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Me and ACA
I tried a bunch of times to get on NYS's health exchange last week. Dead end. The site went down for 'repairs' over the weekend, but as of 8 AM today it was up and running. Some thoughts.
The first step is to get a user ID. For those familiar with this type of registration process the Captchas etc. are not a big hurdle. But two 8 digit codes (no spaces please) are required on step one. My guess is that there are fair number of people who will struggle with this. The same could be said for the password requirements (eight digits, two numbers and one capital letter).
The NYS exchange wants more than the standard ID info of address and SS#. I was asked a series of questions to 'prove' my identity. I was asked to identify a financial institution that I had opened an account with in the past two years. Five banks were listed, and one of them was the bank I had in fact opened a new account.
Another question blew my mind. I have never purchased pet insurance, so this was a trick question that required the response "None of the above" to continue with registration.
These questions prove that the exchanges have access to a great deal of information about who is signing up. I suspect that the need for the servers to go out and gather the individual's data so that these questions can be posed, is the reason that the exchanges went down the first week. The plumbing for this can easily get clogged; the data bases for this type of info are huge. NYS has access to my IRS data, the pricing I got reflected the fact that my income was above the subsidy levels in the prior year.
Once you exist, the rest is straight forward. I'm single, 63; I'm a headache for ACA. Obamacare needs young healthy people to enroll. For every one of 'me' ACA will need a half-dozen twenty-year olds to balance the costs. I looked at the cheapest plan (Bronze - $360/mo) and the richest (Platinum - $620/mo). The difference between the two extremes is the annual deductible:
This pricing structure is flawed. For the Bronze plan I would pay $3,684 per year and face a$5,800 deductible. If I get sick, my all-in cost goes to $10,120. If I pay the high monthly premium I would pay $7,740 a year, but incur no deductibles. Therefore, in the event I need the insurance I would 'save' $2,380 by opting for the Platinum plan. At my age the Bronze plan is a bad bet.
I can easily envisage an age cohort of mine who opts for the Bronze plan, gets sick and then is stuck with a $5,800 bill that can't be paid. These very high deductibles are going to be a disaster for Obamacare. Who is going to eat the losses that will surely come from those with cheap plans and mega deductibles? The taxpayer will foot this bill....
I have medical insurance today that has similar features to the Platinum plan. It costs me $1,100 per month for the insurance. So I'm looking at a real savings of $5,760 per year! This is great news for me, and some will point to this and say that Obamacare is doing what it's supposed to do. The fact that I am now in a group that includes lots of younger people who will not need the insurance has brought down my costs.
This is going to fail. I should not be getting a subsidy from Obamacare. My investment income the past few years (thanks to ZIRP/QE) puts me in the top 2% (Income greater than $175k = top 2%). Why in hell should I be getting a subsidy? And if I'm getting a subsidy, who is going to pay it? Those twenty-somethings are going to save me $5,800 a year?? Why?
In spite of the large savings that I would realize from from signing up for Obamacare (a free one-month trip to Europe!) I did not hit the button. There is a catch in this for me. Can I keep the doctor that I have been seeing (and trust) for the past 25 years? There is no way to determine that. There is a field that allows you to check if your traditional doctor is covered by the plan. But when you ask, you get this:
Okay, this bug will get fixed someday, and when it does I will sign up for Obamacare (provided my Doc is in the group). When I do, I will save a bundle, but there is no way that this should be happening. Why is Obamacare putting big bucks in the pockets of geezers who are top 2%?
My conclusion is that the exchanges are setting the initial cost for insurance at rates that are artificially low. These are teaser rates that are designed to get folks to sign up. A year or two from now the insurance companies will be getting big increases. Whatever you think of Obamacare today, wait two years, you will come to hate it.
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Ah, ah, carefulness having you being taking, the commenter who is Geruda. You are having the fallings out of characters.
Too many angries in your head having you saying the wordings of vulgarities fucking, which is a stupids.
