Given that this is the year that we finally see an income tax initiative on the ballot, it’s hard for me to believe that this could be the worst initiative season ever… but this has gotta be the worst initiative season ever.
I mean, honestly, the way that corporate interests have so totally hijacked our state’s initiative process this year makes Tim Eyman look like Thomas Jefferson.
Let’s see. The first 20 seconds of the ad say nothing, whatsoever, about the actual initiative, except that it is called I-1082.
Then they rattle off their points. The first is false: the ad says it “hands Washington’s worker’s compensation to the insurance company.” It DOES NOT. It ALLOWS the creation of new, parallel, private insurance. And they do not explain in any way why this is a bad thing.
The second point is just a bald-faced lie: it does not, in any way whatsoever, allow insurance companies to wrongfully deny or delay legitimate claims.
The last lie^Wpoint about a kickback scheme is so ludicrous it’s not even worth responding to … especially since there’s literally nothing to respond to.
This ad gives NO reasons to vote no on 1082.
I was hoping to hear some actual argument against 1082, since I like to hear both sides. Unfortunately, if this is the best the no-on-1082 people can do, it appears their only real case is that they want government control, and damn the facts, and damn liberty.
It seems to me if they had an actual argument, they would have made it, instead of spending half the ad on ad hominem against BIAWa, and the other half on misrpresentations of the initiative.
And it’s going to go on, and on, and on, and on…
The Roberts Court–trying to outdo the Taney Court.
If there is anything the past forty years has taught us, it’s that privatization always has a deleterious effect.
Washington’s worker compensation program works well. It offers better benefits at a lower cost than most states. In fact, the system is so efficient , it runs a surplus. So, since we have a functioning system that efficiently delivers promised benefits at a reasonable cost, which is shared by everyone via payroll taxes, what is behind the campaign for I-1082?
Money.
The BIAW used to be able to skim (actually steal) tens of millions of dollars per annum from the surplus and use that money (our money) to fund corporate political campaigns that destroyed the middle class. Olympia reformed the program so that the BIAW could not steal as much money as they used to. Now the BIAW, AIG and Liberty want to find a new way to re-appropriate that money and continue the transfer of wealth from the working poor and middle class to corporate oligarchs. I-1082 forces the State AG to represent private insurance companies in appeals and to argue against citizens who have been wronged by insurance companies – for free.
40 million dollars in costs would be shifted to tax payers. I-1082 would mean a 25% tax increase for small business. It forces the state to pay for all administrative costs over 4% from the General Fund. (the current system’s administrative cost is about 18%)
What we really need is an initiative to do away with the initiative process – that is something that is truly broken.
@1 Commas, colons, CAPS, dots, lies and even “bald-faced lies”. You’re definitely delivering the full package today, Pudge.
Are these the same profit-driven insurance companies, one of them being AIG, that jack up rates each year while providing huge bonuses and golden parachutes for their failed CEO’s?
Is there anything to prevent these insurance companies from cherry-picking low-risk employers from the public non-profit system? How would this benefit employers who want to stay with the existing system? Wouldn’t it drive up their costs?
If an empoyee had a claim dispute, would that person be better off dealing with L&I or Wall Street?
Has worker’s comp privatization in other states ever led to taxpayer-funded bailouts in order to maintain worker coverage and benefits when an insurance company goes bankrupt? How did the CEO’s of those bankrupt companies fare?
Yep, those private insurance companies administering workman’s comp (“industrial insurance” in this state) are real paragons of virtue!!!! Certainly they wouldn’t wrongly deny claims!!!! That would be WRONG!!!! Of course, cutting off benefits to “shirkers” and those “fraudulently continuing to collect claims” is another matter – we should REWARD them for their efforts on that behalf, right???? (Just in case it doesn’t come out in print, heavy sarcasm is intended).
Of course, insurance adjusters will inevitably get to the point where they believe that all claimants are either outright frauds (not really hurt), or fraudulently exaggerating their claims, or malingering. How does this happen?
1. The company tells them the worker wasn’t really hurt, or wasn’t hurt that bad, and the adjuster is told to assume the company is telling the truth, and the worker is not. Since the company is the customer (directly or indirectly), the company’s version of events become the insurance company’s accepted version.
2. The insurance adjuster will refer the claimant for an “independent medical exam”. There’s nothing independent about this exam. The doctor is chosen by the insurance company based upon his tendency to believe that no worker is ever really injured, at least not very badly. He writes his report accordingly.
3. The insurance company’s purpose is to increase it’s own profits. It can do so by raising premiums, increasing investment returns, or denying benefits. It’s ability to do the first two things is limited by the economy. So eventually the word will be given to adjusters to cull the files and reduce payouts. Adjusters who aren’t willing to do so will resign or be fired.
True story: A fellow was bedridden with a broken back due to an industrial accident, recovering from surgery to fuse his spine. The phone rings at his bedside. He picks it up.
Patient: “Hello”.
Caller: “Is this Mr. Bruce?”
Patient: “Yes, who is this?”.
Caller: “My name is Amy. How are you today?”
Patient: “Uh, okay, I guess. What’s this about?”.
Caller: “Oh, I’m your new representative at X insurance company, and I wanted to introduce myself, and let you know you can call me if you have any questions.”
Patient: “Okay, I guess.”
Caller: “You have a good day, Mr. Bruce”.
A week later, the guy receives a letter from the insurance company, saying that his benefits under his industrial insurance claim are being terminated since he is no longer injured.
In the subsequent appeal process, the following appeared in Amy’s report:
“In a telephone call to the claimant, he said he was fine, and suffered no ill-effects from what he had previously reported as an injury. Based on his statements, the claim should be closed”.
I-1082 is plutonomy at its finest.
Watch, as soon as the insurance companies get their hands on workers’ comp., they’ll complain about “frivolous lawsuits” the way they do with medical malpractice insurance and insist that A) they need to raise rates to cover awards and B) we need “tort reform.”
Big business fought the very idea of workers’ comp. for ages, claiming that it wasn’t even necessary – now, they want to take it over?
The fox wants to guard the hen-house.
@3 BIAW still has it’s grubby paws in the L&I money through the ROII program now they want more.
Most small contractors join Master Builders to get access to the ROII program which also requires that they join BIAW. Consequently most of these small contractors get all of their political info from these wack jobs.
My husband went to a Master Builders meeting a few years ago where someone, armed with power point slides direct from BIAW, stated that due to the CRA builders would not be able to build withing 200 ft of a douglas fir tree. He had no idea what he was talking about, just had the slide to prove his point.
If any changes need to be made to workers comp it is the need to get rid of the association link to the ROII program.
“Given that this is the year that we finally see an income tax initiative on the ballot, it’s hard for me to believe that this could be the worst initiative season ever… but this has gotta be the worst initiative season ever.”
Nope, the income tax initiative is the worst initiative on the ballot.
For whom?
Well, one point Pudge made that was not addressed- the kickback scheme he seems to says amidst his spelling and grammar problemsd oes not exist. Ahhh, yes it does. Start by reading the initiative. See the specific exclusion from regulation for group insurance and premiuym retentioon programs. The group insurance system set up would be the only unregulated such system in the country. In any other line of insurance, what the BIAW could do here with insurers to set up kick back arrangements, act as an unregulated middleman, set up their own claims handling programs- would land you in jail. But they make it legal and it all is unregulated!
This measure is highway robbery by insurers and by the BIAW. The crooks over there see this as their new golden goose since the ROI program, or retro, has literally shrunk 95% (Hey, Fairview fanny got something right the other day.)
Me thinks Pudge talks like BIAW, and must be a crony.