my point is that them being butthurt doesn't change anything about the validity of their position, its inconsequential

11/14/2013 8:14:54 PM

My shitty plan is done for but decent plans are an ok price now. I'm no longer being fucked for living in NYC.

11/14/2013 9:52:41 PM

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/12/23/cnn-poll-heath-care-law-support-drops-to-all-time-low/?hpt=hp_t1

We had to "pass it to find out what was in it." Now that we've found out what was in it, we don't like it.

12/23/2013 9:06:19 AM

This article of dubious credibility:

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/bailing-out-health-insurers-and-helping-obamacare_774167.html

notes two mechanisms that I had not heard of before

- Reinsurance Program caps big claim costs for insurers, such that 80% of individual costs between $45,000 and $250,000 are paid by the government
- Risk Corridor Program will pay for unexpected increases in costs out of the government coffers

I can't trivially find more information about these online. To some extent, they seem inline with the general philosophy that the bill's wording reflected. Somehow, the people gunning for a government run healthcare program or a single payer system were coaxed on board, and it would make sense that these were the kind of trap doors that did the convincing. But I don't know for sure. The statements above seem hard to fundge, there should certainly be some extra qualifiers on them, which would be a very glaring omission.

1/13/2014 1:51:50 PM

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/02/11/1276567/-Cartoon-Blaming-Obamacare

2/13/2014 11:12:03 AM

Decreasing the incentive to work is not a good thing.

2/13/2014 11:25:27 AM

Not necessarily.

2/13/2014 12:34:31 PM

fine, replace them with people that want to work 40 hours or more a week.

simple.

2/13/2014 2:43:18 PM

Quote :

"Decreasing the incentive to work is not a good thing."

whatever man... communism worked out so well for the USSR.

2/13/2014 7:46:20 PM

Well if we are making wild comparisons.. those African slaves had a decreased incentive to work after the civil war also.

2/13/2014 9:18:13 PM

According to CNN enrollments are soaring.

2/13/2014 9:19:46 PM

20% of ACA enrollees haven't or can't pay premiums

2/14/2014 10:16:31 AM

Are you surprised?

And, if they can't pay their premiums, how in God's name are they going to pay for the high deductibles many of these bronze plans carry?

2/14/2014 10:59:31 AM

You're right, they should just be getting free healthcare.

2/14/2014 4:19:12 PM

medicare for everyone!

2/14/2014 4:47:57 PM

BCBS has not drafted my 2/1 premium payment yet for obamacare plan, they sent a letter confirming they were going to about a month ago.

I wonder if I have insurance at all.

2/17/2014 3:08:47 PM

liar.

youre just trying to make the ACA look bad.

2/17/2014 5:16:08 PM

I'd like to know the background as to why most people posting here have purchased insurance through the ACA's.

Is it becuase you are unemployed? Self employed? Live with your parents (and if under 26, why aren't you on theirs)? Work for an employer whose insurance sucks?

I would expect most posters here to be gainfully employed in a career type job that would offer at least competitive employer sponsored plans.

2/18/2014 1:21:49 PM

I had my individual health insurance plan banned by the ACA, so I signed up for the obamacare and am now sucking down the government subsidies.

It remains my firm belief that this system as set up should be repealed, scrapped, and replaced with a predominantly unregulated healthcare system. And the surest way to achieve my long term goal is to bankrupt the system as set up. Thankfully my circumstances have me in a position to do my part

2/18/2014 4:29:20 PM

I just got a letter stating they are cancelling my old plan for non-payment, but they still have not drafted the cost of the new one.

2/19/2014 4:20:21 PM

you should go public with your story so proponents of the legislation will say youre not the norm

2/19/2014 5:38:46 PM

Restaurants charging ACA fee

http://money.cnn.com/2014/02/27/news/economy/obamacare-restaurants/

2/28/2014 9:39:21 AM

What? No social security fee too? At least be consistent!

2/28/2014 9:49:33 AM

^^ ha, those are relatively small percentages. If I were an employee, i'd be pissed that the costs were so minimal to give me healthcare, but my employer wasn't offering all along.

[Edited on February 28, 2014 at 9:51 AM. Reason : ]

2/28/2014 9:51:44 AM

^ srsly

2/28/2014 9:55:31 AM

Silently increase menu prices by 1%... or troll bait your customers into complaining about ACA.

2/28/2014 1:55:51 PM

Bumping for current events. 6m+ and counting signed up private insurance through the exchanges nation wide, including over 200,000 in NC alone. Their goal was 7m before the end of March, and they came remarkably close even with the botched launch. Had the website been functional from day one, they would have easily hit that number. I honestly cannot see how the GOP can base their 2014 platform on running against the health care of that many people.

3/28/2014 12:25:34 PM

those numbers don't really provide any clarity. We would need to know how many of those 6 million had plans before and they were canceled, and how many are new. And there are probably a number of people that signed up for plans outside of the exchanges, or employers who provided plans outside of the exchanges. They also released that they had about 15% (or something like that) less young people than they expected.

We can't really know if this phase of ACA was as success until those are released, but I think it's safe to say it hasn't been an abject failure at least (but the GOP is going to paint it this way anyway-- they'd paint it this way no matter what).

3/28/2014 2:46:44 PM

6 million out of 7 million is about 15% less than expected.

