**UPDATE** New Obamacare Reality Setting in: 8M in exchanges, 35% are < 35 yrs old

[sactoking]

Interesting. But forgive me, I thought that Medicaid in many (most?) states operates like Medicare, whereby the federal gov't works with private insurance companies as the single payer to cover citizens 65 and over. I was not however aware that Medicaid didn't work this way.

EDIT: From Wikipedia:



Admittedly, I know little about the legal definition of insurance vagaries.

I'm on my phone so typing is tough, please forgive me. You're right that Medicaid can use private managed care organizations. That does not make it insurance. Medicaid is still Medicaid, the addition of the MCOs only injects administrative risk to the MCO and not true morbidity risk. Medicaid effectively offers their MCOs a chance to profit by controlling bureaucratic costs and managing care more efficiently than the government does. But the downside risk to the insurer is that the insurer can't manage the administration and loses money, but I don't believe the insurer is ever really at risk of suffering pure morbidity losses.

 

[Jhhnn]

I love how you conveniently forgot to mention the illegal immigrants and the people who can afford it but choose not to get it. Typical leftist.

How many right wing hot button red herrings can you drag into an argument, anyway?

 

[shortylickens]

Please point us to the specifics of this "free market healthcare system" you continually sing the praises of. And please also explain to us how this system would solve the problems of pre-existing conditions, tens of millions of uninsured Americans, and spiraling healthcare costs.

Removing the government backed monopoly the AMA has.

Which no politician will ever try to do. So we will never have a free market health care system in America.
Ever.

 

[Incorruptible]

How many right wing hot button red herrings can you drag into an argument, anyway?

Not a right winger but keep spouting BS.

 

[sportage]

All this crap. Especially from faux news and right wing talk radio. WHY should anyone be surprised or question that people really do want and are willing to pay for healthcare ???
This is simple folks, people really do want healthcare. Especially families with children that have never been offered the opportunity before. And there are millions of those in need families despite what faux or Rush might tell you. So what is the shock and more so illusion with healthcare? People want it. Millions have been denied the luxury of healthcare for one reason or another. And showing up uninsured at the ER is NOT an healthcare plan. And remember two things here... one, the republicans have been doing their best to mislead people on their wanting healthcare. And second, this round of open enrollment has only been round one. When people realize all the republican lies were lies and then realize word of mouth that many of their own friends and neighbors signed up round one for healthcare, well expect round two will be much more popular. And that theory follows exactly the same trend with Romney care. Where in that state they now have over 90% of the population covered. So.... well just don't be surprised.

 

[Jhhnn]

Not a right winger but keep spouting BS.

By anybody's definition other than your own, you're a right wing zealot.

Next up, incorruptible claims day is night, then believes it himself.

 

[shira]

Keep spouting leftist BS. obamacare needs to be demolished and replaced with a free market healthcare system.

Please point us to the specifics of this "free market healthcare system" you continually sing the praises of. And please also explain to us how this system would solve the problems of pre-existing conditions, tens of millions of uninsured Americans, and spiraling healthcare costs.

I love how you conveniently forgot to mention the illegal immigrants and the people who can afford it but choose not to get it. Typical leftist.

I love you just evaded to my specific question, and raised the issue of "illegal immigrants" which had NOTHING to do with this sequence of posts.

Why is it that whenever someone asks you for specifics about this "free market healthcare system" you continually sing the praises of, and how it would solve the problems the ACA was designed to address, you ALWAYS either evade or fail to answer?

If you claim to know of a better system then the ACA, then either provide the details or STFU.

 

[shira]

Removing the government backed monopoly the AMA has.

Which no politician will ever try to do. So we will never have a free market health care system in America.
Ever.

Clearly, then, your opinion is that the ACA is okay, since a "free market health care system" is an unattainable fantasy.

Why, then , does Incorruptible continue to advocate a system which cannot exist, given the realities of American governance?

 

[Jhhnn]

Clearly, then, your opinion is that the ACA is okay, since a "free market health care system" is an unattainable fantasy.

