CBO confirms Obamacare will increase drug prices

[Anarchist420]

I hate the health care bill. It's going to create a huge class divide, which was Obama's intention.

 

[MooseNSquirrel]

Are you a communist Pens?

How dare you suggest price controls!

 

[MooseNSquirrel]

I hate the health care bill. It's going to create a huge class divide, which was Obama's intention.

Feh, the "free market" was doing that on its own already, your point?

 

[Carmen813]

probably, roughly, presumably, likely, might - great points Carmen.

The whole fucking thing is not based in reality, it's based on 'feelings'. No surprise there. For deep thinkers, the left sure relies on a lot of voodoo. No need to sweat the details, what matters is the intention. Even if it fails, it's a success in the eyes of progressives, because it's rooted in wholesome goodness.

If you can't attack the message, attack the messenger.

CBO reports always use tentative language. That's because we live in the real world, and with a system as complex as health care it is basically impossible to have an absolute understanding of how the changes will impact the system. They do what any professional would do, look at the pros and cons and try to reach a conclusion.

On a side note, I always laugh when "feelings" are attacked while "logic" is put up on some imaginary pedestal. It simply reveals a lack of awareness about how people are.

 

[bamacre]

Feh, the "free market" was doing that on its own already, your point?

When was the last time we had a "free market" health care system?

 

[Carmen813]

This all but confirms what most of us knew already. The health care reform bill was a total FAILURE.

If the bill needed to do one thing, it was to drastically cut the costs of health care. Not just for us, but more importantly for gov't. Medicare is projected to bankrupt our entire county.

The longer we wait to fix Medicare the worse the problem will be.

Those who speak in absolutes...

There are those among us who think that health care reform needed to do drastically more than simply cut costs. Those areas may not be priorities for you, but that does not mark the bill a "total" failure. It is a remarkable accomplishment that this bill expands coverage to 30+ million people, expands consumer protections, and will have a negligible cost (most independent reports say 1-2&#37 on the countries overall health costs when compared to doing nothing. That type of outcome simple would not have been possible if the bill did not curve costs in some way.

I will tell you that I personally wept when this bill passed. Not because of some bleeding heart liberal fantasy, but because this bill does a great deal to enhance my personal freedom. My wife and I are cancer survivors. No more worrying about losing our insurance at a whim. No more worrying about whether or not I can move across the country to seek new opportunities because I might not find adequate health insurance. No more pervasive fear, every single day of our lives, that one of us will get sick and not be able to see a doctor. No more life time caps or annual limits, meaning that we won't face bankruptcy if we have a relapse. No more fear about if we will be able to get insurance for our children, if we decide to have them. We're in our mid-twenties, and this bill gave us a second chance at actually pursuing our dreams. Perhaps these things mean nothing to you, but it means a great deal to me. Those who believe HIPAA already provided this simply lack experience with the flaws our system had.

This bill is not perfect, and substantially more work needs to be done. No sane person argues against this. Hopefully the GOP in the House won't waste too much time on fruitless attempts at repeal, and instead will work to improve the changes that have been made by addressing tort reform and the patient-provider relationship.

 

[EagleKeeper]

The CBO also uses input numbers that are provided by Congress to to crunch the data.

Garbage in, garbage out

 

[wetech]

85 cents rule means you get back 85 cents on the dollar of each dollar you pay for insurance thats not used in your health care...

Any rate raises now are temporary and the last gasp profiteering by the insurance companies..

Why do you keeps saying this despite people correcting you in other threads? The 85% rule applies to the TOTAL amount of medical payouts as a percent of the TOTAL amount of premiums collected; it's not on an individual basis. If you spend $1000/yr on premiums but only use $200 in services, you do NOT get a check for $650 because part of your premiums are used to pay for other people's medical bills (that's the whole point of insurance, spreading the risk out over a large population).