Yep, that's right. Hanging out in this cesspool of stupidity is turning me into a stupid like many of the rest of you. Before I know it I'll be back into the kind of wet work I used to do if I don't get away from you ignorant fucks.
I know there are a few intelligent people here who don't say much so I'll doing some venting for them.
The commenter who is Geruda having these wordings:
Explainings having showing the incapacity to addressing the real sourcing of the issue. Raving about a fabled past is just that, raving.
Ah, ah, please havings no shaming regarding your working. After the all, peoples do having needing servicings of honeydippers wet workings.
Swallow, swallow, swallow.
I am somehow having seeings the story under a differents lighting. One has to sporting flexible jaws like some snakes to be able to having swallowings the huge distortings of reality Chinese citizenism peoples requiring to be part of the club.
"just wait"... heh, how come repubican$ can't get thi$ up$et over absurd military $pending, pork barreling, foreign aid, all of the "little" expendature$ that make a giant number of wa$te. Then you might have $ome credibility. I gue$$ the Koch brother$ like that $hit though.
Hey there, Roadbuzzard, things slow over at OFA, MoveOn, or whatever rock you propagandize from?
FORWARD ASS NAPKIN OBAMA!
Hey, UpChuck. Glad I pissed you off. You wingers crack me up.
That would make you multicracked.
My old usenet newsreader had a "killfile" feature, where I could have it shitcan any article by people who proved themselves to be unworthy of reading their crap. I wish I had that in these comment sections. I'd shitcan anyone who invoked the phrase "Koch brothers". I've never once read a post by anybody in any forum who used those words who had anything worthwhile to say.
Yes, the Repubs suck. What's your freaking point? The Dems suck somewhat worse and the world would be a better place if everybody were a libertarian.
Go fuck off, you partisan hack...like the god damn Democrats are any better.....they aren't...so wake the hell up.
For every Koch Brother, I raise you a Soros, a Buffett and a Bloomberg....and a whole host of Bilderbooger/Progressive asshats
KMA winger
My health insurance premium doubles next year under the ACA. Same insurer, same coverage, same deductible, double the premium. I won't qualify for any subsidies. So this becomes another progressive tax on the productive among us. Every year, my taxes increase a bit while my income remains the same or decreases. This is a painful hit.
On the bright side though, because my family is going to pay more for health insurance, we'll have less money for food. Which is actually a good thing because I read that we live longer on a reduced calorie diet. So even though my taxes are going up (er, I mean health insurance or whatever), I'll live longer and collect more social security!
What? It won't? Oh snap...
Dumb fuck, you honestly think that red vs. blue is anything but a piece of cheese on a string?
We need a goddamn malthusian die-off, it's the only way to fix shit now.
How come you never say that to the repubicans here. It goes both ways, son. Besides I love poking wingers. They think there shit don't stink.
I think you meant "They think their shit don't stink."
Thankfully, partisanship does not require intelligence.
Only a willingness to shout about things one does not fully understand.
And to denigrate and vilify those who disagree.
This roadhazard, who is so full of bullshit that the rest of the animals can't produce any, makes me wish we went back to those captchas where you had to actually add something before posting. Then we wouldn't have to deal with his silly "there are only two ways to look at things" idiocy. Vote Libertarian. We're the only people with any sense.
The captcha was only around when ZH allowed anonymous posts.
Once you establish an account you're allowed to post almost any comments you want as long as they follow the established guidelines.
What you fail to realize is that no matter how dreadful the ACA mutates in to those on the left will still think its the most wonderful thing since sliced bread.
To them health care is a fundamental human right as long as someone else pays for it, or appears to be paying for it.
I'm just amazed they didn't eliminate the payroll cap and increase the payroll tax rate to pay for the whole damn thing. That way it would have been a hidden tax for all practical purposes since most people don't bother looking at all the taxes they pay on their paycheck
This way the upper echelon income earners would be paying more of the burden. And no hiding your money in trusts like Gates and Buffet to avoid paying taxes on your billions in assets.
But, then since many members of the House and Senate are multi-millionairs in their own right this would eat into their income as well.