Why, then , does Incorruptible continue to advocate a system which cannot exist, given the realities of American governance?

"Incorruptible" and "realities" in the same sentence is a non sequiter. He shares common reality only in the sense that he can use the internet.

Or do you have some translator program/ magic decoder ring indicating you should believe otherwise?

 

[werepossum]

Indeed, that's a good catch. Non-covered.

Of course....thinking about it for a bit, I imagine many of those <1M may be people who fall into the coverage gap of people in states that haven't expanded Medicaid; those whose AGI is more than 138% of poverty line in non-Medicaid expanding state but less than the private exchange ACA subsidy line. As you well know, this is a problem still centered around the SCOTUS case in 2012 and conscious Republican intransigence in said states (FL, TX, etc.) for not taking the expanded Medicaid poverty line definition. All entirely avoidable if not for politics, in other words, and really having nothing to do with a "flaw" in the ACA, other than it not anticipating the extent of conservative obstruction in two branches of gov't.

Whatever helps you sleep at night.

Something interesting from ccchr's Forbes article:

Notably, RAND finds that outside of employer-sponsored insurance, Obamacare’s impact on the uninsured has been minimal thus far—a net of 1.1 million between Medicaid (+5.9 million), the exchanges (+3.9 million), off-exchange individually-purchased insurance (-1.6 million), and other forms of insurance, such as coverage for federal employees and the military (-7.1 million).

It appears that the main group signing up through the exchanges are not the uninsured, but those who already had health insurance and are taking the opportunity to get it more cheaply. Outside of employer-furnished health insurance, the number of those who now have health insurance thanks to the ACA (1.1 million) is little more than the number of those who now don't have health insurance thanks to the ACA (< 1 million.) Not too impressive.

If I were a Democrat politician (Heaven forbid!) running in a red state, I'd be slamming the Medicaid expansion message every opportunity. My daughter-in-law is one of those who lost her (crappy) health insurance and is unable to afford an Obamacare policy - she just doesn't make enough money to pay enough tax to get enough subsidy to make an ACA-compliant policy affordable. (And the stupid facilitators sold her a policy she could afford - a life insurance policy!) There have to be a lot of people in that situation.

Also from his quoted article:

I highlight that as your post seems to imply everyone had to pay more for coverage.

No, my post implied that the Obamacare policy was more expensive, which except perhaps for New York is pretty much universally true. It's just that for a lot of people, it's either paid straight out of their taxes via subsidies or someone else pays it.

I have mixed feelings about that. I disliked it initially, but now I'm coming around. Health insurance is pretty important - why should government get its money before one buys health insurance? It's not like there is any fiscal restraint in federal government borrowing aside from the ACA, so it makes sense to let people use that money for health insurance instead of paying it in taxes.

Where does that quote come from?

I can't find it in the OP's link.

IIRC, the last year's CBO estimate they predicted only 1 million new insured from the ranks of the employed. That's much different than the Rand results.


Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/obamacare-rand-study-uninsured-rate-esi-2014-4#ixzz2yRS1rCU5

Unless the CBO did a much more recent estimate I don't think it's helpful to quote their numbers.

I'd also like to know what they meant by "grandfathered plans".

Fern

The additional numbers of people receiving health insurance from their employer kind of makes sense. One push in Obamacare was to force employers to provide health insurance. I know several people whose hours were cut back to avoid qualifying for health insurance under the new guidelines, but it cannot be practical for employers to cut the hours of everyone who did not qualify for health insurance under the old rules but do under the new rules. People whose hours were cut are a net wash, but those people who now get health insurance are a net gain, so the overall effect would be positive. With the economy still slowly gathering steam and employers more and more turning to part time workers, it makes sense that more employees would have to be covered.

 

[master_shake_]

Keep spouting leftist BS. obamacare needs to be demolished and replaced with a free market healthcare system.

this, because if you can't afford 8hundredgazilliontrillionbilliol dollar hospital stay YOU NEED TO DIE!

do you live in ontario? if you do i hope i am not paying for your government healthcare.

