers
We see it in the $1.4 million the insurance companies spend per day to thwart health care reform. Fully half of Congress has been bought and paid for by Wall Street and the Insurance companies to insure their continued profitability and control as America sinks into the abyss.
It would appear giving the responsibility of financial policy and health care policy to the private sector was not the best thing for the greater good of American and that is what the ???Free Market Economy??? is all about.
Daniel Gross
Good Luck With That Retirement!
Medicare and Social Security are in terrible shape. Unfortunately, private-sector health and pension plans are doing even worse.
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Unlike my colleague Robert Samuelson, I'm not too worried about the impending bankruptcy of Medicare and Social Security, the government-run programs designed to provide health care and pensions to Americans. The two programs, he notes, will start to run low on cash in 2017 and 2037, respectively.
But funding these programs adequately is more a matter of will than financial ability. We can choose to fund the health care and a guaranteed retirement income for our older citizens, or we can choose not to. (Those answering "not to" should provide an acceptable poverty rate for the elderly. Thirty percent? Fifty percent?) More importantly, before we freak out about potential public-sector failures in the future, we should be seriously freaking out about the current failure of the private-sector systems designed to provide health care and retirement benefits to Americans.
PERSONAL FINANCE
Corporate America got theirs. Here's how to construct your own financial rescue plan.
People in the business community often argue against expanding public health care and pension benefits, arguing that this would raise taxes and that the private sector can do a better job providing those benefits than the government. But the evidence is mounting that the private sector can't.
Take health care. Before this recession started in late 2007, there were 45 million people without health insurance, of whom 21 million worked full-time, according to this exhaustive Census report. In 2007, the percentage of people covered by employment-based health insurance fell to 59.3 percent, or 177.4 million people, down from 64.2 percent in 2000, while the number of people covered by government health insurance rose from 80.3 million to 83 million. But Census's definition of "government health insurance" applies only to those covered by Medicare, Medicaid, the military or SCHIP (pronounced S-chip) programs. If you add in the millions of people who work for the government and in public-sector jobs (e.g., teachers), the private sector probably covered about 160 million people in 2007. Since December 2007, however, the number of Americans receiving insurance from private-sector companies has dropped sharply, since the private sector has shed 6 million jobs during that period.
In this long and deep recession, those who still have private-sector jobs are now increasingly less likely to find that it comes with insurance. "Accelerating health-care premiums and sharp revenue shortfalls due to the recession are forcing some small companies to choose between dropping health insurance or laying off workers—or staying in business at all," Dana Mattioli reported in The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday. The National Small Business Association (NSBA) reports that last year, the percentage of small businesses providing health coverage fell to 38 percent, down sharply from 67 percent in 1995. A new NSBA survey found that 9.8 percent are considering getting rid of it over the next year. A Hewitt Associates survey cited by the Journal said 19 percent of companies want to cease offering insurance over the next three to five years. Like Jonathan Weber, a small-business owner and blogger at the Big Money, more owners are wondering why they have to provide health care to employees. Business is clearly getting out of the business of providing health insurance to workers.
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