Can't have Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and Diane Feinstein paying their fair share, that's something only for the Oblongs, (Oblong == mere mundane).
Affordable health care IS a basic human right. It is obvious that since the Government had to step in that the Capitalist sector was screwing the People just like the FED for example. If health care was affordable and not screwing the People then we would not have the Government involved.
I know that the cost never made a damned bit of difference to you who have your employer pay for your health care.
Honestly, roadhazard, as much as I disagree with you. To some degree, I do think we should get it over and have some kind of rational debate about what are and aren't basic rights that should be involve the goernment. If your view wins, fair enough. If it goes the other way, same. But let's have everyone stop simply asserting things as if they make such decisions themselves.
The time for a con con is well past. Let's put a whole list of pending questions to it and get on with it.
I usually don't bother with trolls, since most left/right trolls bring their own convenient set of facts, but when they make a fundamental mistake, I respond.
you clearly don't understand what makes a human right a human right - rights due to you by your very existence, they do not require the positive input of others and can only be impeded by their actions (eg speech, religion, etc.)
Health care is not a fundamental right as you are requiring the resources, skills, and time of others. By declaring it a right, you are fundamentally declaring that the providers of health care are beholden to you. At the extreme, they are your slaves.
the fact that you do not understand the very basic nature of a human rights undermines all of your arguments.
By your definition, defense is not a fundamental right either.
Always tricksy finding the end of one nose and the beginning of the next.
NOTHING is or can be a 'human right' that must be forcibly extracted from one citizen to redistribute to another. You have an incredibly ignorant and grossly perverted sense of 'rights'.
Your rights end at my closed pocketbook.
That is the biggest leftist fallacy right there - "Affordable health care IS a basic human right."
Howver, the law before ACA required ERs to see patients regardless of healthcare coverage.
So you're not above paying for other's healthcare, but they need to really suffer before you'll kick in?
I see you added exactly zero.
...teaser rates...
move along folks, no inflation/deflation to see here...
Bruce having signed up for Social Security ( I'll be 62 at the end of this month) that entry questionaire is straight from the Social Security website. I too checked out how much I would have to pay under Obama's plan but, since I have retiree health insurance with a municipal public employee plan ( probably equivalent to a high blue or low gold plan) I too am not going to switch. The real deal, if you saw 60 minutes, for us aspiring geezers is to claim disability as soon as you leave your job and go on medicare!
I ran the numbers for that and if I had claimed disability at 58 ( when I retired) I would have collected over $75,000 more between 58 and 65 than I will collecting Social Security at 62 plus I would have not had to use my own money ( over $4000 per year) to stay in my municipal employee health plan, I would have been eligible for medicare so toss in another $25/30,000 in government benefits if I had said I was unable to work any longer due to , bad knees, bad back, mental illness, unable to shave due to loss of vision in one eye, Whatever.
Health insurance, like college, was dirt cheap before the government began "helping" us pay for it.
Cum hoc ergo propter hoc.
Bruce:
Thanks for your example. I would suggest that it is hard to make a ceteris paribus comparison because all things are not going to be equal here:
1) doctor availability, access to specialists
2) hospital network availability
3) service level
4) claims processing, outright denials of claims etc.
You can be sure ACA insurance premiums will be "means tested" in a few years.
Good call on the deductible, Bruce.
This solves nothing. People will still go broke from the co-pays and high deductibles, and infinite hidden fees and charges. If this looks bad in New York and Cali, think of what a disaster it is everywhere else.
I'm most curious to see the effect on states monopolized by a single health insurance company or handful of same.
That's the idea... you're supposed to bail out the insurance industry... and, along with it, the medical services industry.
And move one step closer to "The Night of Long Scalpels".
"Of course, I want people to have health care," Vinson said. "I just didn't realize I would be the one who was going to pay for it personally."
Don't you just love these people? Ideological idiots. Stupidest f'n people alive.
http://www.mercurynews.com/nation-world/ci_24248486/obamacares-winners-and-losers-bay-area
"The taxpayer will foot this bill...."
