you re a budget hawk. or do you support the president s agenda fully even if it means not having a balanced budget? i think we have to continue to balance. right now in congress everyone talks about a ten-year window. and what s happened in the last couple years is we force ourselves to hit the ten-year window to balance, balance in ten years, but then no one pays attention to the out years. it hits balance and then goes into outer space for the out years. the goal would be starting immediately but also over a generation, really bend the cost curve down. there are three programs driving 70% of the debt. among them being social security, medicare and medicaid. and that s after the money that we as taxpayers and workers put into it. so that s how we have to have this discussion.
in the industrialized world has to settle for. why should they pay out of pocket month after month after month to pay for something as basic as a hospitalization or maternity services or, you know, the rest of this list. there may be things on the list would he disagree with. but i m worried we re headed to a choice tto one else in the industrialized world has to accept. i accept your goal and i hope we can work together to make it so. you mentioned we should listen to the governors, which brings me to my second question and your answer to senator portman. in colorado, you may have heard this. we have something called the accountable care collaborative that is a unique approach to medicaid. it connects members with coordinated primary care providers while reducing various taxes. it also provides coordinate care for those with dual eligibility for medicare and medicaid. i could show you the cost curve
different states coming up with different approaches. and it may well be that there s a new approach out there that helps to bend the cost curve more on health care costs because one of the problems of the affordable care act is there s nothing affordable about it. how are you going to now walk me through the coalition that you re going get to 60 on this. why is it the way forward? first of all, we are the first senators to put a concrete plan out there. and we expected it to be shot at by both sides, but it s so important if we re going to get to a solution that we advance specific proposals. then they can be refined, amended, and ultimately enacted. we re talking to members on both sides of the aisle. and it s attractive to people who realize that premiums have gone through the roof in their states. it s also a attractive to people
100% of the medicaid expansion, have given medicaid care companies generous contracts. i ve seen some of these. they are worth more per beneficiary than a blue cross/blue shield policy which covers everything. so we change that, and make it so that all these costs aren t being passed on. the federal taxpayer rather is protected, cost curve begins to bend down. you were telling me just when we were in the break that you practiced this as recently as five or six weeks ago. yes. and you volunteer at a clinic. do you see this unnerving impact it s had on so many people, who haver in had insurance before and afraid it s going to be taken away? what is unnerving when someone has a bronze level plan with a $6,000 deductible, and she has to go to the urgent care daught earhe because she has a $6,000 deductible. we pre-fund a health savings
it, some states won t keep it. is the plan financially feesible? yes t is financially feasible because we take the dollars that are currently allocated for obamacare and we just redistribute those to this system. i would argue it is more financially feetible under obamacare the open-ended obligation where folks can pass their costs to the federal taxpayer and she or he is out no matter what is passed to them. under ours a per beneficiary payment so if you will align the incentives. the state has an incentive to watch cost, the federal taxpayer is protected but we provide essential benefits for those lower income. i want to make sure i m clear. you re not changing the money federal government is sfending on this, but the way it s distributed. yes. does that answer concerns of republicans saying this is too expensive? no, we begin to bend the cost curve so as opposed to state medicaid programs which because the federal taxpayer is paying