Let's say your insurance company insures 10 people @ $1000/yr in premiums, so they've collected $10,000. You use your $200 in services. The other 9 people use a total of $9000 in services because some of them have some serious medical issues. The ins. co. has now paid out 92% of premiums in claims. You get nothing back because the total is over 85% despite you only claiming 20% of your premiums.

Now let's say the other people only use $8000 in claims and you use the same $200. The ins. co. has now paid out 82% of premiums in claims and has to refund the difference of 3% ($300). I'm assuming that it's to be divided equally amongst all policy holders, meaning each person gets $30 back.

 

[PeshakJang]

No, if a company collects $10M in premiums, and pays out $9M, they keep $1M. Nothing changes due to the 85% rule.

If a company collects $10M in premiums, pays out $8M, then $500K is returned to customers and the company keeps $1.5M.

It literally forces premiums down by the magic of math if premiums were >85% of medical payouts to begin with.

Didn't I already explain this specifically for you in another thread yesterday?

Edit:http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=30710272&postcount=121

Ok, I get it... didn't see that yesterday. That makes more sense... you'd get the difference of the 85% paid out and the 15% kept if less than 85% of the original premiums were paid out.

Still though.. I thought the profit margins of insurance companies were already pretty low... how would this reduce premiums? Wouldn't they simply increase payouts to justify higher premiums, leaving them with a higher 15% leftover?

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

Ok, I get it... didn't see that yesterday. That makes more sense... you'd get the difference of the 85% paid out and the 15% kept if less than 85% of the original premiums were paid out.

Still though.. I thought the profit margins of insurance companies were already pretty low... how would this reduce premiums? Wouldn't they simply increase payouts to justify higher premiums, leaving them with a higher 15% leftover?

Some reports show that 85% is pretty close to the current norm for most companies so this doesn't drastically change things currently, but it does help ensure that norm remains going forward. As for creating an incentive for more payouts for more profits, it does and I see that as a positive given the current status quo of denying claims for more profit.

 

[thraashman]

Those who speak in absolutes...

There are those among us who think that health care reform needed to do drastically more than simply cut costs. Those areas may not be priorities for you, but that does not mark the bill a "total" failure. It is a remarkable accomplishment that this bill expands coverage to 30+ million people, expands consumer protections, and will have a negligible cost (most independent reports say 1-2%) on the countries overall health costs when compared to doing nothing. That type of outcome simple would not have been possible if the bill did not curve costs in some way.

I will tell you that I personally wept when this bill passed. Not because of some bleeding heart liberal fantasy, but because this bill does a great deal to enhance my personal freedom. My wife and I are cancer survivors. No more worrying about losing our insurance at a whim. No more worrying about whether or not I can move across the country to seek new opportunities because I might not find adequate health insurance. No more pervasive fear, every single day of our lives, that one of us will get sick and not be able to see a doctor. No more life time caps or annual limits, meaning that we won't face bankruptcy if we have a relapse. No more fear about if we will be able to get insurance for our children, if we decide to have them. We're in our mid-twenties, and this bill gave us a second chance at actually pursuing our dreams. Perhaps these things mean nothing to you, but it means a great deal to me. Those who believe HIPAA already provided this simply lack experience with the flaws our system had.

This bill is not perfect, and substantially more work needs to be done. No sane person argues against this. Hopefully the GOP in the House won't waste too much time on fruitless attempts at repeal, and instead will work to improve the changes that have been made by addressing tort reform and the patient-provider relationship.

Seeing as several of the leading Republicans have repeatedly over the last few days indicated that their main purpose is to repeal healthcare and ensure Obama is a one-term president rather than make any actual attempts to fix anything, I think we're shit out of luck.

 

[Pens1566]

Those who speak in absolutes...

There are those among us who think that health care reform needed to do drastically more than simply cut costs. Those areas may not be priorities for you, but that does not mark the bill a "total" failure. It is a remarkable accomplishment that this bill expands coverage to 30+ million people, expands consumer protections, and will have a negligible cost (most independent reports say 1-2%) on the countries overall health costs when compared to doing nothing. That type of outcome simple would not have been possible if the bill did not curve costs in some way.

