This is a breakdown of each CA Proposition as researched by Debra Dowdy. She has taken the time to research the facts as given by the Ballot Initiatives and information available on ballotpedia.org. At the end of the description, she and I give our vote for each Proposition. There is also a linkable list of Propositions at the bottom of the post. We hope this will help you learn more about these important initiatives. Please leave a comment with your thoughts and vote!
CA Prop 61. Limiting prices on medications State buys.
Voting yes on this one means preventing the state from buying any prescription drugs at any price over the lowest price paid by VA for our Medi-Cal programs, retired public employees, students at UC and CSU, and others. Sounds good. Maybe.
This must be really important to someone. They say this could be one of the most expensive ballot measures ever in California history. The supporters and opposition have raised mover then $101 million–mostly the opposition.
In 2014-15 California spent $3.7 million on prescription drugs. Let’s see. $101 million raised to support/fight this would have paid for the meds for over 27 years. Something squirrely here.
The fiscal impact on the state is unknown because they don’t know how the drug manufacturers will respond.
The supporters of this initiative raised $14.6 million. 99% came from the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF). This is the same group that wrote and supported Prop. 60–the condom one. They are a gigantic non-profit with a $200 million per year budget. I can’t determine where their money comes from. They also wrote this initiative, but exempted themselves from it’s provisions. Section 10 gives the “proponent” the right to sue and the California taxpayers will have to pay the lawyers. Their main argument seems to be that “Big Pharma” is evil and greedy.
The opposition raised $86.9 million. The top ten donors are all pharmacy companies or companies with interests in the drug industry. Seems like their big fear is that this passes in California, 49 other states will want to do the same and that will impact their bottom line. They also say that AFH brings in $1 billion per year selling prescription drugs and running HMOs and they’ve exempted themselves from this law. (The supporting arguments don’t deny this anywhere.)
So, on the one hand we have evil, greedy Big Pharma who’s spent a fortune to defeat this because they might lose a fortune it if goes through. On the other hand we have a mysterious non-profit that wrote and financed a law that they love so much they exempted themselves from it and, should there be any lawsuits, want us to pay the bill.
Lovely.
How is this poor little taxpaying citizen supposed to decide?
The only thing I have is a radio program where a conservative and a liberal were giving their opinions on the initiatives. They both said “no” to this one. The conservative said the State already has the ability to bargain and the liberal said the whole thing is absurd.
Debra Dowdy is voting – No
Chris Dowdy is voting – No
Links to all other CA Proposition for the 2016 Ballot:
Proposition 52 – Medi-Cal Hospital Fee Program
Proposition 53 – Revenue Bonds
Proposition 54 – Legislative…Proceedings
Proposition 55 – Tax Extension to Fund Education and Healthcare
Proposition 56 – Cigarette Tax
Proposition 57 – Criminal sentences and parole
Proposition 58 – Multilingual Education
Proposition 59 – Corporations and Political Spending
Proposition 60 – The Condom One
Proposition 61 – Limiting prices on medications State buys
Proposition 62 – Repealing the Death Penalty
Proposition 63 – Background Checks to Buy Ammunition
Proposition 64 – Legalizing Marijuana
Proposition 66 – The other death penalty initiative
