Bribe fest continues

As I predicted yesterday the Coaliation counter Labor's disastorous medical policy announcement with more bribes pitched at the aged.

I'm getting very cynical at this point.

Presidential Debate

I listened to the debate with interest this morning.

Kerry was definitely the better speaker, and for the first hour I had him winning by a huge margin. Bush had me cringing at various points.

In the last 30 minutes it turned around completely. There were some huge blunders by Kerry and Bush articulated a clear message.

Better debater: Kerry
Better finish: Bush

Which image sticks in the mind? I'm not sure for the average American voter. I suspect the net impact on voting intentions is minimal.

Overall I'll rate it a draw. I think both sides will think their candidate won, and they both definitely appealed to their base. While Kerry was the better debater, he was also the one who made some very bad blunders which may yet come back to haunt him - stay tuned.

Getting more pessimistic

This election is turning into a bribe fest. The last one was similar, but this one seems worse.

Labor's put out a terrible policy on health. The Coalition will counter with one in the next few days which will likely be just as bad.

Let's be clear...

1) Urgent medical care is already provided to all citizens (no-waiting lists).
2) Non-urgent medical care is a mix of public (waiting list) and private (jump the waiting list and get your choice of doctor).

Labor's policy (in a nutshell):

1) Extend non-urgent medical care to all seniors over 75 (They already get urgent care provided so it's only the non-urgent that is relevant).
2) Seniors can get the doctor of their choice (it's in their policy documents).

Labor is getting the government to effectively pay for Private Health insurance for all over 75's. For critical and non-critical medical care. Seniors will no longer need private health insurance.

One reasonable arguement is that this will reduce the cost of private health insurance to younger Australians. Yes, this is true. It will also reduce the cost of the 30% rebate to the government. Unfortunately it also means that an optimiser (like myself) no longer needs to take out private health insurance as the most likely scenario is that the bulk of your health care costs are when you are over 75.

The part that is not considered is that what will seniors do now that elective hospital procedures are free with no waiting list?

Answer: Increase their demand.

Who pays? Won't be the baby boomers. They will be retiring in the near future. Yes it's the small shrinking workforce we keep hearing about.

Labor's Pitch

Big bounce today for Labor.

Labor $1.40
Coalition $2.70

Labor's big move is to offer to pay for all hospital care for over 75's, and to index the pension 4 times a year instead of twice. This has to be a huge vote winner. The indexation won't make much difference, but it sounds good if you're an older plebian.

The free hospital care has huge ramifications. I can't even begin to get my head around them in a couple of minutes.

My first reaction is no-one over 75 will need private insurance.

My second reaction is, this means I don't have to take out private health insurance today, as most of a persons health bills are in the last 5 years of their life and the average life expectancy is around 80 for someone born today.

My third reaction is, this is the death of private health insurance.

My fourth reaction is, this will actually reduce the costs to private health insurance companies (previously they couldn't filter out clients by age, but now older people will do the filtering themselves).

My fifth reaction is, maybe it's not the death of private insurance, but it certainly is an unprecendented change in the way it works.

My sixth reaction is, who is going to pay for this? Well now you need make no provision for your health costs for 50 years (see baby boomers). Then fall back on the tax-payer to cover all your needs. I guess the younger generation are going to have to pay for the excesses of the older generation. This is age discrimination at its worst.

Being human I know I'm going to fall into this very same trap. My grandkids can work hard to provide for me in my old age. I no longer have to. Thanks in advance to the kids of the future.

Senate Guide

Here's my Senate guide.

Likely scenario:

Coalition 37 seats
Labor+Democrat+Green 37 seats

Undecided 2 seats.

(1) South Australia
To be fought out between
-Meg Lees
-Greens
-Family First

(2) Queensland
To be fought out between
-Democrat
-Labor
-Green
-Independent

This leads to some fascinating scenarios. The most likely though is that the government (assuming a coalition victory) will NOT be able to get legislation through without support from one of Labor, the Greens or the Democrats. This will put them at a disadvantage to the current parliament where they can still use the independent senators to get legislation past those three parties.

If Labor were to win the election they will have extreme difficulty in the Senate.

Either way it is going to be harder in the next sitting period than the current one for legislation to pass.

Strongest odds yet

Howard $1.28
Latham $3.30

Bush $1.33
Kerry $3.00

The smart money's on the incumbents.


Let's rate the parties:

-Industrial Relations: Coalition (No-one could argue for Labor on this)

-Schools: Coalition

-Childcare: Labor

-Family Tax Benefits: Can't tell. Labor's policy document sucks, I read it numerous times and they went out of their way to make it unclear and leave out key bits of information.

-Health: Coalition (Labor only increasing the rebate on bulk billing consults is a mistake, the GP rebate is ridiculously low as it is, people that can't get bulk billed receive no benefit)

-Universities: Coalition (would be a disaster if Labor got in for the Unis)

-Economy: I'm tempted to say much of a muchness. Unfortunately for Labor they have a Creanite, and the Libs have Costello. No contest here. Crean is a Creanite. Drop Crean and I'll call it a wash.

-Foreign Policy: Coalition (Latham is a popularist)

Hmmm. I'm trying to think of something other than Child-care that I think Labor is better at. There must be something.

-Taxation: Labor (I like Labor's idea of raising the top rate, and allowing sole income earners to split their tax free threshhold. Both are needed) What I really want though is an increase in the GST rate.

Overally I'm afraid I have to give the win to the Coalition so far. Labor has 10 days to go, let's see if they can announce something that could help them get my vote.

Oddswatch

The Coalition have jumped up in the betting after an election spending splurge by the PM on the weekend. Very effective wedge on the opposition. You can outspend the opposition and use the governments prior record to justify it.

The allocation of funds directly to the P&C's is an interesting idea. Quite funny really.

Coalition $1.33
Labor $3.00

Then in the US election (which I think is a foregone conclusion, the odds have finally moved in Bush's favour).

Bush $1.37
Kerry $2.85