Indeed, I would like @Kearsen1 to explain how, in general, greatly increasing the size of the insured base causes insurance rates to go up, since the opposite would seem to be true, all other things being equal. Sure, there are many shortcomings and inadequacies in the ACA, and every single one of them is caused by Republican opposition, intransigence, and obstructionism, abetted by the almighty power of the insurance lobby. One of the things that can, in fact, cause rates to go up is if an excess of sick people sign up, and young healthy people tend not to bother. This was the perverse situation that the mandate was intended to prevent, and is precisely what Republicans managed to repeal. Gee, almost as if they were trying to get the ACA to fail!
But if Obama and Democrats could have done what was really needed, the ACA taken to its logical conclusion would have provided universal coverage for everyone, everyone would have exactly the same (low) rates irrespective of their health status, and all doctors and all hospitals would be covered (there would be no “networks”). It’s called single-payer, and in one form or another (even if it’s not literally a single government payer) some form of it is what is practiced in virtually the whole of the civilized world.
I’ve long argued that the biggest beneficiaries of single-payer would be small businesses and independents who wouldn’t have to make health insurance a business consideration. The ACA fell way short in this regard.
But @Kearsen essentially said both sides had done nothing to address the healthcare problem. That’s clearly, demonstrably, factually, stupefyingly wrong, but all he’s done is move the goal posts to what Democrats did wrong.
As they did year over year prior to the ACA. The question is, did they go up faster or slower, and my understanding is that after the ACA, the rate of premium growth slowed.
People losing their insurance is a similar issue. For years before the ACA, many employers had started cutting their benefits, reducing their contributions to healthcare plans, and reducing the quality of them. If your employer increased premiums or decreased benefits, that wasn’t the ACA, that was your employer. (Which only points out how horrible an idea it is to tie healthcare to employment in the first place.)
In 2005 I was working at a job that had pretty good health insurance, and in 2006, they decided to change it to a much more crap insurance that the doctor that I had been going to wouldn’t accept (wasn’t in network.)
But, since changes did happen to people’s plans after ACA was put in, even if they were not due to them, they were blamed on it anyway.
It would also encourage more entrepreneurialism, rather than a serf-like feudal dependence on employers for essential health care, a concept that seems to belong to medieval times. You’d think Republicans would be in favor of it for that reason alone, even if Democrats favor it for social and moral reasons. Unless, perhaps, big corporations and Big Insurance have Republican legislators in their pocket.
Exactly. If I leave my job to work independently, I know I’ll be facing much higher risks. But when you add tripled health insurance premiums to those risks it makes the proposition a lot less attractive. So remind me again why the party of rugged individualism opposes single payer.
To the contrary, that serf-like dependence is the feature that Republicans want, even though it would be political suicide to say that. That’s why “repeal and replace” never seems to find a “replace” – the status quo pre-Obamacare worked very well for the main drivers of Republican party policy.
It fell short of what I would like, but it did help. It does give myself and my employees another option. Otherwise, we’d have no coverage options at all.
I get the motivation of big insurance, but I never understood why the rest of the business community isn’t screaming for a different system. As an employer that pays 100% of the cost of health insurance to about 40 employees, I can tell you that it is a huge expense that we would love to transfer to the public sector, even if it meant higher taxes.
The question, though, with the appointment of Amy Coney Barrett, who is guided by God, is how does Jesus feel about the ACA? I don’t mean the historical real Jesus as we understand him, I mean the Jesus who hates gays and Muslims and who (according to Mike Pompeo, anyway) caused Trump to become president, the one whose dad created the world 6000 years ago, and who smites Democrats at every opportunity. I don’t imagine he would have much use for the ACA, or much sympathy for people who couldn’t afford decent health care. But hey, maybe ACB will surprise us and be a justice with some regard for law and logic, creating another Republican disappointment.
My understanding is that Big Businesses look at Health Care as another competitive advantage for them in hiring and retaining better employees. These are large companies though. At least 1000+ employees.
Health Insurance is a very important calculation to many workers that have options.
Your opinion is seem a little odd to me. You have a trained and good worker who is staying with your company as you have a good health plan and you would rather they leave? Why? That means he is probably also a fairly smart employee.
I worked for a utility company that abused the hell out of its workers.
When anyone would complain, they would tell us that we should be grateful for our jobs and the benefits that they provided.
I ended up quitting, as I didn’t much like that attitude, but if I had a family or any dependents that were also on my insurance, I certainly would have thought twice about it.
As a business owner now, I really don’t want to have that atmosphere, and would much prefer to have my employees stay because they like their jobs, not because I have leverage.
Maybe I didn’t explain it right. What I was trying to convey is that I don’t like the idea that I can “control” my employees or keep them at this job because I provide their health insurance. I believe they should be free to work for me or work somewhere else, as they choose. I was responding to this:
I understand that under the current system health insurance is a crucial benefit. (that’s why we made a conscious decision to pay 100% of the cost) If we had a different system, we could easily find other incentives to attract and retain good employees, and everyone would have their health insurance through some other means.
Why on earth would you want them to leave? To me, that’s like saying, “Well, if someone is staying just because we pay them well, I’d rather they leave.” Makes not one bit of sense. Health insurance is just as important as salary, possibly more so.
ETA: If they go somewhere else they may hit the “pre-existing condition” barrier or a family member might be in the middle of treatment and they have to wait for insurance to kick in. Health insurance shouldn’t be tied to employment any more than car or homeowner’s insurance. This from a career free-lancer who, fortunately, didn’t get breast cancer until I was on Medicare.
