Thursday, November 22, 2012

Whitefish Bay Saves Money By Going Union, Cutting Out Walker

Remember how Scott Walker and all the right wing talking pinheads kept blaming WEA Trust for the high expenses of health insurance for teachers?

Guess what!

They were lying to us, as usual:
Whitefish Bay was able to save at least $622,000 over the next two years by changing the way it contracts with health insurance providers.

Typically, the village acquires its benefits through the state's Employee Trust Fund. Most employees choose WEA Trust, which offers the lowest-priced plan. After conducting an analysis, the village's insurance broker determined it was able to save money by eliminating the state as a middle man and contracting directly with WEA Trust.

The Whitefish Bay Village Board voted in approval of the two-year insurance plan at its Monday night meeting. Although it's a two-year plan, the contract will be signed one year at a time.

The WEA Trust Plan comes in $347,000 under the price offered through the Employee Trust Fund. The village saved at least another $275,000, due to a price lock not to exceed a 9 percent increase in 2014. The village could save more money if insurance premiums increase less than 9 percent in 2014.

"If you chose the lowest-price provider through the state plan for next year, it is WEA Trust. We're just buying it direct. We're buying the exact same plan. Same deductible, same everything," said Village Manager Patrick DeGrave. "We're saving that much money just by cutting out the state as the administrator of the plan."
WEA Trust is actually gaining many customers back as they find that the private insurance companies were playing bait and switch games with them, costing more money than before.

And just another example of how things would have been better for everyone - teachers and taxpayers alike - if Walker had done nothing.

11 comments:

  1. I wonder if we'll see this in the Patch?

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    1. The article I linked and cited is the Patch.

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  2. Its not surprinsing since so many of the republicans have never spent a day in the private sector. If they had they would know how easy it is to WIN a contract and then raise prices.

    It is showing year two of Act 10 is worse than year one.

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  3. I've been saying this for YEARS. WEA Trust is a great option, well-funded and well-run. Good benefits at a low price. All you have to do is cut out the profit hungry insurance companies (the same ones that donate a substantial chunk of their profits to the campaigns of Walker & associate Wis GOP).

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  4. Anon, you would NEVER find this very accurate info in the press. My school district tried other insurance companies and came back to WEA Trust. It was the best deal for the districts AND employees.

    And Walker saying this was an expensive union plan was just a plain old flat out lie. WEA Trust functions as an insurance company and investment options...no more no less. It is not WEAC. Either the opponents are woefully uninformed or just plain lying.

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  5. Is there a source that shows what the cost per employee was for the WEAC plan prior to act 10 compared to after? That would be a true gauge of whether WEAC was competitive before or not. Apparently they are now, but the fact that their expenditure on election spending went down by roughly 1000 percent in the last election compared to 2010 leads me to believe they have tightened up their numbers a bit.

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  6. After all the articles I read about districts saving money by switching insurance away from WEAC, your suggesting that they were the cheapest alternative all along? My question is, did they lower their rates? My assumption is, that by not spending 1.6 million on political activity like they did in 2010, they were able to lower their rates. Or, maybe forced to, as they are now participating in a free market.

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  7. And our gas prices would be cheaper if the gas companies stopped spending money on political activities. Should we outlaw all money spent on political activities(which I am on board with) or should we just stop people from giving to democrats?

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    Replies
    1. Of course corporations, well, those who give to Republican politicians, should be exempt from any scrutiny, laws, or other attempts to regulate political activity.

      Organizations that support democrats, independents, or just critical thinking in general, should be outlawed.

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  8. In the first year of Act 10, our school district, harassed by a Tea Party lawyer in the City who thinks he's God (but is actually despised by residents - yeah, talkin' about YOU Mr. S.)pushed to change insurance agents. As a result, the school system never even got a quote from WEA Trust, which could have met or beaten the quotes provided by other entities. Consequently, our school system is now paying MORE for LESS coverage at HIGHER cost to employees and to the school system.

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