Hagan still a key vote; new numbers on BC/BS monopoly

Kay Hagan may be talking about a public option as she tours the state this week, but her office says she's still considering various plans and has not yet even endorsed any form of public option — let alone a robust one.

That's interesting, because Talking Points Memo is reporting that a draft of a public option has been leaked from the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committee - one of the committees Hagan sits on, and the committee most likely to introduce a public option in the Senate. Here's TPM's take on the draft:

"Initial reports of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions process suggested that the committee's draft would call for a public option that paid providers Medicare rates plus about 10 percent--a robust plan . . .

"This leak doesn't rule that configuration out explicitly--but if it's accurate, then the committee's kicking the issue back over to the executive branch, and insisting only that the public plan operate on at least a level playing field with private insurers.

"It's unclear whether this language will please freshman Sen. Kay Hagan (D-NC)--the HELP Democrat whose reservations about the public option have forced the committee to modify their plan and delay its roll out."

So there you have it — we're still waiting to find out whether a slightly watered-down (though strong enough to satisfy SEIU president Andy Stern) public option is sufficiently weak to satisfy Senator Hagan. My guess is that someone on the committee wants folks to know that every other Democrat is working in good faith to produce something close to President Obama's vision, and that Kay Hagan is the sole obstacle. Her D.C. number: (202) 224-6342.

Now for the really shocking news:

Adam Linker of the North Carolina Health Access Coalition has been putting out some key information about Blue Cross/Blue Shield's near-monopoly power in this state. And today he's come up with some shocking figures which take BCBSNC out of the near-monopoly category and into the Standard-Oil-type-monopoly category.

Here's the deal: as I mentioned last week, there's a 3 in 4 chance that a North Carolinian holding private insurance - whether through their employer, or as an individual policy-holder - is insured by Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina. Adam was my source for the "3 in 4" number; he has looked at that number again, and come up with roughly the same result, saying that BCBSNC controls about 72.5% of the private market in this state. That's bad enough, but for individual policy-holders, buying insurance on their own, BCBSNC controls 96.8% of the market.

So it's no wonder BCBSNC wants to shut down a public option (though it's perfectly justified to wonder what sort of pressure they're putting on Kay Hagan). Any competition from the government would cut their market share, and could cut it significantly. By pushing for a public option, we're trying to create a free market in health insurance, not eliminate it.

Oh, and in other news, a BCBSNC lobbyist was just acquitted on bribery charges.

(Cross-posted at Scrutiny Hooligans.)