Obamacare Jacks Up her Insurance.

Is this another drive-by post, where you inflame responses, but (apparently) never intended to discuss?

Look, I disagree with the US Supreme Court. This act is unconstitutional. But don't treat this forum as your blog. It ain't.

In before I could say it myself, Rob.

Edge, I can assume, I suppose, that your opinion is that the President has lied about how coverage for folks who already have insurance would work under Obamacare. I mean, "lies" pretty much leads me to believe that is what you think.

Got any more to add?

EdgeOfDark said:

Nought else, Cranky.

Robjvargas is right; this isn't my blog, and I'm not going to treat it like one. I've never even written a blog before though. I'll just keep my thoughts to myself. Politics is just too mean an issue for me to deal with.

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Politics can, indeed, be quite rough and tumble. But we're not going to be throwing shoes in here, at any rate. You don't have to keep your thoughts to yourself, Edge. Quite the contrary! We'd like your participation. May I recommend poking around some of the existing threads, seeing how they tend to go, to get a better feel for how P&CE rolls? If you have any questions, you can feel free to send me a PM and I'd be happy to answer them. But by no means should you feel that your opinions aren't wanted. We have all kinds 'round these parts.

EdgeOfDark said:

Robjvargas is right; this isn't my blog, and I'm not going to treat it like one. I've never even written a blog before though. I'll just keep my thoughts to myself. Politics is just too mean an issue for me to deal with.

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It's not that, Edge. Look, I know how rough and tumble it gets. I got booted from these forums. HARD. Because of how deeply I dove into that side of things.

(Thanks for the reconsideration, Mac).

Just realize that these are forums. Not like a community bulletin board. If you're going to take the time to bring something up, people like me and quite a few others are going to respond while expecting a back-and-forth discussion. You didn't give that in your previous posting about Obamacare.

One-off posts aren't the norm here. In fact, just about every place I've ever frequented with forums considers that rude behavior. As Cranky said, it's not that your opinion is unwelcome. We'd simply rather that you took the time to support it if you took the time to post it.

Know what I mean?

Chime.

It also really helps, IMO, if the first post of a political thread contains no ideological bias, merely information - not just a link, but a brief quoted portion of the article, so that people can know if they are interested before they take the time to read it (this subforum moves fast). Then, you can make a second post where you state your piece on it. To do otherwise looks flamebaity to me, though that just may be my personal style talking? What do y'all think?

I speak just for myself of course. I am curious as to whether that's just my format or the usual.

It isn't my style. As you can see in this thread I started, I put my opinion right in that first post.

But if you word that post as if there's no way anyone can disagree with you, that can be problematic. To put it lightly.

Right. I do that in threads I post, too - at least sometimes - when I have a feeling that there will be less debate and more consensus.

I agree, posting something that people WILL disagree with as if it's gospel is problematic.

Those are very helpful tips, folks, but we're in danger of hijacking the thing beyond redemption, so might be best to let that go for the nonce.

As far as whether or not it's "lies", I have to admit that I agree that the part about existing plans not meeting the new guidelines was pretty underplayed. To the point that I wasn't even aware that would be an issue until earlier this year. It matters not to me, personally, since I'll be buying on the exchange anyway, but for people who were perfectly happy with the plans they have now being told that they can't have them because they aren't meeting the actuarial standards set by the legislation...well, I can't blame them for being unhappy, even if they end up with better coverage. They don't have a choice about it, and it was implied that they would have one. Or rather, that they wouldn't have to choose at all.

Noted, Cranky. I thought it would encourage him to press on. But I defer.

Cranky said:

As far as whether or not it's "lies", I have to admit that I agree that the part about existing plans not meeting the new guidelines was pretty underplayed.

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I agree. Perhaps Obama could have said, "those of you who already have decent insurance can keep it."

I think there's something to be said for insisting that insurance plans meet a basic minimum standard. Not everyone reads the pages and pages of fine print -- they may be happy with their cheap insurance, only to find out when they get sick that very little is covered -- basically not a whole lot better off than if they had no insurance at all.