 

[rockyct]

A couple things. First of all, nobody doubted that Obamacare would add people to the insurance roles. No trick in doing that. Just give out more free or subsidized plans and you'll accomplish that but it's far, far away from universal coverage. We started with about 50 million uninsured. The White House promised us at least 32 million. They're a far cry from that.

Finally, if you want to insure more people, fine. Give out your goodies and go for it but why did you have to screw with my insurance too? Why did you have to insist that my plan include birth control and dental care for kids? I was happy with my plan and now Obamacare forced me to give it up for a more expensive plan because it has to include so many things. Why did you have to F* with my plan in order to give 9 million people Medicaid or subsidies?

Of course people doubted that the ACA could add people to insurance pools in a sustainable way. Had only sick and older people joined the coverage pools, rates could have spiraled out of control and ultimately forced the Democrats to cave and dismantle the insurance pools. We'll never achieve universal coverage outside of eventually moving to Medicare for all or another form of single payer. The goal was to get low income people some form of health care and provide a way for uninsured people earning above the poverty rate to get into a state-wide insurance pool at a somewhat reasonable rate. It's not a great solution, but at least it addresses a problem which the Republicans don't even think really is one.

I'm sorry if you lost your plan, but the fact was that the status quo wasn't working for too many Americans. The ACA includes making sure children will be covered on their parents plan until age 26, no caps on benefits, and no price discrimination based on pre-existing conditions or gender. These "goodies" affect a lot more than 9 million people and prevent the horror stories of people thinking they had good insurance until they got sick and hit the benefit cap. Sadly, yes, in order to offset these changes everyone has to get insurance or pay a fine and many plans are going to go up in the short term.

Basically, your plan got "F*"ed with so that a lot more people could be added to private insurance pools that cover some essential services that even a lot of insured people weren't getting before. If it weren't for the Republican governors blocking the expansion of Medicaid in their state, the ACA would be meeting its projection of covering that 32 million people it was estimated to.

 

[Stewox]

Total Fraud study guys, it's dreams

will explain later ... Still setting up room after renovation

 

[michal1980]

All this crap. Especially from faux news and right wing talk radio. WHY should anyone be surprised or question that people really do want and are willing to pay for healthcare ???
This is simple folks, people really do want healthcare. Especially families with children that have never been offered the opportunity before. And there are millions of those in need families despite what faux or Rush might tell you. So what is the shock and more so illusion with healthcare? People want it. Millions have been denied the luxury of healthcare for one reason or another. And showing up uninsured at the ER is NOT an healthcare plan. And remember two things here... one, the republicans have been doing their best to mislead people on their wanting healthcare. And second, this round of open enrollment has only been round one. When people realize all the republican lies were lies and then realize word of mouth that many of their own friends and neighbors signed up round one for healthcare, well expect round two will be much more popular. And that theory follows exactly the same trend with Romney care. Where in that state they now have over 90% of the population covered. So.... well just don't be surprised.

People want free shit.

News at 11.

 

[Sea Ray]

Of course people doubted that the ACA could add people to insurance pools in a sustainable way. Had only sick and older people joined the coverage pools, rates could have spiraled out of control and ultimately forced the Democrats to cave and dismantle the insurance pools. We'll never achieve universal coverage outside of eventually moving to Medicare for all or another form of single payer. The goal was to get low income people some form of health care and provide a way for uninsured people earning above the poverty rate to get into a state-wide insurance pool at a somewhat reasonable rate. It's not a great solution, but at least it addresses a problem which the Republicans don't even think really is one.

I'm sorry if you lost your plan, but the fact was that the status quo wasn't working for too many Americans. The ACA includes making sure children will be covered on their parents plan until age 26, no caps on benefits, and no price discrimination based on pre-existing conditions or gender. These "goodies" affect a lot more than 9 million people and prevent the horror stories of people thinking they had good insurance until they got sick and hit the benefit cap. Sadly, yes, in order to offset these changes everyone has to get insurance or pay a fine and many plans are going to go up in the short term.

