The facts about Obama's health care plan

[county worker]

If you have health insurance through your employer and you like your plan, you can keep it.

If you're a small business owner, you'll receive new tax credits that make it easier for you to provide coverage for employees if you choose to do so.

If you have Medicare, the President's plan guarantees that your benefits will not be cut, and the Medicare Trust Fund will be extended for more than 9 years.

If you're uninsured, you could receive a tax credit to help pay for coverage if needed -- part of the largest middle class tax cut for health care in history.

If you buy your own insurance, there will be new protections from insurance company abuses, and tax credits will make coverage more affordable. You will never be denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions.

You will never again be hit with arbitrary health insurance premium hikes.

Up to 17 million more people will be uninsured by 2019. Insurers can continue their massive and arbitrary premium rate increases -- such as Anthem Blue Cross raising rates for customers in California by nearly 40%, and rates in Illinois going up by as much as 60%. As many as 275,000 people could die prematurely over the next 10 years because they don't have health insurance.

The average family's health care costs will nearly double by 2020, from $13,000 to $24,000.

[Cronus Protagonist]

1. You missed out the universal mandates and fines

Isn't that a little dishonest?

[impik]

6. So, what's your point? You can't have reform without mandates and

there going to be plenty of subsidies.

[Cronus Protagonist]

8. Yes, you can

Explain why you can't do it without mandates. And subsidies don't matter at all when the bill arrives which you must pay or be fined.

[dionysus]

22. you don't understand how risk pools work, do you?

[Hello_Kitty]

29. Yeah, we do.

The larger the pool the more you spread the risk out. It's the basis for every kind of insurance. Which is why I'm for single payer. Just so you know, using single payer rhetoric to pretend that's what this mandated private insurance is does not fool us for a second.

[dionysus]

50. single payer would be the best choice, unfortunately we'd need to replace more than half the caucus

to get it!

[Hello_Kitty]

52. I understand that

I'm just tired of pro-mandate people sounding like they're talking about single payer when they're not. "We need everyone to be in the system for it to work" implies that everyone will be participating (the plan leaves at least 20 million people out) and that there is only one "system" that "everyone" will be in. That is utterly untrue.

[dionysus]

54. well it's destined to fail if the risk pool is all people in poor health. thats my concern.

[Hello_Kitty]

55. 86% of Americans have coverage now. Are they all in poor health?

This notion that a few million healthy people not having health insurance is what's bringing the whole thing down is absurd. That's essentially the basis for the mandate argument. And if you look at Massachusetts as an example you can see that while they did achieve near-universal coverage with their plan, they have not realized appreciable cost savings.

[dionysus]

56. i am hoping the regulations in the bill saying that x% of premium $ must be spent on care will

drive those costs down.

[Hello_Kitty]

57. 85% MLR seems reasonable to me.

There need to be teeth in regulations over that too. Letting the insurance and medical cos. decide what constitutes "medical" spending is and it could include things like junkets to Barbados billed as "training".

[dionysus]

61. agreed

[Oregone]

30. Do you?

And what is the benefit of a ton of small, tiered pools?

After all, the reform and magic "competition" are only going to make more pools to coral different segments of the poopulation in

[harun]

44. We most certainly do and you are full of sh*t.

[DJ13]

19. Yes, it can be done without mandates

The income tax is supposed to be for funding government programs.

Forced individual purchases is the wrong way to do this.

[bornskeptic]

58. Do you have a problem with food stamps too?

You realize, of course, that they represent tax dollars going to for-profit grocery stores.

[bvar22]

59. At least the Grocery Store provides something for the dollars.

The Health Insurance Industry manufactures NOTHING, provides NO Health Care, and produces NO Value Added Wealth.
The Grocery Store is a much better deal for the bucks.

[county worker]

7. Without the mandates none of this can happen.

If all of contribute, more of us can have health insurance. Only if healthy people are in the insured pool will we get the benefits from this plan.

