Health Care Reform Part III: The Implementation.

If a ton of people sign up for Medicaid, you think that's completely independent of people signing up via the exchanges?

 

I fail to see what your point is. What matters is the percentage of people who have plausible access to healthcare, either through insurance or through Medicaid/Medicare. The fact that people may move from the Medicaid group to the insurance group or from the insurance group to the Medicaid group is moot.

 

You do understand that so are the insurance plans that are acquired via the exchanges, right? Just like Medicaid, the actual people that are getting insurance via the exchanges will change because people will get insurance through their employer, will find themselves qualifying for Medicaid, miss a payment and lose insurance, lose their employer provided insurance and sign up for insurance through the exchange, etc. I'm not even sure what your argument is here. Medicaid doesn't disappear just because the names of the people that have it change.

 

Open your EYES!!!! OPEN your mind!!!

Just imagine what would happen when we get the report in mid-April...

We would just fill this thread with Kittens!!!!

 

What if we happen to like both apples and oranges? Fail to see the relevance here.

 

Some kittens like watermellons!

 

Sure, no problem that an individual or family are no longer qualified for Medicaid due to getting a job or making more money but then are not able to afford insurance. But who cares, just damn statistics. Woo hoo, 6 million.

 

Two things:

1) Glad to see you accept the official numbers now.

2) "Just damn statistics" is why you can't predict what you already ate this morning. Show it some respect.

 

I have always acknowledge those numbers as official propaganda. That number is meaningless when it is predicted that at least 20% have not paid any premiums, thereby making them uninsured. And some estimates claim that less than 1 million were previously uninsured, meaning those who signed had a policy previously. So we are still looking at 40 million not insured. You call that progress?

Bottom line is that the law has done nothing to bring down the cost of health care or make it more accessible for those in need. So have a party regarding your numbers as you don't give a damn about helping people out. As long as you can claim political points, that is all that counts.

 

If we have six million signed up, and 20% have not paid, how on earth can you claim the number is meaningless. It means 6,000,000*.80 = 4,800,000 people who have paid. That's more than the law needs to stay afloat. If only 1 million of the six million were previously uninsured, that's a one-year, one-million drop in the uninsured rate. That's also good. That 1/6 problem also ignores the percentage of U-26ers and Medicaid enrollees who never had insurance before. Let's assume ACASignups is accurate, and that 1/6th never had insurance. That means, of a grand total of 14.4 million people enrolled in all three (exchange, medicaid, u26), that 2.4 million never had insurance before. That's our floor and it's pretty damn good.

Now, that's also for one year. If the website doesn't crash next October, and if the majority of the 15 million people expected to get insurance (also known as 5% of the entire population of the country) enjoy it, especially the 2.5 million who never had it, the never-insured-before group will continue to decline, year after year.

Just like it was supposed to, all along. If you could even add simple single-digit numbers together you would know this.

As to your larger point about only caring about political points, this law was pushed through Congress (rammed down our throats, you would say) by someone who had to watch his mother die because of gaps in her health care coverage. I am a direct beneficiary of the law's pre-existing coverage clause. You are a very lucky, well-off person indeed to have lived this long in life without incurring the health coverage problems that millions of us face every day. You are an idiot for telling me this is a numbers game for me, or for the President, but that's for another day.

 

That is why significant subsidies can be claimed by those just over 138% of the fpv.

Is the system perfect? Hardly. But if it moves us to a higher percentage being either insured or covered by Medicare/Medicaid/etc then we're at least moving in the right direction. That's why state-by-state numbers are going to be interesting.

 

Thanks for proving my point. It is nothing more than politics for you.

 

Not wanting premiums to rise is playing politics? If not enough individuals enroll, premiums increase faster than if they do not. That's the point of the exchanges; boost the size of the market to spread costs out. If not enough enroll, the law collapses. Nobody wants the law to collapse. If that's "playing politics," then it's a sad commentary on your already pathetic life.

 

Well....

 

Yeah.. I can think of quite a few people that would be more than pleased to see the law collapse.. Most have a (R) after their name.

 

http://money.cnn.com/gallery/news/economy/2014/03/28/obamacare-enrollees/index.html

Just a reminder of what Falc and VFish are opposed to. Humans life.

 

What a non sequitur. I'm not against getting people insured, nor am I against subsidizing the premiums of those that need help. What I am opposed to is a very ill-conceived plan that exacerbates the problems of our current system while at the same time doing severe damage to the parts that do work.


ObamaCare isn't really a healthcare plan but more of a redistribution scheme, so of course there will be winners and losers. I'm glad the ER found Kathy’s blood disorder, but am I really supposed to believe the ER wouldn't have admitted her and her "useless insurance" without ObamaCare? And why didn't she go to the doctor in January when her shining new insurance kicked in?

 

Aren't you a fan of the Dutch system? That's pretty redistributive. In fact it's pretty difficult to see how you're going to get something even mildly approaching universal coverage without being redistributive, be it a regulated insurance based approach or a single payer system.

They would have "medically stabilized" her and then chased her for the cost of her stay. If she'd had assets, they would have gone after them, if not, they would have written off the cost and others would pick up the bill. At least with the ACA, she is contributing something.

 

No, you're supposed to believe that she wouldn't have GONE to the ER with her useless insurance because she was afraid of the costs she would incur.

 

As I've pointed out time and time again, if you are going to base a system on mandates I think the Dutch system is one you should look at. That said, it is not what I would propose.

Yes, the ER would have admitted her and to be frank, her old, crappy insurance would probably have kicked in toward the bill much as what her fancy new ObamaCare.

 

We go into the new month Tuesday. She should receive her hospital bill soon. Let's see how happy she will be when that hits the mailbox.

 

As Spock would say .....

That is not logical Jim.​

 

How are you going to get towards universal coverage without some kind of redistribution?

 

Well obviously not with this ObamaCare plan... which seems to be wash between those that have lost insurance and those that are newly insured.

 

Forgive me, but isn't this the kind of ER abuse you promised the law would correct?