The TPP's potential impact on the ACA:

[cali]

Big Pharma has a new tool to make turbo-charged profits and insulate itself from efforts to rein in skyrocketing health costs. Under the emerging Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) free trade agreement with the U.S. and 11 Pacific Rim nations, drug companies will be able to challenge any restraint on their ability to price-gouge, including laws that empower public programs like Medicare and Medicaid to use their purchasing power to obtain lower prices. In the lawless market envisioned by the trade deal, drug makers would charge whatever they want without any constraints. TPP negotiators are currently meeting in Salt Lake City for critical discussions about this agreement, which would be the largest economic trade treaty since the World Trade Organization was established in 1995.

The pharmaceutical companies don't need any help from a trade agreement to make more money. The CEOs of these companies are compensated well for this unprecedented accumulation of corporate wealth. Over the 10 years ending in 2012, the 11 largest global drug companies made an astonishing $711 billion in profits, according to an analysis of corporate filings by Health Care for America Now. The leaders of this handful of companies were paid a combined $1.57 billion during this same period.

The United States Trade Representative is pushing to include policies in the agreement that would prohibit the ability of states and the federal government to get discounts for prescription drugs in the same way that private insurers do. This would apply to all the countries in the TPP and would include existing and future laws. As a result, the TPP agreement could nullify the mechanisms to control pharmaceutical prices that the U.S. already has in place, including state Medicaid rebates and the Affordable Care Act's (ACA) discounts under Medicare Part D.

The TPP could also undermine new initiatives to control costs. For example, a public option for coverage under the ACA wouldn't be able to achieve savings by bargaining over prescription drug prices, and a Medicare savings measure under consideration by Congress might be stopped dead in its tracks. The president's budget proposal includes a measure to allow Medicare to get bulk purchasing discounts just like state Medicaid programs. A similar measure introduced by Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), the Medicare Drug Savings Act, would save $141 billion over the next 10 years.

<snip>

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ethan-rome/big-pharma-could-win-inte_b_4310643.html

[djean111]

3. Well, darling, if some do not pay out of pocket because they have so little income,

then ALL taxpayers pay. Which, of course, is the objective, IMO - taxpayers will end up paying just as much to Pharma and the insurance companies as they would if we had single payer - without getting anything anywhere near the benefits.
Well done, Pharma and insurance and Wall Street!

ETA - thanks, jury - I hatessss getting so pissed off first thing in the morning. Excellent!

[DrDan]

4. 5 to 1

Juror #1 voted to HIDE IT and said: No explanation given
Juror #2 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: Robust but within the rules.
Juror #3 voted to HIDE IT and said: No explanation given
Juror #4 voted to HIDE IT and said: yep - personal attack
yoo hoo, MIRT . . .
Juror #5 voted to HIDE IT and said: Sexist and dismissive. Looks like a RW troll too.
Juror #6 voted to HIDE IT and said: No explanation given

[Laelth]

2. Yikes! k&r for exposure. n/t

-Laelth

[fasttense]

5. TPP is the Enabling Act for corporate rule. N/T

[Fumesucker]

6. Why would Obama's Trade Representative do such a counterproductive thing?

Cui bono?

[Heather MC]

7. $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ n/t

[bunnies]

8. worse & worse & worse.

unfuckingreal.

[Wilms]

9. ^