patrick.net

donjumpsuit says

On Christmas when I was 25, my intestines ruptured. I went to the emergency room, they decided that with no insurance, I should just wait it out, like it was a kidney stone or something.

But, but... young people are immortal. Vaticanus and Captain Dumbfuck said so.

Vaticanus says

@drew eckhardt

You make some excellent points. Which is why you/they will be ignored

Says the guy who ignores all my good points.

Homeboy says

If insurance companies "love" ACA so much - if ACA is just a scheme to make insurance companies rich, then WHY DID THE INSURANCE COMPANIES SPEND MILLIONS OF DOLLARS TO DEFEAT ACA?

It's a scheme to make the health care industries richer. PhRMA spent $150M to pass it once they had objectionable provisions like the re-import clause removed. While they'll do great in the long run the insurance executives had good reasons to oppose it in the short term:

Risk and having to answer to share holders who emphasize quarterly profits.

Insurance companies are inherently conservative. Their actuaries make projections based on historic loss data, they set rates which allow that plus overhead and profit, and they collect their premiums like clockwork. They do not make risky bets.

Obamacare has the potential to shake up the market. Will losses be higher than expected because the first people who sign up have pre-existing conditions and people decide it's less work to pay the fine than jump through the hoops to get subsidies? If they choose instead to delay participation in state exchanges like Aetna, Cigna, and United Healthcare who pulled out of California will they loose market share? A wrong bet here could ruin a company and therefore not playing the game is preferable. Not playing requires no Obamacare.

While in the long term things should work out well (families earning through the 75th percentile have their contributions capped, which will allow rates to go up) there will be volatility in the short term which might get a few executives tossed out or otherwise impact their pay. Only $1.3M out of United Health Group CEO Stephen Hemsley 's $13,890,000 2012 compensation package came as salary with the difference being a lot of money to loose.

Opposing Obamacare was the right business move for insurance executives at the time, just like supporting it was right for PhRMA.

Homeboy says

Vaticanus says

@drew eckhardt

You make some excellent points. Which is why you/they will be ignored

Says the guy who ignores all my good points.

You had good points, when?

Homeboy says

Many people do not wish to pay for something they don't need or want.

You DO need health insurance. If you got cancer, for example, it could cost as much as a million dollars to treat. Most people don't have that kind of change lying around. So what happens? They go bankrupt, the bill never gets paid, and the cost of the treatment is passed on to everyone else. Not a good system.

Bankruptcy may be the least of your worries.

I've talked to excellent sports medicine people whose goal is to have injured people performing at their prior (professional in some cases) athletic level as opposed to walking with a limp that just won't see people without insurance.

Along similar lines EMTALA only mandates medical care for life and limb threatening conditions. Medical facilities aren't required to provide non-emergency care such as rehabilitation to people who can't provide insurance or demonstrate the ability to pay.

If a car hits you being insured may make the difference between recovering most of your pre-accident functionality and not. It would suck to be you if that was required to do your job especially where disability insurance generally covers only 60% of your prior income up to a cap and often has a time limit past which the ability to do any work (like serve as a Wallmart greeter) cancels benefits.

I've noticed that car insurance similarlly requires all the people who aren't getting in to accidents to be insured.

Vaticanus says

CNN calls obamacare what it is, a subsidy tax paid to big insurance

Yeah, I don't see that they said that at all. I do understand what they did say.

Vaticanus says

You had good points, when?

All of them. For example, when I pointed out that 96% of young people will get insurance subsidies, and you ignored that point because you couldn't answer it. I made many other points, too. Try reading the thread.

drew_eckhardt says

It's a scheme to make the health care industries richer. PhRMA spent $150M to pass it once they had objectionable provisions like the re-import clause removed. While they'll do great in the long run the insurance executives had good reasons to oppose it in the short term:

You are conflating two different entities. PhRMA is a group of drug manufacturers, not a health insurance company. I pointed out that health insurance companies spent millions to defeat ACA. Your evidence of PhRMA's later influence on the design of the law does not disprove what I said. I am not naive enough to think that corporations do not influence legislation, but that is a far cry from claiming that the ENTIRE PURPOSE of ACA was to make insurance companies rich, or that it is nothing more than a "scheme". Insurance companies were making record profits overcharging for insurance and then dumping policyholders as soon as they got sick. I seriously doubt guaranteed issue was their idea.

drew_eckhardt says

Opposing Obamacare was the right business move for insurance executives at the time, just like supporting it was right for PhRMA.

Kaiser seemed pretty big on it. And didn't BlueCross write it, out of Baucus' office.

Insurance overheads isn't the long pole in the tent here, hospital costs are.