Nonetheless, it was handled badly.

And I think that although the majority of people will benefit greatly, there will surely be some who will end up paying more. I don't see how any new system (except single payer, funded through taxes) will be great for 100% of the populace.

But I have some questions about that story.

First, if Blue Cross is offering a "similar plan" for more money, the original plan must have also qualified, no? Sounds more like BC using the ACA as an excuse to jack up prices. Anthem Blue Cross in California tried the same thing back in 2012, which had nothing to do with anything except profit.

Anthem customer Ellie Podway, 55, of Pasadena said she and her husband received a letter the day before Thanksgiving informing them of a 14% rate increase to $881 a month, effective in February. Since 2010, Anthem has boosted the couple's monthly premium 81%, she said.

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http://articles.latimes.com/2012/nov/28/business/la-fi-insurance-rate-hikes-20121128

Second, there is no mention of trying to find a better plan on the health exchanges. Apparently, Blue Cross simply cancelled her plan and offered another at higher rates. Many of us can't get to keep the insurance plan we like -- it's totally at the discretion of the insurance companies.

Remember the guest on the Hannity show whose policy was cancelled and the new one was going to cost considerably more?

Next I called Allison Denijs. She’d told Hannity that she pays over $13,000 a year in premiums. Like the other guests, she said she had recently gotten a letter from Blue Cross saying that her policy was being terminated and a new, ACA-compliant policy would take its place. She says this shows that Obama lied when he promised Americans that we could keep our existing policies.

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But she only talked to Blue Cross.

I tried an experiment and shopped on the exchange for Allison and Kurt. Assuming they don’t smoke and have a household income too high to be eligible for subsidies, I found that they would be able to get a plan for around $7,600, which would include coverage for their uninsured daughter. This would be about a 60 percent reduction from what they would have to pay on the pre-Obamacare market.

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http://www.salon.com/2013/10/18/ins...ine_i_fact_checked_sean_hannity_on_obamacare/

So technically, it's true not everyone can keep their insurance -- not if it doesn't meet certain standards. And it's also true that your insurance company may gouge you, forcing you to pay more for less, or switch companies. But that's always been true, and if you developed a medical problem while covered, no other insurance company would touch you. At least that's changed.

All I know is that my husband was told that we're switching insurance companies because his company is changing insurers.

Our rates are going up. Not sure if we're getting the same coverage or not but we'll be paying more.

Guess we're the 1% now.

Well said, Rugcat. Blue Cross is especially notorious for capriciously jacking up premiums, canceling affordable policies and replacing them with "better," much more expensive ones. They've gotten flagged by states several times for that practice, all years before Obama was president or the ACA anywhere near existence. But they're one of the biggest insurers in the nation, so they really don't care. The point is this is not a flaw in the ACA but a common bad practice of insurers. The difference the ACA makes is that it's now nominally easier for customers to find a new insurer. In any event, the way insurers operate, I've always believed it's better to switch policies/providers every now and then, the way some people do with cable/net providers. Keep 'em on their toes. But then I also think the entire private health insurance business is a racket that should be outlawed anyway.

Sheryl Nantus said:

All I know is that my husband was told that we're switching insurance companies because his company is changing insurers.

Our rates are going up. Not sure if we're getting the same coverage or not but we'll be paying more.

Guess we're the 1% now.

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That happened to me twice back when I worked for companies that were big enough to offer employee insurance -- and I haven't done that for over 15 years. I don't get why ACA is suddenly the cause of something that has been a common occurrence for ages.

health insurance that does not cover being in hospital. Huh. And of course it doesn't cover mental health issues because they aren't real or something. Or pregnancy because that never happens by accident.

