Mark Metherell
February 6, 2012





HEALTH Minister Tanya Plibersek has revealed the disproportionate benefits wealthier people get out of the health insurance rebate in a fresh bid to swing support for means testing of the rebate.

Ms Plibersek has revealed to The Age that while just 12 per cent of couple taxpayers earn above $160,000, they comprise 21 per cent of the couples benefiting from the rebate. That rebate reduces a typical hospital/extras policy premium by about $1000 a year.

High-earning singles are even more likely to get the perk than their lower-paid peers. Ms Plibersek says 14 per cent of single taxpayers earn above $80,000 a year, but make up 28 per cent of singles with health insurance.


''Lower-income Australians, some of whom can't afford private health insurance, still pay for it through their taxes as a subsidy for higher-income earners who choose to take out a policy,'' Ms Plibersek said.

Her remarks come as the government struggles to woo sufficient cross-bench MPs to back legislation that would impose means testing on the rebate for singles earning above $83,000 and families on $166,000. The measure would remove it entirely for singles earning $129,000 and couples earning $258,000.

The move is a vital budget measure, estimated to generate $2.4 billion in savings over three years.

But a confidential report to health industry insiders indicates the government risks unsettling historically high public attachment to health insurance if it introduces the means test.

The Ipsos survey figures seen exclusively by The Age show that the proportion of privately insured people saying they are likely to opt out at present is at 1 per cent, the lowest level the poll has recorded in 20 years.

And there has been a significant rise in health fund members stating that their private hospital cover is one of the last things they could do without. The survey, of 5500 people undertaken last year, found that 48 per cent held that view, up by more than 10 percentage points compared with 2009.

The results from the Ipsos survey also show that the means testing proposed by the government would prompt about 35,000 people to bail out of insurance in the first year, with that likely to compound into losses of hundred of millions of dollars in premiums over five years.

While that figure is significantly lower than the big losses in members forecast by the health insurance industry, Ipsos says that adding additional layers of complexity to health insurance would increase the high levels of confusion that turn off many people who would potentially join.

The survey finds that more than three-quarters, or 78 per cent, of Australians say there is an urgent need to simplify health insurance.

Of those recently inquiring about taking out private health insurance, 66 per cent said complexity and confusion deterred them from proceeding.

Tony Quint, a co-director of the Ipsos project, says a means test will certainly add to the complexity and confusion.

The proportion of the population who believe the $4.5 billion spent on the health insurance rebate is a good use of government funds remains largely unchanged at 64 per cent.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/national/new-push-for-means-testing-of-health-rebate-20120205-1qzth.html#ixzz1lXM9rOLV

Wont happen, the ALP are to weak to put it up.

It will be a watered down nothing if it even makes the floor.

I re-post the following, because it is relevant here -
perceptions_now wrote on Feb 5^th, 2012 at 9:15pm: