*SCALPSWINGSTRADDLE*

[oldberkeley]

Q: What type of health insurance do members of Congress receive? Is it a single-payer, government-run system?

A: Members of Congress are covered by private insurance under the same system that covers all federal workers.

Members of Congress have good health insurance by any standard, but it’s not free and not reserved only for them – and it’s not government insurance. House and Senate members are allowed to purchase private health insurance offered through the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, which covers more than 8 million other federal employees, retirees and their families.

It’s not a “single-payer” system where the government acts as the one and only health insurance company. As President Bush’s chief of personnel Kay Coles James said in 2003, while lecturing at the conservative Heritage Foundation, “the FEHB program is not centralized, government-run health care.” It has drawn praise both from conservatives and liberals, including President Obama, who held it up as a model for his own health care proposals.

http://www.factcheck.org/2009/08/health-care-for-members-of-congress/