Va Choice Program Out Of Money? Or Not?!?

[63SIERRA]

bottom line. va doesnt want vets going outside the system, because we will be told what is really wrong, it will garner more care and comp and costs will skyrocket.

The va thwarts the veterans from using the choice program, with all the red tape and rigamaroo , then trys to say it is underutilized so they can eliminate it..

All the choice program is is a temporary appeasement to cool the fires that started in arizona,,, There are too many politicians who get campaign contributions from the VA union, and they do what they are told to do.. Bernie sanders is on the veterans committee and gets money rom the union... how wrong is that?

[Notorious Kelly]

Our highly-educated leaders are either ignorant or idiots; who would put union people in charge of sending veterans to non-union providers?

With all of the VA's failures and proven lack of integrity, what would make a thinking person let them have ANY part of VA Choice?

Congress is well-aware of the VA horrors and band-aids are the best they are willing to put on them.

[63SIERRA]

One day I would like to start a charity whereas money is raised to give to veterans to go outside the va and get HONEST examinations to find out thier health problems in detail and thier entirety, the have them go give the results to thier primary care providers at the va and demand they acknowledge,. treat, and medicate them for the conditions as needed.. In my opinion, the manipulation of data, and turning a blind eye to veterans problems are one of the worse problems inside the VAMC.

The care inside the vamc feels like they act like they are giving you second fiddle free care rather than earned care.

[Chuck75]

The VA Medical system is planned failure. When the VA starts to talk about changing benefits like this Veteran's Choice you better duck fast. There is a rational way to create a good veteran's health care system based on the Medicare model. That would mean about 900,000 VA employees would lose their jobs. All the welfare to hospitals, University medical programs, and political appointees would have to stop. Medicare has tiny administrative costs while I bet the VA spends billions just doing the paperwork. The VA spends mucho money to bill my insurance to capture a couple of dollars. The only time we get any increase in benefits is when there is a war going on somewhere. Let's hope Iran is busy making an Atom Bomb so we have a good excuse to send 500,000 troops back to the Middle East again. Now that Iraq and Afghanistan are off the front pages the population and congress has started to forget the vets already. Our benefits have only increased according to the CPI since WWII. That just means that your compensation has the same buying power it had in 1960. A 100% vet gets about $2900 a month. Multiply that by 12 and you are below the average median income by about $15,000. If you we were on welfare we could at least get food stamps and have a free pad in the projects.

"Our benefits have only increased according to the CPI since WWII"

And, the CPI is deliberately setup such that it does NOT reflect the true cost of living increases. A wag might be between 1/2 and 3/4.

To get an idea of the difference, the governments own tables used in contract cost calculations can be used.

In any event, the current VA 100% disabled compensation is about 36K a year. The Average income for the US is somewhere between 47k and 57k.

The 36k supposedly compensates for the "lost income" ?????

[john999]

If I had to live on my VA compensation even though I get HB benefits and a benefit for being married I could not afford to buy the house I have been living in for 28 years. I was a federal employee, and when I had to retire I lost my ability to contribute to the Thrift Savings Program. This was the third leg of my pension plan with the federal government. I lost 15 years worth of future contributions. My federal pension was reduced by future contractual raises and SSA contributions as well. Becoming disabled is expensive especially when your own government is underpaying your compensation. If young soldiers really understood the risks they faced when they enlisted for a hitch they would never do it. It is one thing to get KIA but another to be disabled and live like a second class citizen for the rest of your life after being service connected. I do remember my father got a 10% rating after WWII. It was $12 a month when he died in 1956. When I got 10% in 1973 it was $28 a month. The CPI does not include food or energy prices. It does include things like the prices of microcircuits, TV's and computers. You can't live in those things or eat them.

John