[Cronus Protagonist]

10. Cool. I hope you have a job for me so I can earn the extra cash

I'll need about $1300 bucks a year. I sure hope you have an extra job for everyone in need, because we're all going to have to work more or be fined.

[county worker]

13. The fine is so small that you most likely will not buy health insurance.

It may be a matter of conscience to some people. If medical care is a right, and medical care has a monetary cost, then the only way a lot of people get to exercise that right is if we all pay something. It seems that with rights goes a responsibility.

[Cronus Protagonist]

14. Sounds like that communication didn't land in your universe

Your statement appears to imply that there is cash available with which I'm refusing to part, rather than the reality which is that there is no cash available and the bill as written now will fine me, or cost me, money that I simply do not have.

[county worker]

15. What will you do if you need serious medical care in the future.

I understand where you are coming from.

• Struggling middle-class families will receive a tax credit to make coverage even more
affordable – the largest middle class tax cut for health care in history
REDUCE THE COST OF CARE FOR OUR FAMILIES, BUSINESSES
AND THE GOVERNMENT

[Hello_Kitty]

31. Yep the "families" will get most of the subsidies.

Single childless people will be screwn, as per usual.

As for what happens to Cronus Protagonist if s/he needs serious medical care: Bankruptcy, most likely. Whether this bill passes or not.

[Egnever]

39. So then whats the difference?

Hard to have a lot of sympathy if thats the eventual outcome in either case.

[RaleighNCDUer]

34. What good is a tax credit a year after you need the money? nt

[RaleighNCDUer]

33. The idea of the government fining you for not purchasing something

from a private for-profit company doesn't bother you?

How about, the government is worried about the state of the US auto companies. To rectify that, every american old enough to drive will be required to buy an American-made car. Whether you drive or not. And if you do not do so, you will be fined, penalized by the government. Refuse to pay, and it will be turned over to the IRS for collection.

What is the difference here?

[Egnever]

43. Sure it does

But the idea of not being able to get health insurance at all bothers me much more.

[Cha]

2. Thanks for the facts, county worker. nt

[denimgirly]

3. Can't imagine any sane person would choose this over a Public Option or Medicare for All....

This bill feels like it kinda wants to solve the problem but is purposely avoiding the most obvious and simplest solutions out there. It clearly leaves open loopholes for abuse that will expectedly lead to revisions in 10 years. Wellp, America is known to always do the right thing after exhausting every bad path...so congratz.

[county worker]

9. But today you don't have that choice.

Your choice today is this plan or keep on doing what we are doing as the repubs want us to do.

[HughMoran]

20. Obvious, simple AND NOT ACHIEVABLE IN CONGRESS!!!!!!

Think!!!

:think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think: :think:

[dionysus]

23. thinking isnt their strong suit

[HughMoran]

25. Pushing the propaganda is, however.

The Republican obstructionists would be proud.

[Turbineguy]

4. OK, so

who do I believe? You or Glenn Beck?


On edit: :yourock:

[Better Today]

5. Those are SOME facts, but they are not THE facts which implys an offering

of all facts.

You fail to mention the long wait for much of the bill to kick in, or the lack of any device to reduce insurance cost while improving care for patients and security for healthcare workers, and so much more. . . yeah, it has a few good things, but it has a lot of not.

[denimgirly]

11. Bingo. There's a lot of bad. And Simple powerful solutions are purposely Avoided.

Health stocks are up again today.

[county worker]

16. That's true. The most obvious answer to me is single payer next is a

public option. For many years now I thought we should have a two tear health insurance system. One for those who want to pay what ever the insurance companies wanted and medicare for all of the rest of us.

Today that is not happening but what we could have is new restrictions on insurance companies and we could have 90% of the population covered with some kind of insurance thus more medical care than we would have if we do not pass this bill.

[HughMoran]

21. Only a novice would look to the price of any given sector on any day & think it meant something

They were down the day it was determined the bill would pass, how does your pretzel logic square that?

I didn't think so.

[county worker]

12. So you would prefer that we keep things as they are because that is the only other alternative at

this time.

