Why do they call them Co-ops when they don't have a product, insurance in this case, which they

market to themselves and to others?

Aren't these just going to be just buying clubs, re-packaging and re-selling existing health insurance products?

How does that reduce the cost of health insurance when it just adds another layer of insurance delivery jobs?

So co-ops "buy" coverage wholesale from Ins Co, and Ins Co gives them special rates on the types of coverage the co-ops buy, so there is some reduction in the cost to us there, but it seems that even if the co-ops were non-profit they'd still eat up any cost advantage in just overhead. Sounds like a pretty good deal for Ins Co though, because they then get nearly the same amount of business without having to sustain the overhead for it themselves.

As someone here said yesterday, "How changealicious!".

At first I thought they would be like Credit Unions or Farmers' co-operatives.

But all it looks like is another kind of packaging for Ins Co. They already sell Group products. This is just another kind of Group, except it's groups for which they will have waaaaaaay less overhead.

to manipulate.

raging, Ins Co holds ALL of the face cards.

The co-ops are intended to be very expensive and ineffectual. It is a ruse intended to make Obama and the Blue Dogs look good.

IN FACT, THE ONLY PEOPLE WHO WILL LOOK GOOD IF THE CO-OP IDEA IS MADE INTO LAW ARE THE TEA-BAGGERS AND RON PAUL EXTREMISTS. Mark my words on this. This "compromise" is a cop-out that will have dire consequences for the future of our country.

We need to inundate Obama with e-mails warning him that we will not support him in 2012 unless he either forgoes health insurance reform altogether and honestly admits defeat or gets a robust public option or single payer insurance. Compromising on this will lead to disaster. Better nothing than a compromise that harms the American people and costs more than the present coverage.

usiness?"

Ins Cos A, B, and C will make offers A, B, and C based upon their estimate of some range that represents the most you'll pay for your co-ops' inventory of insurance products and the least they can/will leverage the revenue for in their own finances. All little ol' co-op you have going for you is your group(s) and the number of competing Ins Cos. The actual leveraging is done by the ones who are doing the financing, that's Ins Co, which leveraging, BTW, is largely a Private and Un-regulated process, right?

A co-op is an organization that is run and managed by members. It is sometimes co-opted by companies that want to fool people into thinking there is something folksy and cheap about the services they are offering. But if members don't have at least a big say in the policies and choice of management of the "co-op" there is nothing co-op about them. Co-ops that aren't cooperatively managed are just yet another sales gimmick.

Co-ops cannot compete with health insurance companies and failed to compete when they were tried in California because
1) if they are truly co-ops they were and will be too small and too weak to compete with the huge insurance conglomerates like United Health Care and Blue Shield and Blue Cross;
2) no matter what size they are, they will not be able to provide competent, inexpensive services. (That is why the insurance companies are arguing for co-ops -- they will prove very expensive. That is what happened when they tried them in California.)

The co-op idea is intended as a soppy biscuit to be thrown at those of us who want real health care reform and who recognize that affordable health care is not and never will be available as long as for-profit companies and their voracious hunger for money are allowed to operate unchecked.

Co-ops cannot work if they are large enough to place a check on the private insurance corporations.

Just forget co-ops. They are a cruel joke.

Some co-ops lease facilities, hire their own doctors, purchase their own medical equipment and such. They then provide health care to their members w/o the insurance component.

The problem with this is that it only works in a dense area (such as more 500,000 people), they end up outsourcing stuff, and it has never been proven to really work/scale up.

Co-ops are a cop-out to attract some mythical republican votes which will not be there anyway. I heard Repuke Sen Kyle say he opposed co-ops today. In fact he opposed just about everything, the mandate, the community rating, etc.