Health Insurance Reform: Bravo Barack; KO Kay Lazar

I’d like to appaud Barack Obama for Wednesday night’s eloquent and powerful speech on health insurance reform–and the Globe’s Kay Lazar for her excellent elucidation  of his points as they relate to the difficult situation faced by small businesses in Massachusetts.  Relief in State Health Plan Sought, Boston Globe, 9-11-09./

Much as I appreciate the Massachusetts Health Initiative requiring  health insurance for all,  not being able to join other small businesses or organizations in order to bargain with health insurers has has forced me and many of my colleagues to pay a very hefty price.

 

As an independent consultant pf a certain age,  I’ve had to pay nearly $10, 000 a year for health insurance. I’m fine with paying for insurance; eight years ago, Blue Cross  helped me through a  health crisis and I’ve been fine ever since.

 

But I don’t understand why, unlike other states, Massachusetts prohibits small businesses and the self-employed  from grouping together to bargain with insurers on behalf of individuals of different ages and categories of risk.  Nor do I understand why I should have to pay so much more than others just because, during economic ups and downs of the last decades,  they’ve managed to hold onto full time jobs.  

I wholeheartedly support the Obama plan–which incorporates the strengths of the Massachusetts initiative and omits the weaknesses. And  I wish Governor Deval Patrick success in his attempts to change the 1996 law Lazar mentions in order to give small businesses in Massachusetts the bargaining power they need to gain a much needed financial lift.

—Anita Harris, President
Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA

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