Personally I would rather have single payer but that is not going to happen any time soon. If we don't do something, things will only get worse for all of us.

[Better Today]

17. After weeks now of consideration, if there is no PO or Medicare

available for all (I'll even support an incremental lowering of the age rather than all at once), then it would be better it fail.

Here's my reasoning, as I agree with you 100% IT WILL ONLY GET WORSE FOR ALL OF US (well, actually it will only get worse for those who can afford insurance now, those of us who can't, we'll still either do without or use Medicaid, or just show up to the ER, let's keep that in mind).

If we pass this, then all of you with insurance now will feel a little less pain after what 3-4 even 5 years, but okay, you get some hope. So guess what, nothing else happens, y'all are happier, so it'll be over.

If however we don't pass it, and those with insurance now feel the pain you suggest, we'll have HCR on the table again in NO TIME, because the upper-middlers will be screaming their heads off and then perhaps something more sensible will be presented that starts immediately, I expect this would happen in about 4 years, gee just about the time this Senate piece of crap will really start taking effect.

Yeah, nothing today is better than crap today.

[HughMoran]

24. After watching Ed last night, you kind of have to be in favor of manslaughter

to oppose passing this bill NOW.

We're not going to start preventing people with no coverage from dying until we start the process.

You and the Republicans want to "start over". My view? FUCK THAT!!

[Better Today]

26. Yeah, right, most of it doesn't take effect for years. My response explained my reasoning.

It's not like there will be very many helped to live longer or better in the next 3-5 years.

[HughMoran]

27. Yeah, because it takes a while to implement - waiting another generation BEFORE EVEN STARTING AGAIN

...is the answer.

Are you really that out of touch?

You know that after the mid-term that no attempt at healthcare reform will occur for at least another decade.

Seriously, you're just missing the reality boat - by a lot!!

[Better Today]

28. I believe I've recently heard Grayson and Kuncinich suggest that

Medicare for all would take under a year to implement.

If you and those like you with insurance who are just worried about yourselves and your insurance costs continue to slide into financial ruin due to insurance industry, then Medicare for all becomes a reality in four years, implemented within the next year. That's my hope, that's my prediction.

[HughMoran]

32. I don't care if they can be implemented quickly, I CARE IF THEY CAN PASS CONGRESS!!!

What good are plans that CAN NEVER BE IMPLEMENTED!!

Hoping for financial ruin of others so you can get what YOU want? See, you made me sound selfish in your statement, but it actually made you look sadistic.

[Better Today]

35. Not just for me, but for the country. It isn't as personal as you'd like to make it.

But yes, folks like you have to realize that you will be the only ones seeing any change with this bill and quit being so selfish, if that takes a few more years of financial frustration and fear, then so be it.

[HughMoran]

36. Aww geez, "It isn't personal", but it is about "folks like me"

Give me a fucking break!

Can you believe the arrogance of a fellow DUer wanting to pay less than

$36,000/YEAR

in premiums.

:eyes:

[Better Today]

37. Then demand a better bill for everyone RIGHT NOW! Instead of taking your cake

and telling the rest of us to live with it, or as it may be ... die from it.

[HughMoran]

41. OK, now you've lost me

You can't have a conversation without blaming me for something, even though YOU'RE THE ONE WHO DOESN'T WANT THE BILL THAT CONGRESS HAS BEEN WORKING ON FOR A YEAR TO PASS. I've been demanding PO or nothing all year - like Ed, I realized a while back that we'd get nothing at all if we didn't at least get the current reforms (which are quite good) signed. You'll never be happy with anything anyway and you'll never admit you're just arguing for the sake of winning the argument, so this whole conversation (as usual) was for naught.

[Better Today]

46. You read a lot into others' responses and try to make them personal

My conversation has been class based, not personal, from the get-go. I've explained myself clearly as to why nothing now is better than this piece of crap. If you choose to remain baffled by it, then it is a reflection of you, not me.

Have a lovely day!

