Finally......Obamacare At A Glance

[sparks]

I've been trying to understand the new national healthcare policy for some time now. Here's the latest simplified flowchart.

http://dailybail.com/home/obamacare-complicated-check-out-the-flow-chart.html


Had no idea it was so simple....





sparks

[glenn kangiser]

Should be no problem implementing that...

[Woodsrule]

The nightmare begins. We were just told that our HSA's would no longer be used for over the counter meds like allergy medication. We now have to get a "prescription" for OTC (over the counter) medications! Now, I'm not sure what my doctor is going to say when he is asked to write a scrip for a non-scrip item. Obamacare - ya gotta love it.

[NM_Shooter]

My wife's migraine meds are no longer covered either.  Copays went up too.

[stricsm]

I've worked for the gubment for 22 years and it is very hard for them to do anything simply for fear that they will offend an important special interest group, lose votes, or a bunch of other senseless excuses.  I'm fed up with both parties.  I think the two party system makes it difficult to right the ship.  We need another choice.

[SpoonyG]

Is this contribution increase a result of Obamacare?  It seems odd that my contributions have remained steady over the past years, yet this year jump $115 every pay check.

[archimedes]

Apparently you guys are not aware that most of the new healthcare law doesn't go into effect until 2014.  

And the changes cited above,  to HSA's and certain meds not being covered,  wouldn't be affected even when the law is implemented.  

Since the law doesn't take effect until 2014, it certainly wouldn't effect your premiums now.

And Spoony if you haven't seen a premium increase in two years, consider yourself lucky, you're one of the very few in America who hasn't.  I know, I'm a licensed insurance agent.

[NM_Shooter]

Archimedes, I disagree.

The health care companies are private companies, and since they are not under as much government control as they will be, they are setting up their sandbags while they still can.  In anticipation of all the new restraints that they are having forced upon them, they are positioning in a manner to ensure their profit. 

My wife came home yesterday and said that our specialist co-pay is going from 35 to 60 dollars next year. 

This is not a coincidence.

[ScottA]

Don't worry the whole Obama care scam will go down the drain as soon as they have to arrest 10 million people who can't afford to pay their premiums. If that doesn't sink it the Federaly mandated eating of broccoli and spinich will do it for sure. If they can force you to buy health insurance they can force you to eat your veggies too commrade. Welcome to the USSA.

[Ajax]

Don't worry the whole Obama care scam will go down the drain as soon as they have to arrest 10 million people who can't afford to pay their premiums. If that doesn't sink it the Federaly mandated eating of broccoli and spinich will do it for sure. If they can force you to buy health insurance they can force you to eat your veggies too commrade. Welcome to the USSA.

There is no penalty for not buying insurance

[ScottA]

Don't worry the whole Obama care scam will go down the drain as soon as they have to arrest 10 million people who can't afford to pay their premiums. If that doesn't sink it the Federaly mandated eating of broccoli and spinich will do it for sure. If they can force you to buy health insurance they can force you to eat your veggies too commrade. Welcome to the USSA.

There is no penalty for not buying insurance

Not today but starting in 2014 there will be. Up to 2.5% of your income as a penalty but it's disguised as a tax. It will be collected by the IRS. What happens to those who can't pay commrade?

[fishing_guy]

Apparently you guys are not aware that most of the new healthcare law doesn't go into effect until 2014.  

And the changes cited above,  to HSA's and certain meds not being covered,  wouldn't be affected even when the law is implemented.  

Since the law doesn't take effect until 2014, it certainly wouldn't effect your premiums now.

And Spoony if you haven't seen a premium increase in two years, consider yourself lucky, you're one of the very few in America who hasn't.  I know, I'm a licensed insurance agent.

Covering preexisting conditions and allowing children on policies until age 26 (BOTH in effect NOW) doesn't have any effect on premiums?
My wife works for an insurance company and says we haven't begun to see the effects...

[Pox Eclipse]

Archimedes, I disagree.

The health care companies are private companies, and since they are not under as much government control as they will be, they are setting up their sandbags while they still can.  In anticipation of all the new restraints that they are having forced upon them, they are positioning in a manner to ensure their profit. 

My wife came home yesterday and said that our specialist co-pay is going from 35 to 60 dollars next year. 

