Senate Proceeding 11-03-09 on Nov 3rd, 2009 :: 2:16:15 to 2:27:30
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2:16:11 to 2:16:33( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: mr. president, i urge our colleagues to stop the delaying tactics and allow this bill to come to a vote. thank you, mr. president, and i yield the mr. brown: mr.resident? the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. president. mr. president, i would ech the words of senator murray w worked perhaps harder than anyone in this institution to extend unemployment benefits.

2:16:15 to 2:27:30( Edit History Discussion )
Speech By: Sherrod Brown

2:16:34 to 2:16:54( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: you know, i -- sometimes around here is politics. politics has a role. it certainly does. we have two we have a couple of independents, both in the house of representatives and the senate. that happens. on this, mr. president, with extending unemployment benefits that 90% of the country agrees on.

2:16:55 to 2:17:15( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: it's not a welfare program. it's unemployment insurance. people pay into it. it's to help people that want to work, that lost their jobs, that would like to get back into the workace. but there seems to be from the other side of the aisle on this the fact tha passed, we have been working on trying to get this passed for three weeks. that some republicans here who

2:17:16 to 2:17:36( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: frankly don't much like unemployment insurance. it's a government program. some number of republicans don't like minimum wage, they don't like workers compensation in my state. they don't like medicare. they don't like -- they don't believe government has a role in some of these

2:17:37 to 2:17:57( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: swallow when it comes to unemployment insurance. senator murray mentioned a number of people, emails she got from her state. i get letters and calls from people in lima and xenia and springfield and zanesville and bel air and ravenna, all the time. people who work hard, play by the rules, they are paying their taxes.

2:17:58 to 2:18:19( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: keeping their house nice and keeping their neighborhood strong. they have lost their job. they're looking and looking and looking. they can't find a job when the unemployment rate is 10% -- more than 10% in my state. al them a extension of unemployment so they can keep looking and keep putting food on the table. unfortunately, not a

2:18:20 to 2:18:41( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: republicans but se number of republicans think there is no role of government. they don't like medicare, they don't like minimum wage, they don't like workers compensation and they don't like unemployment compensation. it's a tragedy because frankly i don't think they are helping the people in their because almost no real people except a bunch of people who dress like this and hang around this chamber and down the hall in the house o representatives

2:18:42 to 2:19:02( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: think that don't think unemployment should be extended. mr. president, i ask that my following remarks be placed at a different point in the record. i ask unanimous consent. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. brown: thank you, mr. president. i just came an hour ago from a committee that senator harkin had about increasing health costs facing small businesses.

2:19:03 to 2:19:23( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: we had a panel of five people who spoke, small businesses who have been been -- who have been really victimized by these huge health care costs. you know, you start with this. you start with the business model o and a health insurance company because we know not our entire problem, not all of our problems are with health insurance in

2:19:24 to 2:19:44( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: this country, but a big part of ou the insurance industry. think about it this way. the insurance companies, they -- their bottom line is they need to make money, they want to make money, they should make money. but when their business plan is this, their business model is this, that they hire a bunch of bureaucrats to figure out how to

2:19:45 to 2:20:06( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: refuse to sell insurance to people conditions, and then on the other end they hire a bunch of bureaucrats to say -- to stop from paying -- paying claims for people who they are they get sick, that's how they really make their money. theyon't insure people with pre-existing conditions, and

2:20:07 to 2:20:27( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: then they don't pay up when -- on claims sometimes when people get something mr. president, something like 30% of health insurance claims in the first round are denied, 30%. about almost one in three. sometimes peopl their insurance company and end up getting paid, but, i mean, why should they have to do that? they paid for insurance year after year after year. the insurance company makes

2:20:28 to 2:20:48( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: money on them year after year after year. and then, after they get sick, sometimes their claims aren't paid. sometimes they get really sick and it's really expensive and they lose their insurance. something called rescission. they just cut them out and take their insurance away from so when you start with that business model, it's pretty

2:20:49 to 2:21:10( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: obvious what happens. cigna -- the c.e.o. of aetna made $24 million last year. insurance company profits in the last several years have hundreds of percent. the top ten insurance companies in this country, their executive c.e.o.'s' salaries averag so in order to make that kind of profits, in order to make that

2:21:11 to 2:21:31( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: kind of c.e.o. salaries, not to mention the salaries of other vice presidents and top executives, to do that, i guess that's the business model you need. you need to deny people you have been getting insurance with a pre-existing condition. on the other hand, you hire a bunch of bureaucrats to keep them from getting their claims paid for. that's why insurance reform is so very, very that's why this legislation is

2:21:32 to 2:21:52( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: so very, very important. so today and in our committee -- this is the committee senator sanders joins me in sitting on. today we had this hearing on the increasing health care costs facing small businesses, because this whole insurance company model denying care, coverage because of a pre-existing condition and

2:21:53 to 2:22:14( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: denying claims when people them, this whole idea of -- this whole business model particularly hurts small businesses. when t that, small businesses in particular are particularly victimized by it. small businesses who pay more for their insurance per person. small businesses who if you have ten employe gets very sick, the prices for

2:22:15 to 2:22:35( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: the whole insurance plan, for the whole small business get so out of whack that they often have to cancel coverage or they simply can't afford it. so what we're doing in our legislation is wt's so important and that's coming out of this health care hearing as we have worked on this. we have created health insurance exchanges which will allow small businesses to pool their risk and leverage better deals for insurers.