PPACA is the correct piecewise approach, since this country isn't politically mature enough to handle any bigger steps right now.

Just look at the current mess, with rightwing shitheads complaining about "sweetheart waivers" and whatnot, when the real issue they have is having to pay for poor peoples' care starting Jan 1.

Something I don't understand... Obamacare is supposed to have flexibility of prices based on age. Why shouldn't it be priced to market much cheaper and thus making it not a subsidy for other ages. What am I missing?

ja says

Something I don't understand... Obamacare is supposed to have flexibility of prices based on age. Why shouldn't it be priced to market much cheaper and thus making it not a subsidy for other ages. What am I missing?

There is a provision in the law that the differential in rates between subscribers of different ages cannot be over a certain amount - If memory serves, it's 3 times. So let's say for example that the actual cost of providing medical care for older people is 4 times the actual cost of providing medical care for younger people - they can only charge 3 times as much, so the younger people would be subsidizing the older people to some degree.

ja said: Why shouldn't it be priced to market much cheaper and thus making it not a subsidy for other ages. What am I missing?
AARP. This isn't Kansas; you're in BoomerlLand now. Also, with some justification, this motivates the market to look at healthcare costs for older folks.

humanity says

I've noticed that car insurance similarlly requires all the people who aren't getting in to accidents to be insured.

Exactly, and auto insurance is a great
way to spend money for nothing. Wasn't one of buffets first great investments in geico?

humanity says

I've noticed that car insurance similarlly requires all the people who aren't getting in to accidents to be insured.

She's a witch! Burn her! Burn her!

humanity says

I've noticed that car insurance similarlly requires all the people who aren't getting in to accidents to be insured.

Yes, and they also allow those that don't need car insurance, not to participate!

Why don't any of you heritage foundation ditto heads that blindly support ppaca, pine for divorcing health care, from health insurance?

That way young, healthy guys like me can pay cash when we go for a physical a couple times per decade, and then pay 20$ per month, just in case (insurance) some unforseen catastrophe should befall?

I've shipped off over 50k to health insurers and I'm only 32. In return, I've received three physicals. What kind of jackass thinks that is a good idea, economically? Are yous retarded?

Homeboy says

There is a provision in the law that the differential in rates between subscribers of different ages cannot be over a certain amount - If memory serves, it's 3 times. So let's say for example that the actual cost of providing medical care for older people is 4 times the actual cost of providing medical care for younger people - they can only charge 3 times as much, so the younger people would be subsidizing the older people to some degree

Thx! you are right

However, it doesn't look the difference respect no age ratio scenario is that much

http://www.rwjf.org/content/dam/farm/reports/issue_briefs/2013/rwjf404637

Pay a little bit more when you are young, receive a little bit more when you are old. A little bit like SS (and not as much)

errc says

I've shipped off over 50k to health insurers and I'm only 32. In return, I've received three physicals. What kind of jackass thinks that is a good idea, economically? Are yous retarded?

Lucky you... Now does anybody know which is the average money spent at 32?

Bellingham Bill says

Kaiser seemed pretty big on it. And didn't BlueCross write it, out of Baucus' office.

Neither organization is a for-profit insurance company.

Kaiser health plans are not-for-profit although their medical practices are physician-owned for-profit entities.

Blue Cross Blue shield was exclusively not-for-profit until they allowed licenses to be for-profit entities in 1994, although some of those organizations remain not-for-profit.

Insurance overheads isn't the long pole in the tent here, hospital costs are.

Right although it's the current insurance system which allows them to be so ludicrous.

ACA does nothing to fix that and will make things even worse by effectively legislating they spend more on care. With gross margins capped at 20% the only way insurance companies can profit more is by spending more.

For example I expect they'll "improve" prescription plans which only cover the non-patented forms of drugs (Prilosec) to include patented forms (Nexium) with the same active ingredient (in that case the molecule comes in mirror image forms where only one is bioactive) because a $20 markup on $80/month beats a $2 markup on $8 a month.

It'll also be better for patients to visit well-equipped "procedure centers" with facility fees instead of having things done at their doctors offices without.

>I've shipped off over 50k to health insurers and I'm only 32

Are you going to remain 32 years of age?

Paying a little more when young and paying a little less as old is a good trade-off.

All taxes come out of rents, since rents come out of disposable income.

Mandated cost-averaging in retirement and health-care are EXCELLENT public policies, not "retarded" at all.

We should double the SSA tax and double retirement payouts with it.

Get the money before the landlord takes it, or we'll just use it to bid up the cost of housing.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=n1S

real per-capita housing expenditures

drew_eckhardt says

ACA does nothing to fix that and will make things even worse by effectively legislating they spend more on care. With gross margins capped at 20% the only way insurance companies can profit more is by spending more.

yes, I saw this issue a long time ago . . .