Basically, your plan got "F*"ed with so that a lot more people could be added to private insurance pools that cover some essential services that even a lot of insured people weren't getting before. If it weren't for the Republican governors blocking the expansion of Medicaid in their state, the ACA would be meeting its projection of covering that 32 million people it was estimated to.

It's way too early to say that premiums won't spiral out of control. In fact there's already evidence that they are. Premiums certainly are not going down $2500 like Obama said so many times.

Furthermore I disagree with you that goodies such as free birth control needed to be included. Why only BC? Why not add free beta blockers or insulin? There's no reason it needs to be free.

Want to know how Republicans can become heros? They can remove much of the regulation of Obamacare and make it possible for people like me to buy a plan that does NOT include free BC, colonoscopies, kids dental, Mammograms and preventatives. Then those policy premiums would drop by hundreds if not thousands of dollars. Relieve voters pocketbooks=political success

 

[glenn1]

It's way too early to say that premiums won't spiral out of control. In fact there's already evidence that they are. Premiums certainly are not going down $2500 like Obama said so many times.

Furthermore I disagree with you that goodies such as free birth control needed to be included. Why only BC? Why not add free beta blockers or insulin? There's no reason it needs to be free.

Want to know how Republicans can become heros? They can remove much of the regulation of Obamacare and make it possible for people like me to buy a plan that does NOT include free BC, colonoscopies, kids dental, Mammograms and preventatives. Then those policy premiums would drop by hundreds if not thousands of dollars. Relieve voters pocketbooks=political success

Democrats don't believe that people have the intelligence to make choices themselves, thus why government needs to make the choices for them. No, we don't trust you to manage your retirement funds, therefore we'll oppose to the death any privatization of social security regardless of whether it's appropriate for you or not. We don't trust you to pick a health "insurance" option that meets your needs, thus we'll force you to buy a plan containing what we say you need.

That's why the Democrats are doomed to failure unless they change their approach. In the modern, hyper-personalized and customized world trying to impose massive 19th century top-down political solutions *will* fail. Not that the Republicans are any better, but at least their default mode isn't to resort to Soviet style collectivism for every problem. Of course on social issues the GOP default mode is more like the Salem witch trials and burning heretics in the name of "family values."

 

[shira]

It's way too early to say that premiums won't spiral out of control. In fact there's already evidence that they are. Premiums certainly are not going down $2500 like Obama said so many times.

Furthermore I disagree with you that goodies such as free birth control needed to be included. Why only BC? Why not add free beta blockers or insulin? There's no reason it needs to be free.

Want to know how Republicans can become heros? They can remove much of the regulation of Obamacare and make it possible for people like me to buy a plan that does NOT include free BC, colonoscopies, kids dental, Mammograms and preventatives. Then those policy premiums would drop by hundreds if not thousands of dollars. Relieve voters pocketbooks=political success

Hey, while we're at it, let's get rid of requirements for the insurance to cover doctor visits, surgery, hospital costs, treatments for disease (especially cancer), rehabilitative care, and prescription medications. I'll bet we can get the cost of "insurance" down to pennies a day, and ensure "coverage" for every man, woman, and child in America.

 

[fskimospy]

Democrats don't believe that people have the intelligence to make choices themselves, thus why government needs to make the choices for them. No, we don't trust you to manage your retirement funds, therefore we'll oppose to the death any privatization of social security regardless of whether it's appropriate for you or not. We don't trust you to pick a health "insurance" option that meets your needs, thus we'll force you to buy a plan containing what we say you need.

That's why the Democrats are doomed to failure unless they change their approach. In the modern, hyper-personalized and customized world trying to impose massive 19th century top-down political solutions *will* fail. Not that the Republicans are any better, but at least their default mode isn't to resort to Soviet style collectivism for every problem. Of course on social issues the GOP default mode is more like the Salem witch trials and burning heretics in the name of "family values."