That really is the insurance you have when you don't have insurance,

I've seen even worse, Glory. The cheap grad student insurance my university bargained for did not cover diabetes, heart problems, cancer - pretty much all the things you really need insurance for even if you're young and totally healthy.

rugcat said:

I think there's something to be said for insisting that insurance plans meet a basic minimum standard. Not everyone reads the pages and pages of fine print -- they may be happy with their cheap insurance, only to find out when they get sick that very little is covered -- basically not a whole lot better off than if they had no insurance at all.

Nonetheless, it was handled badly.

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I don't know the ins and outs of this, but I agree that you ought to be able to rely on a basic minimum standard of healthcare for your money. I think the simplest way to do this is single-payer. But that wasn't achievable. Was there a way to handle this any better given that you had to do it via private medical insurance?

muravyets said:

That happened to me twice back when I worked for companies that were big enough to offer employee insurance -- and I haven't done that for over 15 years. I don't get why ACA is suddenly the cause of something that has been a common occurrence for ages.

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The premiums for the insurance that my small business provides have gone up every single year for the past 15 years. It got to the point where one year when they only went up 7% we thought we were doing great.

We switched companies three times. Each time it was for the best deal we could get and yet premiums are still higher than they've ever been, and the coverage is worse than it's ever been.

We've instituted personal health savings accounts for employees(a conservative idea) and it's working pretty well. Although I do support the ACA in a lukewarm fashion, it's still remains to be seen whether it will be financially better or worse for our particular business.

There are a lot of perfectly valid concerns about the ACA. But what I've seen from the right is mostly a bunch of made-up stuff specifically designed to scare people and mislead them. Along with a determined effort by conservative politicians to do their damnedest to make sure that it won't work.

Yorkist said:

I've seen even worse, Glory. The cheap grad student insurance my university bargained for did not cover diabetes, heart problems, cancer - pretty much all the things you really need insurance for even if you're young and totally healthy.

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Better yet, the plan at our university didn't cover any injury that happened in a car accident, since (they argued) auto insurance was mandated to have personal liability insurance. So whoever was at fault, you'd be covered. Ignoring the prevalence of uninsured motorists for a moment, they neglected to notice that motorcycle policies in the state didn't have to cover personal injuries (if you crashed your own motorcycle). A friend actually had this happen, and he fell between the cracks. He wasn't covered by his motorcycle policy, or the student health insurance policy. He almost lost his leg and ended up waaaay in debt and probably passing the costs of his uninsured treatment to people who did have insurance.

Private health insurance really is a horrific mess. We're in love with the concept of having choices about which features we want with our policies, as if we can anticipate everything that might go wrong. And when people have too many choices, they tend to freeze up and either not choose at all, or to choose badly. That's one problem with the health exchange, I think.

One good thing about the ACA, imo, is the thing that ticks some people off most about it--it makes health insurance mandatory (because overall, uninsured and under insured people cost the rest of a lot of money). I respect rugged individualism, but unless you really plan to remove your own appendix on the kitchen table, or concoct your own chemotherapy drugs if you get cancer or something (or just die quietly and unobtrusively when you get sick), health care is not a "do it yourself" thing in the modern world, and it's waaaay to expensive for most people to afford out of pocket. One serious illness can spell financial ruin, and since health care providers cannot ethically turn seriously ill people away, we all absorb the costs when people can't pay their bills (or their insurance refuses to).

The refusal to cover people with pre-existing conditions is another problem with the old system. My brother is a cancer survivor, and he owns his own business (he's a doctor, actually). Getting insurance has been well nigh impossible for him except when his wife has been employed with the state (which has family benefits). Keeping young adults on their parents' plans longer is a good thing too, I think.

My big problem with it is it doesn't go far enough. Since it's preserved private insurance that it's not going to rein in costs, and yes, there are lots of unanticipated issues that will crop up as insurance companies try to find loopholes or ways to jack up their profits in the new world order.

e simplest way to do this is single-payer. But that wasn't achievable. Was there a way to handle this any better given that you had to do it via private medical insurance?

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Not that I can see. Which is why I count myself a reluctant supporter.