This is not a coincidence.

So in your world, insurance companies now have carte blanche to bugger us any way they want, and all they have to do is blame Obamacare to deflect your anger?  What a sweet deal!

[Ajax]

Don't worry the whole Obama care scam will go down the drain as soon as they have to arrest 10 million people who can't afford to pay their premiums. If that doesn't sink it the Federaly mandated eating of broccoli and spinich will do it for sure. If they can force you to buy health insurance they can force you to eat your veggies too commrade. Welcome to the USSA.

There is no penalty for not buying insurance

Not today but starting in 2014 there will be. Up to 2.5% of your income as a penalty but it's disguised as a tax. It will be collected by the IRS. What happens to those who can't pay commrade?

Here's the detail on the individual mandate

Require U.S. citizens and legal residents to have qualifying health coverage. Those without coverage
pay a tax penalty of the greater of $695 per year up to a maximum of three times that amount ($2,085)
per family or 2.5% of household income. The penalty will be phased-in according to the following
schedule: $95 in 2014, $325 in 2015, and $695 in 2016 for the flat fee or 1.0% of taxable income in 2014,
2.0% of taxable income in 2015, and 2.5% of taxable income in 2016. Beginning after 2016, the penalty
will be increased annually by the cost-of-living adjustment. Exemptions will be granted for financial
hardship, religious objections, American Indians, those without coverage for less than three months,
undocumented immigrants, incarcerated individuals, those for whom the lowest cost plan option
exceeds 8% of an individual's income, and those with incomes below the tax filing threshold (in 2009 the
threshold for taxpayers under age 65 was $9,350 for singles and $18,700 for couples).
http://www.kff.org/healthreform/upload/8061.pdf

Here's the detail on what the IRS can do, emphasis added by me

The law does make individuals subject to a tax, starting in 2014, if they fail to obtain health insurance coverage. But IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman testified before a hearing of the House Ways and Means Committee March 25 that the IRS won't be auditing individuals to certify that they have obtained health insurance. He said insurance companies will issue forms certifying that individuals have coverage that meets the federal mandate, similar to a form that lenders use to verify the amount of interest someone has paid on their home mortgage. "We expect to get a simple form, that we won't look behind, that says this person has acceptable health coverage," Shulman said. "So there's not going to be any discussions about health coverage with an IRS employee." In any case, the bill signed into law (on page 131) specifically prohibits the IRS from using the liens and levies commonly used to collect money owed by delinquent taxpayers, and rules out any criminal penalties for individuals who refuse to pay the tax or those who don't obtain coverage. That doesn't leave a lot for IRS enforcers to do.
http://www.factcheck.org/2010/03/irs-expansion/


So, like I said in my previous post, no penalty

[ScottA]

I guess this means I don't have to eat my veggies either? I'm sure those penalties will be made to stick at some point. If not the whole law is pointless. There was a time when income tax was suposed to be voluntary too but you see where that got us.

[Ndrmyr]

Archimedes, I too have to politely disagree. I do work with group health insurance and have seen strong increases in premiums and renewals since the healthcare bill passed and there are already changes being implemented.  At renewal group health carriers are installing 100% preventative care and changing plans to an unlimited lifetime maximum (in most cases from a previous $5 mil max).  Still carriers KNOW what is coming down the pipe. NO pre-existing condition clause and immmediate guarantee insurability.  This is akin to allowing people to purchase car insurance the morning AFTER an accident.  It will make the rule of adverse selection the law of the land where insurance carriers can not possibly predict the size of the claims and losses coming their way.
Sadly, it is raising the cost of insurance for all of us, especially those of us responsible enough to have insurance. It is also causing huge price increases to employers, especially small business at a terrible time in the economy.
While liberal moralists believe that it is worth any price, we can be bankrupted by a moral initiative as easily as an immoral one.  Do any of use disbelieve that we can spend our budgets into exhaustion?
This is a financially crushing initiative where our costs escalate enormously so that we can insure those uninsured.  In a time when socialist europe is struggling to decrease their government spending we are raising ours to a new high.

[NM_Shooter]

Archimedes, I disagree.