2:22:36 to 2:22:56( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: instead a sma 12 people trying to buy health insurance exchange with millions of customers, millions of individuals, tens of thousands of small businesses, and they -- then if a few people get sick in one small business, their rates don't spike up. then they have pooled -- they

2:22:57 to 2:23:17( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: have a much l prices in check. small businesses pay more than large companies per capita for their insurance. they pay higher broke they pay higher administrative costs. they have the high cost of medical underwriting. so the result is an unfair competitive disadvantage for small businesses. the other thing we do in this legislation, one of the other

2:23:18 to 2:23:38( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: things for small business is to give tax breaks so a small business can take its 20 employees, they can go into the insurance exchange, and if they choose to, they can go into the public option. the public option is there for several good reasons. the public option is just an option. it doesn't mean you can go into cigna or aetna or blue cross or

2:23:39 to 2:23:59( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: wellpoint. you could choose medical mutual, an ohio company, a not for profit, or you could choose the public option. the public option will mean competition for ins companies in southwest ohio. two companies hav insurance in that part of ohio. it the cincinnati area. when two companies have 85%, you can bet, m

2:24:00 to 2:24:20( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: they're getting lower quality, they're paying higher costs. put the public option in there, compete with them. it's going to help to drive down costs, it's going to stabilize costs and it's going to mean better quality insurance. you don't have to choose the public option but the fact that it exists. the other thing the public option will do is it will keep these insurance companies much more honest. we're going to outlaw

2:24:21 to 2:24:41( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: pre-existing condition, no more discrimination based on your disability or based on your geography or based on gender or any of that. we know that women pay -- the pages sitting in front of these y aren't paying their insurance yet, they -- if we don't change anything, the young women here, when they go out in the

2:24:42 to 2:25:02( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: insurance market, when they finish school, they pay higher rates than the young men here. especially -- there was all kinds of discrimination that we're going to outlaw in this bill, but we need the public option to make sure these insurance consumer protection reforms enforced. let me close with this,

2:25:03 to 2:25:25( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: mr. president. today during this hearing, during this hearing, there was a woman from ohio. a small named liz coreal. she owns a business in ohio, outside cincinnati. company but she can't afford health insurance for her work

2:25:26 to 2:25:47( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: her son was going to come work does. her husband is 65. he has not a problem for him. she is not 65 yet. her sons would like to join the business insurance because she can't afford it for this small business. why do we do that in this country? why do we have a health care system that says to its sons you can't come and work in your parents' family business because you can't get insurance here

2:25:48 to 2:26:08( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: it's not going to work out for you. why don't we allow that? why don't we encourage families to stick together. not be denied because of insurance. the other thing, mr. president, that i hear over and over, and i have come to the floor many times. i won't do that today because senator sanders is speaking right afterwards, but i come to the floor with letters, letters i share from

2:26:09 to 2:26:29( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: this one is from cleveland, one from mansfield where i grew up, from springfield, dayton, all over. two things come through in these letters. one is that people thought they had good insurance until they got sick. then they found out that, well, maybe they lost their insurance because they got really sick, or maybe they had a baby born with a pre-existing c then their insurance was

2:26:30 to 2:26:51( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: canceled. the other thing i found, something that's affecting liz, the woman from southwest ohio. liz is several years away from medicare, but liz is thinking about if several years from now she would be eligible for medicare, she wouldn't have to worry about this. i get lettersll the time from people in their early 50's, late 60's that are just anxious. they are thinking i'm only three

2:26:52 to 2:27:13( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: years away, only two years away, six years away from medicare. then i won't have these problems of insurance. then it's predictable, it's stable. why can't we do that for everybody now? whether you're 26 or 46 or 64, not quite medicare eligible, why can't we take away that anxiety and build peace of mind for people? so they don't have to focus on do i have insurance, can i get

2:27:14 to 2:27:31( Edit History Discussion )

Sherrod Brown: insurance, am i going to get denied insurance, will i have to fight the insurance companies to get the doctors' bills paid? lets te that anxiety off the table so americans can concentrate on small businesses, coentrate on raising their kids, concentrate on fixing up their neighborhoods, concentrate on giving something back to this