ObamaCare: Gentlemen, Do You Like Subsidizing Women's HC costs?

[nonlnear]

As an insurance regulator I am comfortable saying that even though a variable consideration may be actuarily sound that does not mean that variable is socially palatable. You see this all the time in automobile insurance rates that prohibit credit screening and at least one state (Montana, I think) prohibits the use of gender in setting auto rates. Young males (and their parents) have been complaining for years that their rates are higher than young females and state insurance departments are starting to listen (usually after a legislative mandate or voter initiative). This is just the flipside of that.

Then there is California, which prohibits any company to use actuarially sound methods of any kind to set auto rates. They mandate a technique which is fundamentally unsound for many MANY reasons. It doesn't consider the lack of credibility of small sample sizes (and in fact can end up mandating rates that are grossly unsound - actuarially speaking), and it is explicitly wrong in how it captures, or rather fails to capture, interactions between variables.

Would you say that is a matter of social acceptability, or would you say that it's more an example of legislators not having a clue what they were doing, and the people not having a clue what was going on? It sure does make for some cushy regulatory jobs though.

BTW, you wouldn't happen to be a CA insurance regulator, would you?

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Are men more costly in life and auto insurance because they are undertaking activities that are required for humanity to continue to exist?

I'd imagine that more men are employed in jobs of higher personal risk (construction workers, electricians, etc), thus resulting in higher life insurance rates.

 

[Pia]

When they are producing less due to their unique role that is required for our species to continue to exist, perhaps that's not a valid reason.

Why would it be up to employers, and specifically only those employers unlucky enough to hire the people who end up having children, to subsidize that?
When law forbids you from considering the applicant's sex/age/marital status when hiring, and puts you on the hook for any children they might or might not have, a small business can easily go bankrupt just from the bad luck of their only employee having a child.

 

[NeoV]

this guy is a moderator?

How about getting a clue - you do know the difference between health insurance premiums and life insurance premiums, right? Your lame attempt at attacking Obama can't even keep them straight.


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[schneiderguy]

Why is it wrong to discriminate against women on health insurance, but okay to discriminate against men on life and auto insurance?

Because men (especially the white ones) are the cause of all evil in the world and should be punished for their and their ancestor's actions.

You obviously haven't taken "How to be a good Librul 101" yet

 

[Fern]

How is it dissimilar? Following your logic in your original post, a tax-paying, law-abiding atheist might be in a tremendous disadvantage and an understandable grievance toward the government subsidy of churches and their affiliates. Or any member of different faiths could be feel disadvantaged and losing out on the benefit according to the less-than-mathmatically-perfect government subsidy programs on various religious organizations.

Does this analysis differ from your gender and marital-status based analysis of the ACA?

Man, we're just not following each other.

My OP shows that all of us in small business are going to have a very real and substantial change in the calc of our HI premiums under ObamaCare. This is money directly out of own pockets.

Now you're on about atheists and "massive amounts of subsidies" to churches? The connection is too vague IMO. Seems to me under your logic we can bring in the whole (unrelated) issue of progressive income taxation and refundable credits under the justification that it too is about subsidies and cost shifting.

To get back on point, people can either agree or disagree with this change. In this case, there is no need to even discuss if it's real or not, or whether it will affect anyone: That is indisputable.

They can either agree it's fair or not. I don't think it is. If women used less HC than men, and their statistics justified cheaper rates I bet they would raise holy effing h3ll if they had to pay more so men could pay less. As I've pointed above, men have to pay more for life insurance because of their stats. Is that unfair?

People can discuss whether charging based upon stats is "gender discrimination" or not. I don't believe it is. I think we should be using the best/most info available to charge people the appropriate amount. If, like smoking and weight, gender has a substantial and quantifiable impact on expected HC costs it should be taken into account like the other factors.

People can discuss what's up with this crap that larger companies (more than 100 hundred employees) are exempt from this? Why is that? Is that fair?

There are too many tangible issues that are a direct consequence of this law change, no need to wander so far afield about atheists and churches.

Fern

 

[fskimospy]

Why would it be up to employers, and specifically only those employers unlucky enough to hire the people who end up having children, to subsidize that?
When law forbids you from considering the applicant's sex/age/marital status when hiring, and puts you on the hook for any children they might or might not have, a small business can easily go bankrupt just from the bad luck of their only employee having a child.

I'm just going to go ahead and call bullshit on that. Employers are not required to subsidize it. The United States does not mandate paid maternity leave and if the person is quitting to have a baby you have many many months to replace them.