Do you actually believe this crazy nonsense?

 

[Sea Ray]

Hey, while we're at it, let's get rid of requirements for the insurance to cover doctor visits, surgery, hospital costs, treatments for disease (especially cancer), rehabilitative care, and prescription medications. I'll bet we can get the cost of "insurance" down to pennies a day, and ensure "coverage" for every man, woman, and child in America.

You're jumping to an absurd extreme. I'm not suggesting that insurance not cover those items. I'm saying that I should not have to buy a policy that covers them free of co-pays or deductibles. It's simple math. If all those things are required for an insurance co to cover 100% then the policy will be more expensive than one that has co-pays of some sort.

I'm self employed so I've been buying health insurance for myself my whole life. When I'd shop policies, I'd look at the ones that covered checkups 100% and I opted not to buy those policies because the ones that required a co-pay were so much cheaper.

I haven't even gotten into Health Savings Accounts (HSA). Why does Obamacare limit this option to certain policies? Why discourage its use at all?

Then there's the question of whether the FEDs even have the power to tell states what they can and cannot offer in their insurance plans.

If someone asks what has Obama done to expand gov't and take away your freedoms, just say or shout Obamacare! I no longer have the freedom to choose my health insurance. The ACA has limited my choices and without question it's increased the size/cost of gov't

 

[Incorruptible]

By anybody's definition other than your own, you're a right wing zealot.

Next up, incorruptible claims day is night, then believes it himself.

Keep spouting your BS. Have you ever admitted to being a leftist socialist scumbag?

 

[Jhhnn]

Democrats don't believe that people have the intelligence to make choices themselves, thus why government needs to make the choices for them

First, employ false attribution. Extrapolate from there in a rant wandering far from reality. Your handlers, the propaganda sources you trust, should be proud of themselves.

You also underestimate he ability of trained teams of professionals to create documentation incomprehensible to many, many people. It's a function of specialization in modern societies. They won't offer you a deal you can't refuse, but rather one you can't comprehend. Witness the meltdown of the Ownership Society.

 

[Incorruptible]

"Incorruptible" and "realities" in the same sentence is a non sequiter. He shares common reality only in the sense that he can use the internet.

Or do you have some translator program/ magic decoder ring indicating you should believe otherwise?

Again resorting to insults because you have nothing. I have said this before and I'll say it again. You are a pathetic excuse for a human being, you're a miserable extremist idiot. Go to another Tea Party rally so they can kick your ass again and teabag you.

 

[Jhhnn]

Keep spouting your BS. Have you ever admitted to being a leftist socialist scumbag?

You unwittingly confirm what I offered, as you have with every post you ever made to this forum. Your delusions are all encompassing & self reinforcing, the product of enormous propaganda inflicted on a weak & gullible child like mentality.

Let me put it this way- If you're dumb enough to spout the shit that you do, that means you're too dumb to have thought it up yourself. You were taught to believe in things that you don't understand in a truly exploitative manner. You're a victim in ways that you can't possibly comprehend, quite by design.

Intellectually & emotionally, you've been crippled, damaged to serve ends you'll never appreciate.

 

[AViking]

I don't understand you Incorruptible. You of all people should be supporting a reform to our healthcare system. You clearly are mentally ill and need access to affordable healthcare. Odds are you are young enough to still be on your parent's policy which probably wasn't possible before the ACA.

 

[Texashiker]

Because I heard from a friend, that knew someone that lived next to a family that was once in a restaurant where they were served by someone that knew someone that heard about someone who overheard a conversation from two other people on a bus that ACA wasn't all that great.

If the ACA is so great, lets implement the whole thing. Including the employer mandate. There are millions of working class families who would love for their rich employer to be forced to provide health insurance. Lets start with walmart, mcdonalds,,,, and all of the fortune 1,000 companies.

Over 9 million people obtained insurance, that is great. Except some of them bought insurance under duress. Either buy health care or get fined by the IRS.

Honestly, is that the kind of nation we want to leave our children?