[HughMoran]

48. yeah, uh, ok bud

what-ever!

[RaleighNCDUer]

38. have you emailed your rep and senator to tell them you will vote them out

if they do not support real reform?

The only reason it is 'not going to happen anytime soon' is because we let THEM make the decisions at no cost to themselves.

[Better Today]

49. I agree with your concept, but the thing is

that there is no way you or I or John Q Public can make up for the $Ms that incumbents get from big biz and lobbies that essentially guarantee that the best we can do is vote for the lesser of evils. Until elections are trimmed down and reforms are made, we really are essentially impotent to get anything truly favoring, protecting, or really even considering the People of the USA.

[RaleighNCDUer]

62. Then why bother voting at all?

If you assume your vote doesn't count, it won't.

The FIRST reform is for voters to vote for what they want, rather than what incumbents tell them is possible.

If that means throwing your vote away on a challenger who can't possibly win, then DO it - because the end result will be no different than if you voted FOR the lesser of two evils. And you know what? Sometimes the challenger wins.

The ULITMATE power in a democracy is the vote. Incumbancy is powerful. Lobbyist money is powerful. Inertia is powerful. But informed and organized voters can overcome them all.

[SandWalker1984]

18. You left out some facts.......

The Senate bill's complex and sweeping provisions would affect virtually every aspect of the huge health care sector of the U.S. economy.

Like the House bill,it would transfer massive regulatory authority from the states to the federal government and make enormous changes in the nation's health insurance markets.

It would dramatically alter the financing and content of employer-provided and individual health insurance and significantly change Medicare and Medicaid.

It may actually cause many Americans to lose their current health insurance. The CBO estimated that up to 10 million Americans would no longer be covered by their employers due to the bill's incentives for employers to discontinue job-based coverage.

It would change how hospitals, doctors, and other medical professionals are paid and how physicians and other medical professionals deliver care.

It would bend the cost curve up. According to independent analysts and government actuaries, the bill would substantially increase total health care spending instead of reducing it as promised.

Richard Foster, Chief Actuary of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), recently judged the projected savings from the Medicare updates as "doubtful" and estimated that the total national spending on health care would increase

It would impose new taxes on middle-class Americans. The Senate bill contains over a dozen new taxes, including a 40 percent excise tax on high-priced health plans and special fees and taxes on insurance, drugs, medical devices, and anyone who violates the new mandates.

It may reduce many seniors' access to Medicare benefits and services. The bill would reduce Medicare payments by an estimated $493 billion over 10 years - including payment reductions for Medicare Advantage, hospital care, home health care, and nursing homes.

It would impose controversial and unprecedented mandates on businesses and individuals, including an individual mandate to buy insurance.


In effect, the Senate bill would produce the greatest concentration of political and economic power over one major sector of the U.S. economy in the nation's history and GIVE IT TO THE VERY CORPORATIONS THAT HAVE CREATED THE NEED FOR HEALTH CARE REFORM.


Sorry, I hung up my Pollyanna hat several months ago.

[ShortnFiery]

66. "It may actually cause many Americans to lose their current health insurance."

:(

[Bryn]

67. "It may reduce many seniors' access ...

It may reduce many seniors' access to Medicare benefits and services. The bill would reduce Medicare payments by an estimated $493 billion over 10 years - including payment reductions for Medicare Advantage, hospital care, home health care, and nursing homes.

That's not good at all! Is it? :(

[Change Happens]

40. Indeed, change I can beleive in......nt

[Raineyb]

42. You forgot the part where if you have an insurance plan and you don't like it

you're still stuck with it.

You forgot to mention that you'll be forced to buy insurance which will have co-pays and deductibles which will keep you from actually seeing a doctor (assuming you have the cash to fork over for this sub par insurance in the first place)

You forgot to mention that the pre-existing conditions doesn't kick in for a few years so if you happen to need care before then you're shit out of luck.

You forgot to mention that 20 million people will still be uncovered by this bill

You forgot to mention that this POS isn't really reform unless you consider guaranteeing a stream of income for the insurance companies to be reform.