Gotta read up on your labor law, man.

 

[Fern]

Who gets Paid based upon their Production? :\

An awful lot of people.

Commissioned sales persons.

Almost every self-employed person. You don't produce anything, you can't bill anybody, you get no pay.

Office worker drones? Not so much.

Try being a doctor and not do anything, don't see any patients etc see how much money they'd make. Same for lawyers etc.

Fern

 

[AyashiKaibutsu]

Actually, this has nothing to do with HC quality. It's about who's paying for whose stuff.

If the argument is that women's HC quality will rise because they are paying less, then you'd be saying men's HC quality will decrease because they'll be paying more.

Fern

Uh, in this country payment = quality. You can't talk about paying without talking about quality.

You can say that everyone getting equal quality (at least to some baseline) is what's important.

 

[Fern]

By the way I have to say I have really been enjoying all the threads in the last week or so created by men that all talk about how we should be handling women's reproductive issues.

Only on the internet.

You keep trying to make this a reproductive issue. It isn't. Women's higher HC costs aren't soley as a result of giving birth or having abortions etc.

Fern

 

[Fern]

this guy is a moderator?

How about getting a clue - you do know the difference between health insurance premiums and life insurance premiums, right? Your lame attempt at attacking Obama can't even keep them straight.

Next time you post try to have a point.

They both had prices primarily based upon statistical data until Obamacare came along. Now, HI, not so much.

Fern

 

[jackschmittusa]

Are men not equally responsible for much of the increased cost to cover women? If so much of the cost is due to maternity and defines the class of women of childbearing age, wouldn't men as a class be considered to be a causation and have to pay their due?

 

[nonlnear]

Next time you post try to have a point.

They both had prices primarily based upon statistical data until Obamacare came along. Now, HI, not so much.

Fern

Fern,

The whole debate over mandatory BC coverage is pretty much moo anyways. With the mandatory MLRs coming down the pipeline, plans were going to start covering every predictable expense under the sun just to reduce the volatility of their loss costs. You and I both know that mandating minimum MLRs was never going to cause an insurance company to voluntarily reduce their expenses, right? It has some bearing on self-insureds, but that's kind of secondary given the public debate spillover to all employers. This whole thing feels like an election year diversion to me.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Are men not equally responsible for much of the increased cost to cover women? If so much of the cost is due to maternity and defines the class of women of childbearing age, wouldn't men as a class be considered to be a causation and have to pay their due?

But why should a misanthropic virgin have to subsidize Jim Bob Duggar?

 

[Pia]

I'm just going to go ahead and call bullshit on that. Employers are not required to subsidize it. The United States does not mandate paid maternity leave and if the person is quitting to have a baby you have many many months to replace them.

My bad, this thread was all about US so I should have clarified that the situation I explained was from here in Europe.

The general principle is the same than what you commented about, though. If the employer has good reason to believe that someone applying for a job will be less productive, then it's reasonable to make them a lower offer. If you force the employer to pay higher than market wages to some more-equal-than-others groups, you are forcing the employer to subsidize those groups. Even assuming it's good and proper to make those subsidies, why is it right and proper for the cost of the subsidy to fall solely on the employer who employs people in those groups? In forcing the cost solely on them, you are giving the employer an incentive to avoid hiring people of those groups, so it's not all sunshine and roses even for the the group receiving the subsidy.

 

[NeoV]

my point Fern - and you are smart enough to know this - is that this entire discussion is nothing more than a 'boogeyman' attack on Obama - there is no issue here at all

 

[sandorski]

An awful lot of people.

Commissioned sales persons.

Almost every self-employed person. You don't produce anything, you can't bill anybody, you get no pay.

Office worker drones? Not so much.

Try being a doctor and not do anything, don't see any patients etc see how much money they'd make. Same for lawyers etc.

Fern

First 3 points, I agree. 4th, meh, now we're drifting apart. That said, that still leaves what is most likely a vast Majority of Workers completely unaccounted for.

 

[Fern]

Fern,

The whole debate over mandatory BC coverage is pretty much moo anyways. With the mandatory MLRs coming down the pipeline, plans were going to start covering every predictable expense under the sun just to reduce the volatility of their loss costs. You and I both know that mandating minimum MLRs was never going to cause an insurance company to voluntarily reduce their expenses, right?

Hmm. Had to look up "MLR" to see what you're talking about.

So, it's "Medical Loss Ratio".

