EVERY person I know is scared of "Obamacare", and it hasn't even started yet. Myself included.
Interesting. Please enlighten me. What is scary?
Supposedly it was going to lower rates, mine went up last June by 15%. This June is the next time they can raise it for me, we'll see what happens then.
Confidence isn't high.
I was interested in that response and decided to Google it [obamacare to lower rates] to see what's up.
I got this:
In a striking illustration of the promise that the health law holds for consumers, two Oregon private insurers vying to sell coverage on the state’s Obamacare insurance marketplace this October are reevaluating their opening bids for the plans’ monthly premiums. The reason? A side-by-side regional comparison of all proposed 2014 premiums for Oregon marketplace plans became public on Oregon’s marketplace website Thursday, and showed that the two insurers’ planned monthly premiums were far higher than other proposals. That raised fears among the companies’ officials that their plans wouldn’t be competitive on the market later this year, leading them to proactively request a rate reduction — and as more of Obamacare is implemented, state insurance commissioners expect that trend to continue: “Posting rate comparisons company-by-company is a taste of what is to come,” says Cheryl Martinis of the Oregon Insurance Division. Judging by the reaction, there’s already an impact.
“National health spending grew by 3.9 percent each year from 2009 to 2011, the lowest rate of growth since the federal government began keeping such statistics in 1960,” reports the Kaiser Family Foundation. Early data suggest that the numbers held into 2012. So the curve hasn’t just bent; it has bent more than ever. In a new paper, Harvard University scholars David Cutler and Nikhil Sahni calculate that if those numbers hold over the next decade, the government will save up to $770 billion, employers will save up to $430 annually on each covered worker and households will spend up to $290 less on annual health costs. “Slow health care spending growth might thus bring much-needed relief throughout the economy,” they write.
#595721 - 05/30/1308:04 PMRe: Don't let the door hit you...
[Re: Reboot]
six_of_one
Pool Bar
Registered: 04/19/02
Posts: 4474
Loc: Alexandria, VA
Originally Posted By: Jim_
Originally Posted By: Leslie
Quote:
EVERY person I know is scared of "Obamacare", and it hasn't even started yet. Myself included.
Interesting. Please enlighten me. What is scary?
Supposedly it was going to lower rates, mine went up last June by 15%. This June is the next time they can raise it for me, we'll see what happens then.
Confidence isn't high.
Given much of the ACA doesn't even kick-in until next year, that's more the fault of the insurance companies trying to soak the public as much as they can before it does. ("Customers shouldn't be scared of their insurance companies; the insurance companies should be scared of their customers" ;-) ...
Anyways, my confidence about this whole thing is: wait and see. Doubtless the system won't work exactly as intended or anticipated -- things rarely do, especially ones this wide-ranging. OTOH, that the insurance companies are currently jacking up premiums while they can is more just more evidence that something needed to be done. We'll have to see if the ACA helps or not. If not, we'll try something else =)
#595724 - 05/30/1308:24 PMRe: Don't let the door hit you...
[Re: six_of_one]
Acumowchek Is this thing on?
Registered: 12/30/07
Posts: 4208
Loc: Petaluma, CA
Quote:
insurance companies trying to soak the public as much as they can
I think that's exactly what's going on. Forget me. I've been watching my parents insurance skyrocket in the last 3 years. Yes,they planned their retirement, but they didn't factor in the greed… How can the elderly possibly afford to take care of themselves?
#595729 - 05/31/1312:02 AMRe: Don't let the door hit you...
[Re: Celandine]
yoyo52 Nothing comes of nothing.
Registered: 05/25/01
Posts: 30520
Loc: PA, USA
I get insurance through my job, and every year for the last twenty, we've gotten worse and worse and worse medical coverage. Why? Because every year for the last twenty years the insurance companies have raised their rates, sometimes by as much as 20%, and the school has had to cut back its offerings and reduce the benefits. Yearly. We used to have choices among three different companies. We're down to a single company. It's a lousy, but seriously lousy program. But it's the best that the school can get for the money it's willing to spend. None of that has anything at all to do with Obamacare. It has a lot to do with the damned insurance companies, which have nothing but their profits in mind when they raise rates and reduce benefits.
I have insurance. All kinds of insurance--health, car, home, life--all of it sucks a wet one.
_________________________ MACTECHubi dolor ibi digitus
After Ted's second heart attack, his boss insisted that he return to work immediately, even though he was on disability leave, when he gave in thinking 'that they NEEDED him', he dropped the disability claim, and returned to work... two days later they laid him off, leaving us in dire straits.
Now he's unemployed AND with a pre-existing condition, after having lost the medical coverage both from his ex-employer, AND from having lost his disability claim, waiting for the next stress related heart attack to take him out.
Turns out that the turd he'd felt sorry for (thus returned to work early) had only called him back then laid him off in order to cease the disability insurance, because he's now done the same thing to all the other older workers... trying to cut his cost of paying rising health care expenses for older workers that could potentially fall in the traces (work-horse dropping dead in the field)
HEARTLESS SOB. All the guys were within a few years of retirement. What do they have to look forward to? Without warning they went from looking forward to full retirement with benefits to trying to meet their mortgage payments by cleaning tables at McDonald's?
As Paulette was so fond of saying: "What ken I say, Jac.? LIFE SUX ...Then You Die."
"Don't let the door hit you..."
Edited by Celandine (05/31/1305:35 AM) Edit Reason: ironic title