None of that is actually true though. It is insurance company propoganda. They choose to create artificial risk pools when they are not necessary. They do so, though, so they can gerrymander pools to jack up rates in many areas as possible.

The insurance companies are doing a poor job in all this. For some reason they think if they fail things go back the way they were. The reality is we go to a single payer system.

The reality is with subsidies, insurance companies are already getting higher premiums than they would otherwise. It is basically all there for the private insurers to screw up. Let us see what happens. 7 million is just a number. It is based on projected risk pools and not actual numbers. Not to mention based on states and individual carriers a single lump sum number as a pass / fail for it to work does not even make sense.

The insurance companies are working really hard to auto erotic asphyxiate the golden goose.

How to you figure this? If Obamacare fails, I see zero chance of single payer being passed. Even if Republicans lose the House and the Dems have 60 in the Senate, I don't think it gets passed.

So I was having a fb discussion about the ACA and health sherpa, which took an interesting turn when an acquaintance started posting against the ACA like it was 2012 in response to a post expressing happiness with pre-existing conditons being covered. He thinks the whole thing is a left-wing sham and offered this lengthy post ( which I have cut down a bit) that covers some info I have not seen before.

I'm looking for feedback on the points he makes which are outside my sphere of limited knowledge. Thanks!

Guy is talking about the group market not the individual market. Someone with Crohn's disease would definitely not be able to buy an individual policy at any price and the only option would be Medicaid (which many states did not make available to adults without minor dependents pre-ACA) or a high risk pool that would probably run upwards of $1500 / month (if it were available at all.) And almost no individual policies are sold with maternity coverage due to adverse selection.

So yeah, guy is full of **** (or maybe his colostomy bag is.)

Thanks for the post and the big OH SNAP belly laugh at the end.

I'm convinced that if Obamacare sent us into a depression and people were standing in soup lines everywhere and unemployment was 30% that some people in this thread would still be talking about how absolutely awesome the ACA was, that's how deep they've dug in.

I give it a big meh on the whole. As he acknowledges, the difference between no waiting period for coverage of a pre-existing condition and a 12 or 18 month waiting period can be pretty huge. Having continuous coverage also assumes that you can find someone to insure you in the first place and then not rescind the policy. If you lost employer coverage and had a significant pre-existing condition good luck getting individual coverage, and oh look, it's a break in coverage.

The point about people not having coverage through their employer getting on Medicaid or a state based plan is just bizarre. Does he think the Medicaid expansion portion of the ACA was just for kicks? http://www.texmed.org/uninsured_in_texas/ says that 33% of Texans are uninsured. Why aren't they all just on Medicaid if it's so simple?

The point about maternity coverage I don't know enough to speak to.

And if unemployment continues to decline, >95% of Americans have health coverage, insurance rates stay constant with inflation, and infant mortality and life expectancy rates in the US rise to join the rest of the developed world, you'll still be screaming about how Obamacare is socialism that's going to destroy America.

In what sense has he kept the Democrats in line? Gun Control, Syria, the Fed Chair are examples of the opposite.

This isn't unchained.

LOL as opposed to the open mindedness of people like you. Yeah, the dug in side is the people(THE ONLY PEOPLE) who have ANY ****ING IDEA WHAT THE BILL DOES.

ikes- Oh I'm sorry I didn't presume to speak for you.

Well, son, if you happen to have a policy change in mind that:

A) Is not Obamacare
B) Is not to the left of Obamacare
C) Insures at least as many people as Obamacare

I'm pretty ****ing sure John Boehner is EAGERLY awaiting your call to get the deets on that magical flying unicorn of free market conservatism.

This. Believe it or not most people are happy with their employer provided insurance. I mean who wouldn't be. It is free/heavily subsidized by their employer. They have no clue what insurance actually costs.

Reminds of the time I went on COBRA for a while after leaving a job that covered most the cost to run my own business. Classic wake-up call.

