If the government wants to make the second-generation National Health Insurance (NHI) program fair it should scrap the supplementary premiums mechanism and charge a premium based on household incomes, civic groups and academics said yesterday.
The critics, including former health minister Yaung Chih-liang (楊志良), told a press conference that regulations on premium calculations should be revised so that premium fees are proportional to income.
Implementation of the second-generation NHI program, which is scheduled to take effect in July, will reportedly be postponed until January next year because of concerns about its financial viability.
Photo: Chien Jun-fong, Taipei Times
The supplementary premiums, which were added to the new NHI program in January last year after the National Health Insurance Act (全民健康保險法) was amended, use different rates for various groups and income categories, and would make the new program more unfair, Taiwan Women’s Link president Huang Shu-ying (黃淑英) said.
Yaung, who saw the law amended before stepping down in February last year, said he had always insisted that the premium calculation should be based on total household income, but the legislature’s Finance Committee overturned the Social Welfare and Environment Hygiene Committee’s proposal at the last minute.
“The supplementary premium was adopted because the Finance Committee had failed to respect the proposal of a more professional committee and more than 100 experts,” he said, adding that some lawmakers “should have avoided a conflict of interest,” without elaborating.
The former minister said he was in a painful dilemma in January last year.
“If the law was not amended in time, I was not sure if it would be amended at all. At the same time, I knew the amended legislation was far from what I had hoped for,” he said.
Yaung said he still hoped the new program would be implemented sooner rather than later, because the new program benefits the underprivileged and women more than the current insurance scheme.
The former minister also said that, despite the claims made in a Ministry of Finance statement, a formula based on total household income was feasible and lawmakers should try to amend the law before the current legislative session concludes.
Explaining why the supplementary premium mechanism is unfair, National Health Insurance Civic Surveillance Alliance (NHICSA) convener Sun Yu-lien (孫友聯) said that while jobs in certain categories carry a premium of 1.47 percent, wages for part-time jobs, which are usually held by poorer people, would be charged at 2 percent.
“It is also ironic that, under the new program, a jobless person would end up paying a higher premium than someone with a monthly wage of under NT$40,000 and an underprivileged kid working in a convenience store would have to pay the supplementary premium if his working hours exceeded a certain threshold,” Sun said.
NHICSA spokesperson Eva Teng (滕西華) said the new premium regime would “neither broaden the premium base, streamline the administrative procedure nor increase premium revenue” for the government.
As the financial status of the NHI program would remain healthy at least until the end of this year and the presidential election has been concluded, Teng said it was now a good time to relaunch discussion of premiums based on household income.
‘NON-RED’: Taiwan and Ireland should work together to foster a values-driven, democratic economic system, leveraging their complementary industries, Lai said President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday expressed hopes for closer ties between Taiwan and Ireland, and that both countries could collaborate to create a values-driven, democracy-centered economic system. He made the remarks while meeting with an Irish cross-party parliamentary delegation visiting Taiwan. The delegation, led by John McGuinness, deputy speaker of the Irish house of representatives, known as the Dail, includes Irish lawmakers Malcolm Byrne, Barry Ward, Ken O’Flynn and Teresa Costello. McGuinness, who chairs the Ireland-Taiwan Parliamentary Friendship Association, is a friend of Taiwan, and under his leadership, the association’s influence has grown over the past few years, Lai said. Ireland is
FINAL COUNTDOWN: About 50,000 attended a pro-recall rally yesterday, while the KMT and the TPP plan to rally against the recall votes today Democracy activists, together with arts and education representatives, yesterday organized a motorcade, while thousands gathered on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei in the evening in support of tomorrow’s recall votes. Recall votes for 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers and suspended Hsinchu City mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) are to be held tomorrow, while recall votes for seven other KMT lawmakers are scheduled for Aug. 23. The afternoon motorcade was led by the Spring Breeze Culture and Arts Foundation, the Tyzen Hsiao Foundation and the Friends of Lee Teng-hui Association, and was joined by delegates from the Taiwan Statebuilding Party and the Taiwan Solidarity
A saleswoman, surnamed Chen (陳), earlier this month was handed an 18-month prison term for embezzling more than 2,000 pairs of shoes while working at a department store in Tainan. The Tainan District Court convicted Chen of embezzlement in a ruling on July 7, sentencing her to prison for illegally profiting NT$7.32 million (US$248,929) at the expense of her employer. Chen was also given the opportunity to reach a financial settlement, but she declined. Chen was responsible for the sales counter of Nike shoes at Tainan’s Shinkong Mitsukoshi Zhongshan branch, where she had been employed since October 2019. She had previously worked
An SOS message in a bottle has been found in Ireland that is believed to have come from the Taiwanese captain of fishing vessel Yong Yu Sing No. 18 (永裕興18號), who has been missing without a trace for over four years, along with nine Indonesian crew members. The vessel, registered to Suao (蘇澳), went missing near Hawaii on Dec. 30, 2020. The ship has since been recovered, but the 10 crew members have never been found. The captain, surnamed Lee (李), is believed to have signed the note with his name. A post appeared on Reddit on Tuesday after a man
RSS