Obamacare not affordable

[Raeven]

I don't mind saying what I'll be paying in premiums with the ACA. It'll be around $137 per month. That's FAR better than the $835 per month I was quoted for private insurance a couple of years ago -- and for better coverage.

The problem isn't the ACA. The problem is increased costs for health care over which no one -- until the ACA -- has taken any control. There are a myriad of reasons why costs have increased so radically in this country, but the chief one is profits. The ACA requires that profits and administrative costs be held to 20% (about half of what they were before this requirement of the ACA went into effect). Profits going forward will continue to become more limited. If the ACA does nothing else, it is attempting to address this very big problem in our health care system.

[NoraBrimstone]

The rest of the developed world is raising an eyebrow at all this crap.

Healthcare should never ever be a privilege of the wealthy. Wtf is wrong with some people?

[Manowar]

I don't mind saying what I'll be paying in premiums with the ACA. It'll be around $137 per month. That's FAR better than the $835 per month I was quoted for private insurance a couple of years ago -- and for better coverage.

The problem isn't the ACA. The problem is increased costs for health care over which no one -- until the ACA -- has taken any control. There are a myriad of reasons why costs have increased so radically in this country, but the chief one is profits. The ACA requires that profits and administrative costs be held to 20% (about half of what they were before this requirement of the ACA went into effect). Profits going forward will continue to become more limited. If the ACA does nothing else, it is attempting to address this very big problem in our health care system.

is your coverage better? what about deductables and co-pays that all adds up. I have this very very bad habit, I need to eat. When i tried looking a few months ago for a bronze package out of curiousity it was almost $5,000 a year with $5.000 deductable. Does not sound very good to me. ? I Think if I saved that money for all of the years i have not gone doctors at all in the past, I would have saved over $100.000.

manowar

[Raeven]

I don't mind saying what I'll be paying in premiums with the ACA. It'll be around $137 per month. That's FAR better than the $835 per month I was quoted for private insurance a couple of years ago -- and for better coverage.

The problem isn't the ACA. The problem is increased costs for health care over which no one -- until the ACA -- has taken any control. There are a myriad of reasons why costs have increased so radically in this country, but the chief one is profits. The ACA requires that profits and administrative costs be held to 20% (about half of what they were before this requirement of the ACA went into effect). Profits going forward will continue to become more limited. If the ACA does nothing else, it is attempting to address this very big problem in our health care system.

is your coverage better? what about deductables and co-pays that all adds up. I have this very very bad habit, I need to eat. When i tried looking a few months ago for a bronze package out of curiousity it was almost $5,000 a year with $5.000 deductable. Does not sound very good to me. ? I Think if I saved that money for all of the years i have not gone doctors at all in the past, I would have saved over $100.000.

manowar

I haven't yet selected a specific plan because I still need to research which plan will work best with my particular doctors, etc.

I tend to prefer higher deductible plans because I can afford the deductible, and so long as preventive care is covered (required under the ACA), I rarely need to dip into the deductible -- which only becomes an issue if I suffer something catastrophic.

I don't mind co-pays of up to $40 per visit, though I think the ones on the plans I was looking at were lower. All the plans I was looking at were silver, and all cost about the same.

My recollection was that the deductibles were around $2,500 (although double that wouldn't bother me), with co-pays around $25-35 per visit. I will share the specific information when I have it.

[popeyespappy]

Okay, I do have an opinion on this.

I am strongly in favour of universal healthcare. However, the Fed. govt. of the USA cannot afford it, and I do think it should be instituted at State levels.

Ideally, this would be good, but there are the Southern states to contend with. Texas, Mississippi, Alabama... these states cannot be trusted to run ANYTHING. Look at how they run their schools and that's a good indicator of how they'd run their healthcare systems.

Zaz, while I generally agree with most of your posts I don’t think you have a clue what you are talking about this time. In fact I believe your comments are biased generalizations with roots in prejudice that you would normally be quick to call out when you see it others.

To begin with the state of Alabama was doing a pretty good job of regulating the health insurance industry prior to the ACA. Two years ago I was 50 years old, self-employed and paying for my own health insurance. I was paying $221 a month for dam good health insurance. Those rates were among the lowest in the nation for someone my age. They were a direct result of state laws controlling the way insurance providers did business in this state. Currently my employer picks up 100% of the tab for my health insurance, but if I had to buy an individual policy tomorrow I’d be paying over $400 a month for coverage that isn’t nearly as good as what I had the last time I bought my own insurance.

Neither is this state’s legislature doing a particularly poor job in education. Yes, Alabama ranks near the bottom of the list of states in education, but that has a lot more to do with demographics than legislation. Take a look at this chart.



That’s right, the five states (including DC) with highest poverty rates are the five states with the worst education rankings. The five states at the top of the list in the poverty rankings also rate highly in education.

This correlation holds true from the national level all the way down to the local level. Globally the US barely ranks in the top 25 in reading, math and science. But if you only count the schools with 10% or less students on free or reduced cost lunches (the schools with the fewest poor kids) The US moves into the top five in all three categories. The same holds true in Alabama. There are good schools here. The good schools are the ones with the least amounts of poor kids.

The problem isn’t the way the government runs the schools. It isn’t funding for the schools. The schools with the highest number of kids living in poverty get the most money. The problem with US schools is the children of poor adults generally make poor students. If you want to fix the US school system don't worry about what labels the legislators are putting on the biology books. Fix the students by bringing their parents out of poverty.

[Zazzy]

Zaz, while I generally agree with most of your posts I don’t think you have a clue what you are talking about this time. In fact I believe your comments are biased generalizations with roots in prejudice that you would normally be quick to call out when you see it others.

I note your figures, and may have to rethink my harsh assessment of your fine state. I based my comments on stats like this, where the states I listed are in the bottom 5 states for high school graduation, and this, which shows all these states getting grades of C in school achievement (although they weren't at the bottom of the list).

It's true I sometimes let my hatred of Southern politics run away with my mouth- but it's also true that Southern education could use some help.

Fix the students by bringing their parents out of poverty.

This would do a great deal to bring that help, but in Texas, at least, our fine leaders aren't very interested in helping anyone but big business. My point was (if I had made it well instead of just flinging mud) that if we can't get a higher % of our population to graduate high school in the South, it indicates a less than stellar political effort to educate the populace. Those same people are the ones who need healthcare assistance the most; I don't see most Southern republican politicians as being eager to help their poorer populace to get insured.