The only way single-payer will ever be enacted is if the Democrats control the House, the presidency, and have a super majority in the Senate.

Which they actually had last time, but the defection of a couple of Democrats combined with absolute Republican opposition killed the idea. And I don't see the Democrats regaining that sort of majority again anytime soon, anyway.

rugcat said:

Not that I can see. Which is why I count myself a reluctant supporter.

The only way single-payer will ever be enacted is if the Democrats control the House, the presidency, and have a super majority in the Senate.

Which they actually had last time, but the defection of a couple of Democrats combined with absolute Republican opposition killed the idea. And I don't see the Democrats regaining that sort of majority again anytime soon, anyway.

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I basically agree with this.

I think the most outspoken opponents of the ACA don't realize that a lot of its detractors are people who would prefer a single payer type system. Not everyone wants a return to a wild west "leather strap to bite and a whiskey bottle" system of health care or think that the private insurance system is working seamlessly for them now. But yeah, it seems like things are going to have to get a lot worse before enough people support that idea overall.

On a personal note. We have a state employee policy and those are generally better than anything but federal, so take this for what it is worth. So far our premiums have gone up $8 a month, or less than a hundred dollars per year. Our copays have increased by $5. And the amount of PITAs we had to deal with have been reduced drastically, to practically nothing. No more preapprovals, them refusing to pay because someone misspelled my uncommon variant on an unusual name, nothing.

I still don't like that the broke and underemployed millennials are supporting the costs of the relatively wealthy baby boomers without a choice in the matter, though.

rugcat said:

The premiums for the insurance that my small business provides have gone up every single year for the past 15 years. It got to the point where one year when they only went up 7% we thought we were doing great.

We switched companies three times. Each time it was for the best deal we could get and yet premiums are still higher than they've ever been, and the coverage is worse than it's ever been.

We've instituted personal health savings accounts for employees(a conservative idea) and it's working pretty well. Although I do support the ACA in a lukewarm fashion, it's still remains to be seen whether it will be financially better or worse for our particular business.

There are a lot of perfectly valid concerns about the ACA. But what I've seen from the right is mostly a bunch of made-up stuff specifically designed to scare people and mislead them. Along with a determined effort by conservative politicians to do their damnedest to make sure that it won't work.

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rugcat said:

Not that I can see. Which is why I count myself a reluctant supporter.

The only way single-payer will ever be enacted is if the Democrats control the House, the presidency, and have a super majority in the Senate.

Which they actually had last time, but the defection of a couple of Democrats combined with absolute Republican opposition killed the idea. And I don't see the Democrats regaining that sort of majority again anytime soon, anyway.

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Roxxsmom said:

I basically agree with this.

I think the most outspoken opponents of the ACA don't realize that a lot of its detractors are people who would prefer a single payer type system. Not everyone wants a return to a wild west "leather strap to bite and a whiskey bottle" system of health care or think that the private insurance system is working seamlessly for them now. But yeah, it seems like things are going to have to get a lot worse before enough people support that idea overall.

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Exactly so, to all of the above. The ACA has a few features that have a good chance of slightly improving health care coverage for many and vastly improving it for some, though it has yet to prove itself. But it's still a sop to an industry that has proven itself fundamentally parasitic. A not-for-profit public system is really the only thing that has a real chance of fixing our problems, but not even all Democrats support that idea. I think we're going to have to go through all the options and compromises first, and see each one fall short if not fail catastrophically before we, as a nation, finally just get over it and go nationalized. In the meantime, I'll take whatever slight edge I can get via the ACA in my dealings with these useless crooks, the insurance companies.

muravyets said:

. . . A not-for-profit public system is really the only thing that has a real chance of fixing our problems, but not even all Democrats support that idea. . . . In the meantime, I'll take whatever slight edge I can get via the ACA in my dealings with these useless crooks, the insurance companies.

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Agree, most emphatically!

Mags
who probably will qualify for an exemption from the whole mess