Political Quotes

“one of the key components that many Members on this side of the aisle would like to see accomplished is to draw as many people as possible into the competitive model set up in this bill. We believe it is the more efficient, higher quality delivery of health care services, the Medicare Advantage plan. Unfortunately, through negotiations, a lot of the incentives the President has to encourage people to get into those plans and thereby make them work have been taken out in the current version on the floor. That is to the great consternation, I know, of the White House and many Members on this side of the aisle. For quite some time I have been trying to think how they can create incentives--carrots, if you will, as opposed to sticks--to encourage people to get into these kinds of plans. Originally, I intended to offer a differential benefit--in other words, a benefit that would have what I call a standard benefit in the fee-for-service option and an enhanced benefit in the Medicare Advantage option. I was fairly convinced, in discussing with the people on my side of the aisle, we probably would not have a chance to succeed; that there were people who had made commitments that a differential benefit was not something for this time. I went about trying to figure out, could we create incentives to people to come into Medicare Advantage, which I believe is the future of Medicare and the best way to run the system without creating a differential benefit.”