Sorry, even though this says good things about the program, it’s still a Fox source. I wouldn’t trust them to tell me a damn thing.
Well CBS News found the pricing estimates can be off from the actual insurance companies pricing estimates. The site assumes you are a specific age, either 27 or 50, and bases the price on that instead of your actual age. When they went to the actual insurance companies site and put in the real age the estimates were higher.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505269_162-57608843/healthcare.gov-pricing-feature-can-be-off-the-mark/
Here’s a report on how well they are doing.
And that looked intentionally dishonest to me. They originally didn’t want anyone to see the prices of the policies until they were signed in, but now that they’ve been forced to disclose them up front they broke them down into two age groups and picked the lowest age in each group to quote the insurance. At the very least they should have used the median price for that age range, and had a big disclaimer that the pricing was the median price and if you were over the median age it might be higher. Instead, the disclaimer says that the price might be lower, but says nothing about it possibly being higher even though it will be higher for almost everyone who looks at it.
So if you’re 49 and enter your age, you’ll be given a quote for insurance based on being 27 years of age. If you make financial plans around that, or use that information to decide to cancel your current insurance, you’ll be in for a world of hurt when you find out what the real price is when and if the system actually lets you buy insurance.
Once again, we have a ‘benevolent’ government engaging in deceptive practices that would get a private company in big trouble.
True dat! American private enterprise has such strict (ha) standards of ethical propriety (ha ha) that any such deceptive practices would be severely (ha ha ha) reacted to, especially in such traditionally trustworthy realms as banking, finance…(ah, ha! ha! ha! ha!, stop, stop, I’m killing me…)
But true, it should have been handed over to private enterprise, rather than the Federal Department of Software.
[Quote=Same Stone]
Once again, we have a ‘benevolent’ government engaging in deceptive practices that would get a private company in big trouble.
[/quote]
A big company like CBS News, perhaps?
http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/10/23/2823581/cbs-news-misleading-obamacare/
Once again, conservatives engage in deceitful arguments because reality has a liberal bias.
Yes, because it is SO much harder to put a numeric “age” field instead of the two radio buttons on the form, right?
You gotta love thinkprogress’ apologia. Apparently the reason that the website was note deceiving applicants is because “it’s hard [for thinkprogress] to believe that the administration would purposely mislead”.
Are there clear disclaimers that tell you that anonymous browsing will give you an estimate that may.not be accurate or not? Can you get the accurate info from the website or not?
There are clear disclaimers that (and I quote) “The prices here don’t reflect the lower costs you may qualify for based on household size and income”.
There is no disclaimer about the age, is there? As in “The prices here don’t reflect the HIGHER costs for you depending on your age.”
My observations so far. I know someone who got insurance. He’s 65, well educated and lost his good job. His hours at his current job were cut because of ACA so not only is he earning minimum wage he’s limited to 31 hrs/week. He’s tech savy and it took him 2 weeks of constantly accessing the government site to complete the process. It was NOT user friendly and that alone will discourage those who really don’t need it and frustrate the crap out of those desperate to get it. The price he’s paying is way less than I’m paying so it’s heavily subsidized. haven’t had time to compare the policies.
I’m in a similar boat but I’m working multiple jobs and currently have insurance. It rose considerably at the passing of the health care act. I just got a letter stating I have to make a choice among 3. Choice #1 is an increase of 12% that guarantees me another year. Choice #2 is to pay the same and it won’t be renewed after June 2014. Choice #3 is go fish. I’ve seen my insurance company cold selling in stores and the rep basically told me to go fish.
So as it stands I could keep my current policy (at least for a year) but I’m not aware of any subsidy if I do. I would like to be wrong on this. It would help greatly if I could find out which plans my doctor is willing to deal with.
So far my opinion hasn’t changed about this program. I was in favor of some kind of program that helped those who couldn’t get insurance but tying it to businesses was a huge fail. It literally cost me money in lost hrs and I believe it has kept me from getting jobs because my age is now a serious negative to businesses forced to pay for insurance. I know a fair number of people in my age bracket who cannot get good jobs that they are easily qualified for.
He’s 65? So why not Medicare?
:smack: 60. Sorry. Good catch.
That still leaves us with an insinuation supported only by anecdote to the effect that ObamaCare is the major cause of age discrimination in the workplace.
Which is untrue, the major cause of age discrimination in the workplace is snotty young whippersnappers.
elucidator, businesses are cutting back employee hours because it costs them more to insure them. For those that do insure employees it’s the same reason, money. It costs more to hire an older person because it drives up their insurance costs.
So, all of his happened yesterday morning, did it? Before then, the older worker competed on a level field with the younger worker? Then ObamaCare came along, and screwed it all up? You can, of course, substantiate that. But for some reason didn’t bother.
It’s been well established that businesses cut hours to avoid ACA. This hurt a lot of people and all you’ve got is smart ass retorts. You don’t care.
Actually there’s been a lot of speculation and talk and a bit of anecdotal reporting about it, but it’s by no means “well established”. (The opposite, if anything.)
It’s been well-established that businesses have claimed that ACA was the reason for the cuts, yes.
I contend that it’s the *companies *that are cutting their hours which are hurting the employees. Most companies aren’t cutting hours- it’s estimated that less than .5% are doing it- so clearly it’s *not *necessary for businesses to cut their workers hours in lieu of providing coverage. I’d say those companies which are doing so are doing it out of a desire to protect their profits rather than out of necessity.
Basically, it’s a political “look what you made me do”.
I am not a big fan of the ACA, but I disagree with this particular argument.
If anything, the ACA is a big positive for older workers, because it gives them subsidized coverage - meaning subsidized by the maximum 3:1 age rating ratio - paid for by younger people, whose premiums are artificially higher to pay for it.
The only situation I could imagine that supports your claim is if a company would forgo employee insurance altogether, then creates its own self-insured plan in response to potential penalties, and then turns around and discriminates against older workers. This seems like a big stretch at this point, especially as penalties have been deferred until 2015.