Honestly, I haven't thought about that before. I was generally aware of it, but haven't thought about it (or should say read about it since I'm not in the HC industry) and the likely impact on HI company practices. I'll have to research some before I form any opinion.

Fern

 

[fskimospy]

My bad, this thread was all about US so I should have clarified that the situation I explained was from here in Europe.

The general principle is the same than what you commented about, though. If the employer has good reason to believe that someone applying for a job will be less productive, then it's reasonable to make them a lower offer. If you force the employer to pay higher than market wages to some more-equal-than-others groups, you are forcing the employer to subsidize those groups. Even assuming it's good and proper to make those subsidies, why is it right and proper for the cost of the subsidy to fall solely on the employer who employs people in those groups? In forcing the cost solely on them, you are giving the employer an incentive to avoid hiring people of those groups, so it's not all sunshine and roses even for the the group receiving the subsidy.

Again, if you want to argue about what form this should take that's fine. I believe to argue, as the OP does, that such a thing's existence is wrong in principle, is silly.

 

[Fern]

my point Fern - and you are smart enough to know this - is that this entire discussion is nothing more than a 'boogeyman' attack on Obama - there is no issue here at all

How is it a "boogeyman attack"?

(Not quite sure what that means actually.)

I'm a male. I'm self employed. I'm directly effected. Not indirectly, but directly.

And I don't like the policy or the rationale behind it.

And I'll be honest, if it was some change that made my expense cheaper, I'd like it (I still might not approve of the rationale). But it doesn't, so I don't.

Fern

 

[sactoking]

Are men more costly in life and auto insurance because they are undertaking activities that are required for humanity to continue to exist?

From an insurance standpoint that argument is irrelevant. In all actuality health insurance should not cover maternity because it is generally not considered an state of unhealth, is on almost all cases preventable, and the coverage contributes to morale hazard.

Then there is California, which prohibits any company to use actuarially sound methods of any kind to set auto rates. They mandate a technique which is fundamentally unsound for many MANY reasons. It doesn't consider the lack of credibility of small sample sizes (and in fact can end up mandating rates that are grossly unsound - actuarially speaking), and it is explicitly wrong in how it captures, or rather fails to capture, interactions between variables.

Would you say that is a matter of social acceptability, or would you say that it's more an example of legislators not having a clue what they were doing, and the people not having a clue what was going on? It sure does make for some cushy regulatory jobs though.

BTW, you wouldn't happen to be a CA insurance regulator, would you?

Nope, not CA. Actually to my knowledge CA does not prohibit any legally discriminatory ratemaking practices. It's not the regulations screwing up CA it's the terrible drivers.

I'd imagine that more men are employed in jobs of higher personal risk (construction workers, electricians, etc), thus resulting in higher life insurance rates.

Indirectly, yes. Since the male life expectancy is lower than that of women the interest accumulation period before payout on men's life insurance policies is shorter necessitating higher premiums.

 

[senseamp]

Women's health positively impacts men, unless they are celibate or gay, which explains why the Catholic priests are against providing it.

 

[sactoking]

How is it a "boogeyman attack"?

(Not quite sure what that means actually.)

I'm a male. I'm self employed. I'm directly effected. Not indirectly, but directly.

And I don't like the policy or the rationale behind it.

And I'll be honest, if it was some change that made my expense cheaper, I'd like it (I still might not approve of the rationale). But it doesn't, so I don't.

Fern

It's really no different than the young disproportionately subsidizing the old through the 400% premium disparity cap.

 

[thecoolnessrune]

Fern,
As a hetero male and huge fan of women, I'm ok with it. Look at it this way, this is compensation for the prevailing habit of paying women less. BTW, do you think us old guys with failing parts should pay up too?

 

[nonlnear]

Nope, not CA. Actually to my knowledge CA does not prohibit any legally discriminatory ratemaking practices.

I'm not sure the wording of the bolded portion was written as intended. Could you clarify?

As to what CA requires, I have two words for you: sequential analysis. CA specifically prohibits the use of any multivariate statistical techniques in the support of auto rates. Also, California has a list of pre-approved variables that are allowed to be used. Credit is not on it, and they are very particular about the use of territory. Gender is allowed, but not age. Years of driving experience is allowed - mandatory, in fact. As measured by the actuarially unsound sequential analysis, the pricing impact of all optional rating variables in a rating plan must be no greater than the smallest of the three mandatory rating variable (driving record, mileage, and years of driving experience).

It's not the regulations screwing up CA it's the terrible drivers.

Spoken like a regulator.