I will tell you that I personally wept when this bill passed. Not because of some bleeding heart liberal fantasy, but because this bill does a great deal to enhance my personal freedom. My wife and I are cancer survivors. No more worrying about losing our insurance at a whim. No more worrying about whether or not I can move across the country to seek new opportunities because I might not find adequate health insurance. No more pervasive fear, every single day of our lives, that one of us will get sick and not be able to see a doctor. No more life time caps or annual limits, meaning that we won't face bankruptcy if we have a relapse. No more fear about if we will be able to get insurance for our children, if we decide to have them. We're in our mid-twenties, and this bill gave us a second chance at actually pursuing our dreams. Perhaps these things mean nothing to you, but it means a great deal to me. Those who believe HIPAA already provided this simply lack experience with the flaws our system had.

This bill is not perfect, and substantially more work needs to be done. No sane person argues against this. Hopefully the GOP in the House won't waste too much time on fruitless attempts at repeal, and instead will work to improve the changes that have been made by addressing tort reform and the patient-provider relationship.

Great post. :biggrin:

 

[Carmen813]

Seeing as several of the leading Republicans have repeatedly over the last few days indicated that their main purpose is to repeal healthcare and ensure Obama is a one-term president rather than make any actual attempts to fix anything, I think we're shit out of luck.

That is primarily coming from Mitch McConnell in the Senate, who is probably smarting over the fact that he wasn't able to become majority leader.

Boehner has said they want to vote to repeal, but in other interviews I've also seen him talk about working with the President to improve the law.

There are a few possible outcomes as I see it right now:
1.) Vote to repeal to appease the GOP base where it passes House but dies in the Senate.
2.) Attempt to defund the executive branch so it cannot implement the law, leaving us with a worse situation than we have now. Politically risky because the public is basically even split about the law, and likely to support it over the long term.
3.) Attach the repeal to everything, including the upcoming vote to raise the debt ceiling. Results in a lot of gridlock. Politically risky, potentially globally destructive.
4.) Work to address deficiencies in the current bill, focus on cost cutting, and implement Republican ideas like tort reform and address the provider-patient relationship. Seems politically palatable, would demonstrate willingness to govern rather than obstruct, and might actually cause many to view the GOP differently.

There is no mandate for repeal.

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

They will compromise. Boehner will want his name on some enacted legislation as SotH. And once the right sees "their team" more involved with the reform a lot of the outrage will dissipate.

 

[MooseNSquirrel]

When was the last time we had a "free market" health care system?

Not my branding!

 

[bfdd]

btw guys I'm not against a single payer, I just want it done right and simply switching from insurance companies to the government paying for shit won't fix anything. we need top to bottom reform in our health care industry.

 

[shira]

http://cbo.gov/ftpdocs/116xx/doc11674/11-04-Drug_Pricing.pdf

* “[The] increase in prices would make federal costs for Medicare’s drug benefit and the costs faced by some beneficiaries slightly higher than they would be in the absence of those provisions…”
* “The legislation also imposes an annual fee on manufacturers and importers of brand-name drugs. CBO expects that the fee will probably increase the prices of drugs purchased through Medicare and the prices of newly introduced drugs purchased through Medicaid and other federal programs by about 1 percent. Those increases will be in addition to the ones described above that stem from the new requirements for discounts and rebates.”
* “The premiums of drug plans will increase along with the increase in net drug prices, so the premiums paid by beneficiaries will increase slightly.”



Just pass the bill, and we will see all the great things in it!

So, are you telling us you trust CBO analyses? Or do you take that position only when you THINK the CBO supports your ideology?

 

[jhbball]

So, are you telling us you trust CBO analyses? Or do you take that position only when you THINK the CBO supports your ideology?

Why ask the question when you already know the answer?

 

[nick1985]

Why ask the question when you already know the answer?

Awww, still upset you got busted in a lie little baby?

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2117865