On top of the news that Wal-Mart supports mandates for employers to cover their employees and that drug makers would forgo anticipated profits, comes this news that three major hospital associations will ante up $155 billion over 10 years to help pay the costs of insuring the estimated 47 million uninsured Americans. Why?
Essentially, Obama has threatened to make life worse for the health care bureaucracy unless they come to the bargaining table. The goal is to squeeze savings wherever possible to pay for expanding health care to every American. The total cost of such a plan could exceed $1 trillion and these small steps (really these steps are quite major) will help pave a smoother road for congressional negotiators. Politically, this will make it harder for Republicans to resist reform efforts on the grounds that it is anti-medical industry. Getting the drug industry and the hospitals on board are two of the major constituents in this debate. Who knows if reform will actually happen, but these are positive steps.
This style of governing by negotiating with major constituent groups is actually quite common in other groups. It's known as consociationalism.
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