Awful decision by Obama/the democrats. Dear Obama - you aren't running for re-election. Have the gumption to stand behind your policy. People getting cancellation notices, for the most part, had sub-par insurance that wouldn't have actually covered any big losses.

They increased the risk that his signature legislative achievement fails in exchange for a short-term political fix.

I don't know if you read the linked article or not but it was the results of a survey of actual real life small business owners who likely know exactly how employer based health care plans work, as well as the economic sense and reality that they would rather pay a $2,000 fine per employee vs getting bent over for contributing $5,000++ per employee, especially when if they even offered insurance their contribution was less than the $2,000 fine.

The employer mandate is a massive jobs killer and will be the focus of the midterm elections, you'll see Obama pointing his finger at the republicans/small business owner/boss who should hand over his profit to the employees or aka collective. Small business owners run this country when excluding major metro areas and have a broad influence over society, no way this goes down, you thought Obama caved when he delayed the private insurance mandate, just wait as several other concessions are made.

This law is an attack on small business and the productive and is going do ridiculous damage to the economy. Fix the cost structure of the healthcare industry starting with the existing fraud, create a jr. PA degree and offer scholarships/incentives to graduates that will commit to working in impoverished areas, partner with private charitable entities, offer tax credits to organizations/dr's/big pharma that will treat the poor/uninsured and people with preexisting conditions pro Bono or for a reduced rate and educate the poor with conditions and disease caused by unhealthy habits. You could prob also create a tax/make big pharma start paying Corp taxes and finance a huge cost of treating the sick/poor.

How so? V-E-T-O

Because you couldn't. The employer mandate is applicable to companies with 50 full time equivalent employees. In your example you would have to offer a health insurance plan to 49 ppl.

True, but the penalty is (# of full-time employees - 30) X $2,000 or $3,000. So by shifting to part time employees you may still have to pay the fine, but you can significantly reduce the amount of the fine (or eliminate it by getting to less than 30 full-time employees.

http://obamacarefacts.com/obamacare-...er-mandate.php

I think this is an overstated concern, but it is a real incentive to move employees to part time (and probably a loophole that Obamacare should have address, by simply calculating the fee by using full-time equivalent employees rather than just full-time employees).

do you think that's pretty likely?

reposting this from a friend's comment on fb

There should be a template; something like:

I am <age> years old with <family composition> making <income> in <county>, <state>. <I/family member> have/has <no/a> pre-existing condition(s). My existing Individual insurance policy was a <PPO/HMO/Catastrophic> plan which cost <$p> per month. It had a <$x> deductible, <$y> out-of-pocket maximum, and covered <relevant essential health benefits> but not <other essential health benefits>. It provided coverage up to an annual limit of <$z> and a lifetime limit of <$w>.

Now, when I look on the exchange, the best plan I can find is <$q> per month and has a <$x> deductible, <$y> out-of-pocket maximum, and coveres <10 essential health benefits>. It provides coverage up to no annual or lifetime limit. I <do/do not> qualify for Federal subsidies.

Then we get to vote on the fairness/unfairness of your situation.

Couple of things wrong with this.

1) Papa stated that he would have to raise the prices of his pizza a whopping 11 to 14 cents per pie. Are you seriously suggesting that people were "laid off" because of this? (If your comment was merely a meaningless throwaway and not a serious challenge to him to prove that ridiculous negative then feel free to ignore)

2) The ACA passed several years ago, certain business owners have been "bashing it" ever since (including this guy who makes terrible pizza) so I'm not sure how you can seriously assert that "no business owner is going to come out and bash it."

Why would any business anywhere offer health insurance to their employees at all for that matter? Seems like nothing more than a pit to dump profits into.

health insurance being offered by employers was a carrot to attract talent when employment of semi skilled/skilled labor was in high demand (and health care costs were low). the employment bubble has burst and now healthcare costs have parabolically risen, it makes much less sense to offer it as a carrot to attract talent