The taxpayer is going to foot the bill one way or another for the uninsurable-those people who are high risk and/or can't afford medical premiums.
The question is how to do this most efficiently.
Not all we uninsured are deadbeat assholes. The premiums are in all cases far more than I actually spend on health care as a "self insured" guy -
And I do pay my bills, the legit ones, anyway. Yeah, when my wife is in an auto accident with me - a bruise at most, and spends 45 min in the emergency room for one X ray (for which I was present 30 min of the 45, had to spend a few dealing with the cops) - and I get a $3k bill for one X-ray (evidently every intern that had ever worked there piled on, even though she said only one guy X rayed her, and another looked at it) - I didn't pay the whole $3k...I made them eat it for bills from people NOT EVEN THERE IN THE HOSPITAL OR EVEN STILL WORKING THERE.
Even a rather expensive trip when I broke a buncha ribs - I paid. Another major accident that resulted in a Ti jaw replacement, I paid, sans the fraud, just sought out the people WHO ACTUALLY GAVE ME TREATMENT and then paid just them in cash.
All that kind of stuff is expensive, to be sure. But in the last 3 decades I've spent as much on health care as this would charge me - in a year or two.
They can go screw themselves with a baseball bat, rusty nails and no lube.
Call it what you want; you caused an auto-accident and skipped out on a bill. That makes you a deadbeat, asshole.
If it's not okay for socialists to decide who pays for what, why do you think you should get that privilege, cocksucker?
I hope you get hit by a speeding ambulance for the irony alone.
I'm not insured, but I have the money set aside to pay cash. Obamacare would actually put me on the dole.
When you pay insurance, you are also paying for the system friction that exists for administrators. Why should I have to pay for bureaucrats to run websites?
Don't worry, you'll get to not only buy insurance (or pay the penalty), but you'll also get to spend that cash if you actually want any health care worth a shit... not that way now, but that's the way it's heading.
Which is why everybody should instead refer to this boondoggle as the "Affordable Care Tax".
even into my thirtys i could not have afforded the 360 a month bronze plan
that would have been an entire weeks take home pay
back then one could afford to pay as the needed it though
i did however superglue many a cut that needed stitches
"i did however superglue many a cut that needed stitches"
That's what Superglue was originally designed for!
It's a Defense Dept. designed field bandage/stitches glue.
Same thing for WD-40. It was specifically made for the defense dept. to spray stored mortars and rockets so they would'nt rust in storage.
Yeah, me too - if I can reach it, I can fix it myself, and often do.
Youse and the medical industry have arrived at the same conclusion.
"Unaffordable Care Tax"- there- fixed it!
The wailing and gnashing of teeth is from the other end of the spectrum, Bruce. I am sure a 27 year old male with no kids would love to hear your tale.
Any 27 year old, male or female, single with no kids
may not be ecstatic about paying a mandated $6000 insurance tax.
Unless of course they have money left over from two part-time jobs
and/or current school expenses,
and/or old school loans.
Well, even though that $6000 annual minimum will likely be increasing rapidly, maybe the insurance companies will hire more part-timers to process the paperwork.
since the medical folks and the insurance folks wrote their profits into aca, and they are big donors to political parties, why are republicans soooo dead set against it?
well, glad you asked, wmm.
the msm thinks that rep front group, aka the tea-sers, have the other repubs forced into a place that they would otherwise not be in. wrong. the old guard repubs know that when aca is implemented, millions of people who actually get health care when they needed it, will vote demo. aca is the death knell for the rep party. they lose both senate and house and pres and get rolled over no matter what their 39% of the votes wants.
just another prediction...
:)
p.s. golly gee they folks, would single payer have been bettor, cheaper, and easier to implement? is that why the reps were soooo adamant against it? (and the dems caved to $$$ from the industry?) government is where good ideas are morphed into profits for profiteers, and the people be damned.
Wallowa,
methinks some ZH speed readers
missed the words "what the msm thinks"
and down flagged your comment.