The health care companies are private companies, and since they are not under as much government control as they will be, they are setting up their sandbags while they still can.  In anticipation of all the new restraints that they are having forced upon them, they are positioning in a manner to ensure their profit.  

My wife came home yesterday and said that our specialist co-pay is going from 35 to 60 dollars next year.  

This is not a coincidence.

So in your world, insurance companies now have carte blanche to bugger us any way they want, and all they have to do is blame Obamacare to deflect your anger?  What a sweet deal!

No one is surprised that you don't understand.  I am angry, but not at the insurance companies.  I'm angry that your president and his minions "now have carte blanche to bugger us any way that they want" and you are in support of that.

Granted, you'd like hundreds of thousands$$$ of free treatment for your wife.  I'm sorry about her health.  

Having the government mandate that private insurance corporations have to DO anything that ends up detracting from their profit is going to affect their pricing model for their goods and services.  It is pretty simple economics.  

[NM_Shooter]

Pox... read, then re-read Ndrmyr's post above. 

[dug]

I won't take sides but it seems just a choice between getting fleeced by the government or a private corporation.

About 15 years ago I had been insured by one of the largest and most trusted names in the business. Our family had been with them apx. 7 years, never a late payment even though it was our second largest monthly expense- very close behind our mortgage. I had never visited a doctor in that time until I went in (at my wife's insistence) to have a suspicious mole looked at, which the doc said was benign. One week later I was dropped like a hot potato with no given reason. Many infuriated phone calls didn't reveal much, but it was definitely related to that visit.

After that, no company would insure me for any amount. I did find a no name company about 6 month later that sold me a really crappy policy for an absurd price.

Do they know something I don't? I guess I'll never know but 15 years later I still feel fine.

Though I do not agree with Obama care I don't understand why people so vehemently defend private companies who are outright thieves in my opinion. I am all for private enterprise but it is one thing to rip someone off selling a product that they don't need, and quite another to do the same with someone's personal health.

My advice to my kids- put your cash in the bank, or maybe under the mattress would be safer these days.

[MountainDon]

The system we have had up to now has a lot of folks receiving experiences such as dug's. People afraid to see their doctor for something, lest it become cause for being denied coverage or for a large premium increase. My wife and I have encountered both and that was long before we had even heard of a man named Obama.

[NM_Shooter]

Dug, I concur... that just is not right. 

If an insurance participant is paying their premiums, and was dropped (and it was not for a non-disclosed pre-existing condition) then that should be grounds for breach of contract. 

I don't have problems with reasonable regulations being placed on insurance companies.  I do have issues with forcing insurers to accept pre-existing conditions.  I feel that is unreasonable.

We need to strike a balance that allows insurers to work and be competitive.  We need to make sure that consumers are protected under ethical trade laws. 

Obamacare, and the burden it places on private insurers is absolute coercion.  The administration understands that the laws it is enacting will force insurers to raise their prices, which in turn will make many unable to pay, pushing them to the gov't insurance option. 

It is another means by which the liberals wish to control every aspect of our lives.

[Ajax]

I don't have problems with reasonable regulations being placed on insurance companies.  I do have issues with forcing insurers to accept pre-existing conditions.  I feel that is unreasonable.

What happens to people with pre-existing conditions?  Do they go broke or die or both?

[NM_Shooter]

We all die.  Unfortunately, some sooner than others. 

The bottom line is that we are all individually responsible for our own health and well being.  Expecting some giant government department of benevolence to exist and to gently ease us into our graves is delusional.

Insurance is an odds game.  You either play or you don't.  We should work to ensure that those who play get treated fairly.  We should also expect to have to abide by the rules of the game ourselves. 

Expecting to buy insurance the morning after the car crash is unethical as well.

[fishing_guy]

Speaking of insurance, but not necessarily health type, I ran into an odd situation today.

About a month ago, I had several auto insurance policies changed.  Due to a broken axle and procrastination, I dropped 2 cars and reinstated one that had been previously insured.  I went into the office and sat while they changed the policies. 

My wife told me last week that something weird was going on.  I called the agent today to find that only one of my cars had been dropped, and that nothing else had been done.  The assistant that "made" the changes is no longer employed.

The agent backdated the changes to the date that the one policy was dropped.

If only Medical insurance worked so well!!!