PPACA is incremental. It solves some problems, but the system can't vend a pure solution yet, not without Democratic majorities on the order of the mid-1930s or mid-1960s.

Look how much propagandistic bullshit is being catapulted by the right against PPACA's mild & necessary changes. Device profit clawback tax, individual mandate.

ja says

Now does anybody know which is the average money spent at 32?

PPACA's rate for the $5000 deductible plan (all superman here needs) is $235/mo for 32 yos, $2820/yr, so that's half what he paid under the old regime.

John Bailo says

The reason is everyone will need some form of health care as they grow older. So these are fixed, per person costs, that can be estimated pretty good. If you provide one person with lower costs, then you have to take it from someone else. Hence, redistribution, not insurance.

Yes, but you can't predict which person will be the catastrophic cost one any more than you can predict which house will burn down. Your analogy doesn't work.

errc says

That way young, healthy guys like me can pay cash when we go for a physical a couple times per decade, and then pay 20$ per month, just in case (insurance) some unforseen catastrophe should befall?

I've shipped off over 50k to health insurers and I'm only 32. In return, I've received three physicals. What kind of jackass thinks that is a good idea, economically? Are yous retarded?

And when you're 72 you'll be complaining that the young whipper-snappers aren't paying their fair share. After all, at 72 you've "paid your dues" and the young punks should just respect their elders and pay up!

Bellingham Bill says

>I've shipped off over 50k to health insurers and I'm only 32

Are you going to remain 32 years of age?

Paying a little more when young and paying a little less as old is a good trade-off.

All taxes come out of rents, since rents come out of disposable income.

Mandated cost-averaging in retirement and health-care are EXCELLENT public policies, not "retarded" at all.

We should double the SSA tax and double retirement payouts with it.

Get the money before the landlord takes it, or we'll just use it to bid up the cost of housing.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=n1S

real per-capita housing expenditures

By this logic, progressives will be happy as long as SOMEONE'S taxes or other social program "witholdings" go up (or even better if everyone's go up).

Vaticanus says

By this logic, progressives will be happy as long as SOMEONE'S taxes or other social program "witholdings" go up (or even better if everyone's go up)

thats right!

we've been on a treadmill of rising housing and health costs:

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=n3l

is % of wages directly going to healthcare and housing

the Bush tax cuts were quickly eaten by rising rents and home values.

Raise taxes, and future housing rent rises will meet that resistance.

All taxes come out of rents!

Theoretically.

John Bailo says

But what we seem to be talking about here is not "insurance", it's really income redistribution. The reason is everyone will need some form of health care as they grow older. So these are fixed, per person costs, that can be estimated pretty good. If you provide one person with lower costs, then you have to take it from someone else. Hence, redistribution, not insurance.

Well it's actually both. We had a purely insurance system, but obviously it didn't work, because some people couldn't afford to pay for it, and some people couldn't even GET it. So OF COURSE this is wealth redistribution. Your first clue should have been that it's called the AFFORDABLE Care Act.

We've had a couple decades now of wealth flowing UPWARD; I for one welcome anything that's going to reverse that.

By Call it Crazy Follow Mon, 7 Oct 2013, 3:41pm 15 views 0 comments
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The problems with the main Obamacare website – Healthcare.gov – appear to be more than just glitches.

The website on which millions of Americans are expected to sign up for health insurance in the next two months needs more than increased server capacity; it needs changes to its entire architecture, according to news reports.

And perhaps even more ominously for the Obama administration, some consumers are discovering that their premiums are going to skyrocket, and they are threatening just to pay the penalty and “self-insure.” Young adults, too, are pushing back on the requirement to buy insurance.

If enough healthy people don’t buy into the new system, leaving insurance companies with risk weighted toward unhealthy people who cannot be denied coverage, no matter the cost, the system will collapse.

http://news.yahoo.com/obamacare-glitches-why-might-help-end-government-shutdown-183213058.html

A fellow patneter just posted the above in another thread. Please note the last paragraph

Average bear also posted this reaffirming the CNN article referenced above. Thanks average bear.

The one big flaw that the MSM won't tell you about Obamacare: it depends on a ton of healthy young people to overpay for health insurance, with that money transferred to old, poor people and illegals. Once the word gets around and kids/young adults realize they are gonna get screwed, they are NOT going to sign up. And then Obamacare will fall like a house of cards. I'm getting the popcorn ready for this one.....
http://michaelgraham.com/obamacare-poster-boy-a-fraud-real-obot-story-worse/