[harun]

45. That about sums it up.

[Better Today]

47. +++++ More good points!

[BlueIdaho]

51. So your alternative is?

To start over from scratch? Slow walk this process one step at a time? Somehow convince 60 members of the Senate and about 220 members of the House that they should shit can the existing system and create government run single payer health care? In an election year?

Or

Maintain the status quo?

Or

?

[Raineyb]

63. They dithered for a year and I'm supposed to give a shit about them being scared to do what's right

because it's an election cycle?

I expect them to pass something decent and that it's an election year doesn't have a damn thing to do with it. They know the current system doesn't work yet they want to further entrench it by mandating the purchase of insurance? No one said it was going to be easy. But they're not even trying with this half assed nonsense of taking things off the table before they even start negotiating. You really expect me to cheer for some half assed bill rather than try to get something better? If you only settle for whatever water downed bill they are willing to put a modicum of effort of into putting together you will NEVER get anything decent. And I really don't care to hear the whining about how it's an election year. They're always worrying about the next election. If they'd put as much effort into passing GOOD bills as they do working for the next campaign we might actually have a bill that benefits people rather than insurance companies.

I will NEVER support a bill that will enslave people to the insurance companies I would rather stick with the status quo. Because the benefits they claim are so vague as to be meaningless. The loopholes have already been worked out. And at least with the status quo one might be able to scrounge up to pay for a doctor. With this bill you're scrounging for money for an insurance policy that you can't actually use or you're paying for nothing in the form of a penalty.

[Cleobulus]

64. The question is whether its going to be better or worse than status quo.

For some its going to be better, maybe, assuming they can afford to get treatment, for others its going to be worse.

[freddie mertz]

53. This is a dishonest characterization of the plan.

You don't even MENTION the enforced mandate.

OR the excise tax on some extant plans (which means those policies will have to change, which means that your line number one is an outright falsehood).

We could do better.

[GeorgeGist]

60. Are you aware the Obama didn't write the bill?

[Cleobulus]

65. Corrections of your "facts".

If you have health insurance through your employer and you like your plan, you can keep it.

If your employer offers health insurance whether you like it or not, you have to buy into it, and you will receive no subsidies or rebates unless it consumes approximately 10% of your income.

If you're a small business owner, you'll receive new tax credits that make it easier for you to provide coverage for employees if you choose to do so.

This might be true, but it will have to be adequate to make providing health insurance affordable for small business owners.

If you have Medicare, the President's plan guarantees that your benefits will not be cut, and the Medicare Trust Fund will be extended for more than 9 years.

This is a good part of the bill.

If you're uninsured, you could receive a tax credit to help pay for coverage if needed -- part of the largest middle class tax cut for health care in history.

Define "if needed" please, what are the hard numbers, and will this offset outrageous deducts and copays as well?

If you buy your own insurance, there will be new protections from insurance company abuses, and tax credits will make coverage more affordable. You will never be denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions.

Great so insurance companies can no longer deny coverage or claims based on pre-existing conditions, just gives them an opportunity to deny claims based on other equally bullshit reasons("its not a medical necessity, its experimental, you are too young to have cervical cancer, your brain tumor is not life threatening, etc.)

You will never again be hit with arbitrary health insurance premium hikes.

OK, where is arbitrary defined, and how do you determine what is arbitrary and what isn't, are hard price controls in the bill?

Up to 17 million more people will be uninsured by 2019. Insurers can continue their massive and arbitrary premium rate increases -- such as Anthem Blue Cross raising rates for customers in California by nearly 40%, and rates in Illinois going up by as much as 60%. As many as 275,000 people could die prematurely over the next 10 years because they don't have health insurance.

The average family's health care costs will nearly double by 2020, from $13,000 to $24,000.

I don't see how this bill, with the lack of price controls, will help alleviate these problems, except for maybe overall enrollment numbers, but whether those people, being covered by insurance, can actually afford to use that insurance is up in the air.