3/28/2014 3:50:39 PM

how many of the "succesfully" registered have still not been able to pay and may actually not have coverage?

3/28/2014 5:17:28 PM

If they have BCBS there is probably no way to pay short of just mailing a check in and hoping it goes to the right place with no bill to go with it.

3/28/2014 5:31:20 PM

total ACA enrollment : ~6million

Total US Population : 311,591,917

http://www.google.com/publicdata


seems pretty easy to not give a shit about those 6 million

unless you're saying that in the grand scheme of things 6 million people is insignificant and therefore not worth basing a campaign against, in that case, I agree.

3/29/2014 2:12:07 AM

Yes, the numbers seem pretty insignificant, which means the cost of the plans will remain high. Overall, a win for insurance companies, I'd say.

3/29/2014 8:59:18 AM

I love how the 4-5 million people that had their plans cancelled for not meeting minimum standards was a huge number and the end of the world, now the 6+ million buying through the exchanges is "insignificant".

3/29/2014 7:44:46 PM

More people watch Duck Dynasty than signed up for ACA. The sooner this is repealed the sooner we can move on to true communized medicine, the only solution.

3/29/2014 9:39:01 PM

Repeal would hurt that goal. They need to solidify the Medicare expansion, close up the gap for the upper poor people, then work towards a public option.

3/29/2014 10:49:08 PM

Propaganda is getting in the way of progress here. There are huge benefits to be made from a single payer system that we just will not truley consider because it is 'communism'.

Politicians need to be replaced by scientific pannels.

3/30/2014 6:51:03 AM

Why cant they make a functioning website?

The whole execution was flawed from the beginning. There should have never been federal exchanges if they are too incompetent to make a functioning website. They should have made a simple federal website to get subsidy eligibility certificates and then allowed people to go directly to insurers or private exchange websites to make their purchase.

You STILL can not pay for your new plan on healthcare.gov and it was supposed to have been up and running six months ago. Explain to me what the logic is to have a website where you can do everything but pay for the service you are ordering.

3/30/2014 9:45:06 AM

New Yorks website works fine.

3/30/2014 10:20:51 AM

If you know someone with a time magazine subscription, they had a decent article on the ACA website. Eventually a tiny hand picked group of people from obama's election tech team swooped in and fixed things: http://time.com/10228/obamas-trauma-team/

I don't agree with going with a more stripped down site. Technology can and should so more. The problems with the website were due to lack of competency in the firm that was hired to build the site, and poor management of the technical aspects from the highest levels.

3/30/2014 10:50:57 AM

All I know is if I go to buy something on ebay or travelocity they will take my money at the end, healthcare.gov will not. BCBS is blaming all of their billing problems on the government but they would not have any excuse if they could handle the sign ups in house.

3/30/2014 11:02:08 AM

Reid is blaming the most recent delay on people's inability to use the internet. Which, for older folks - pre-medicare, of course, I guess this is true. But you can also call, so it really isn't an excuse.

3/30/2014 11:14:56 AM

The phone reps on healthcare.gov tell you to make a whole new login and start over if you are having trouble with your application.

3/30/2014 11:18:16 AM

I predict that that 25% of people who haven't paid or whatever are gonna end up getting comped so it makes the numbers look better.

As a matter of fact, I'm going online now to sign up for the $350/month plan and not paying, cause that is totally some shit they'd do. The ACA bailout of 2014.

3/30/2014 4:16:07 PM

Quote :

"Propaganda is getting in the way of progress here. There are huge benefits to be made from a single payer system that we just will not truley consider because it is 'communism'."

Yeah, huge benefits like long lines, rationed care, and lack of innovation. Man, I can't wait!

3/30/2014 6:18:59 PM

^ sounds like my interactions with BCBS.

3/30/2014 9:00:38 PM

^^
Citation needed.

3/30/2014 11:12:27 PM

Quote :

"8. Will common sense prevail over partisanship? As my colleague Sam Baker noted, "Republicans predicted it would collapse on itself (didn't happen), while Democrats swore the public would embrace it as time went on (also didn't happen)." The partisans were wrong (again), because the truth lurks in the middle:"

http://www.nationaljournal.com/white-house/obamacare-survives-now-can-it-be-fixed-20140331

3/31/2014 12:25:15 PM

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-obamacare-uninsured-national-20140331,0,5472960.story?page=1#axzz2xYDV8HQV

Lots of good info in there, but here's two that will never make a headline,

Quote :

" • About 9 million people have bought health plans directly from insurers, instead of using the marketplaces, Rand found. The vast majority of these people were previously insured. • Fewer than a million people who had health plans in 2013 are now uninsured because their plans were canceled for not meeting new standards set by the law, the Rand survey indicates. "

The 6 million enrolled through exchanges is a nice number, but it's more of a benchmark for the efficacy of the exchange model than a litmus test for the entire law. If you want to look at the overall number of uninsured to get covered, the most important indicator IMO, it's the most significant expansion of health coverage since Medicaid. In other words,

Quote :

"'This is a big fucking deal' - Joseph Biden"

[Edited on March 31, 2014 at 1:09 PM. Reason : :]

3/31/2014 1:07:16 PM

the link to the RAND survey doesn't work

3/31/2014 1:30:55 PM