It’s SVTFOE hiatus, and you’re like “omg is Brian going to leak something about the new season” and I won’t (or will I?), but I am going to take time out of my day (during which I really need to write the music that brought you all here in the first place) to write about something very important to me. I hope over the years I have gained enough of your respect and trust that you will read this to the end. It’s about health care, but mostly about me and my family and how this bill screws us.
You probably know that the Graham-Cassidy bill is being set up for a vote sometime soon in the Senate (so that they can decide its fate before Sept 30, which is the deadline for them to only need 50 votes to pass it; after Sept 30, they will need 60, which would require bipartisan support). Let’s get it out in the open now: this is an unequivocally a bad bill. The last time the Senate brought forth a bill like this (the “skinny repeal” of the Affordable Care Act / Obamacare), that bill had 12% support from the American public, and the Graham-Cassidy bill is WORSE than the “skinny repeal” bill in many respects. I’ll let Jimmy Kimmel explain, because he’s funnier than I am:
K cool. We’re all up to speed. This bill sucks, all the major medical associations that you rely on oppose it, and the creators of the bill do not want you to know its details because they know you will hate it.
Here’s how this all affects me, personally.
A lot of you know that I had cancer in my 20s. I’ve discussed it openly here. It sucked, it was out of my control and probably written into my DNA and thus unavoidable, and while I am totally in remission now, it is something I think about every day, as I am at higher risk for certain other cancers in the future due to my treatment.
I am also a creative professional, as is my wife. We do not receive insurance from our employers. We are eligible for health insurance through our unions, but we have to log enough official union hours to qualify. THE MUSICIANS UNION DOES NOT INCLUDE COMPOSERS. I can log union hours as an orchestrator or instrumentalist, but only if a show I am working on is a “union show” and I “hire myself” to orchestrate, which is weird. I have never composed for a union show. Some of us composers never will. (There are very few union shows. That’s a whole other issue.) Basically, it is almost a certainty that I will never qualify for health insurance on my own.
My wife, on the other hand, is part of the Writers’ Guild of America (WGA), and whenever she works on a show (she’s on The Flash, Tuesdays this fall on the CW!), it is highly likely that she will qualify for insurance. Very good insurance. But, she is under the same constraints as me, in that she must earn a certain amount of money in a year to qualify. If she works on a short gig, or if she goes on maternity leave and misses a TV season, then we will not qualify for union insurance and will have to purchase it out-of-pocket.
Okay, here’s where the Graham-Cassidy bill royally screws us over. Check out this map from the The Washington Post (or go here and then come back).
See California way over there to the left? We could lose $78 BILLION in funding if this bill passes. That is almost double the state that would lose the second most (New York). This funding is used to stabilize the health insurance market. It’s very complicated to explain why, so I won’t try to do that here because I’d probably get it wrong anyway. If you’re curious, Google (and time – health insurance is super convoluted) is your friend.
What will that loss of funding do? NO ONE FUCKING KNOWS. IT’S SO MUCH. UC Berkeley kind of guessed, hypothesizing that 6.7 million people would lose their insurance. Or that essential services would be cut. And that kids, or people with disabilities, or senior citizens would suffer the brunt.
(Difficult to spot SVTFOE S3 spoiler, not located at the end of this post because I know some of you might just scroll to the end: I scored an entire episode for season 3 primarily with nylon Latin guitar, to reflect a specific character who is the focus of the episode. It doesn’t sound like any other episode to date.)
The Graham-Cassidy bill allows states to decide whether to let insurance providers charge more for people with preexisting conditions. How much more? Well take a look at this chart.
Hey look, there’s “other cancers” on the third line and there’s that absurd surcharge of $73,000. And oh look there’s fucking PREGNANCY (successful, perfectly healthy pregnancy, like my wife had), and there’s a rise in cost of $17,000. That’s an additional $90,000. Great. Would California eliminate pre-existing condition protections? I mean, probably not, we’re super progressive. BUT WHO KNOWS, WE MIGHT LOSE $78 BILLION IN FUNDING.
So what’s the better alternative? There’s enough discontent about Obamacare that, yes, the bill should be reviewed and strengthened. BUT. This should be done with MEMBERS OF BOTH PARTIES (and they’re trying right now, but the GOP is like nah, let’s pass this shitty bill instead because we hate Obama hardcore). If Graham-Cassidy fails, then the Senate will HAVE TO create a bipartisan solution, because they will need 60 votes to pass it.
Listen, I didn’t ask to get cancer. I have never smoked, I have maybe like 4 drinks a year. I exercise multiple times a week. Our home is vegetarian. I did everything right, and I still got sick. When Obamacare passed, I sighed a huge sigh of relief, because I was protected from being gutted by insurance companies (which are profit-based). Now? Now I’m pretty fucking stressed. If my wife and I aren’t working, it means we aren’t making any money, and this is exactly the situation in which the Graham-Cassidy bill would expect us to pay MORE money for health insurance. How does that make any sense?
What can you do? Call 202-224-3121. Tell them this bill sucks. ESPECIALLY CALL if you live in Arizona or Alaska or West Virginia or Maine. Your senators will most likely be the deciding votes. But everyone call. It only takes a few minutes but can protect millions of Americans like me.
Thanks for reading.
This post has already gotten way more views and love than I initially expected, and it warms my heart and gives me hope. I’ll reblog it every day until the deadline, ten days from now. Call. Please.
Also, Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who will be a deciding vote (and voted no on the “skinny repeal,” standing up to her party LIKE A BOSS) is reportedly listening to calls from people who don’t live in Alaska. If you oppose this bill as strongly as I do, let her know how you feel. I don’t agree with her on a lot of issues, but she is in a position to help people here, and I am thankful for that. Here is Sen. Murkowski’s direct office line, and you can leave a voicemail if you don’t like talking to an actual person: 202-224-6665.
And finally, I just want to reiterate that I agree that the Affordable Care Act needs work. It helps people, but it doesn’t help everyone. We can encourage our senators to include everyone in this process by forcing them to listen to us now.
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