Health Insurers Seek Hefty Rate Boosts

Of course they do, what choice do they have? It's medicare or nothing.

 

Except these who have died from it.

 

I image the folks who died from private health care weren't happy with it either.

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They could pay for private insurance. If private insurers would even provide coverage to older, sicker folks.

But the fact they have few options isn't a reason they'd be happy with it.

 

I listed the failures, deal with them.

Why should I support something I have no reason to believe would be better and your solution only addresses seniors. The fact is it is not $2500 cheaper and more affordable for the far more citizens than the 10 million who already had health coverage but now have health insurance.

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To non-medicare medicaid patients or other employment.

See the OP.

 

If I had been able to use the money I have paid into Medicare/Medicaid to prepurchase senior health care then I would have had an alternative. Government wouldn't allow and and force me into Medicare, I have no choice.

 

Roll the tape...

[video=youtube;_o65vMUk5so]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_o65vMUk5so[/video]

That should have paid for the cable and cell phone...

 

I have. I listed the success. Deal with it.

I appreciate that 10 million more Americans now having coverage is meaningless to you.

Medicaid pays less. What other employment do you claim they will go to?

Of course there is a choice. Just as people who pay for public high school have the choice of sending their kids to private school.

 

They couldn't get single payer passed, so they decided to destroy the private health insurance market with Obamacare. That way they can come back and see "geez, what a mess. We better pass single payer".

 

Agree they should have done it from the get go but they'd have been stopped by conservatives and the insurance lobby.

 

I wish Obama had simply expanded Medicare or even Medicaid to begin with - it would have been so much simpler. But he passed Obamacare, which he readily admits is a Republican healthcare plan that forces people to buy from insurance companies against their will. Would Democrats be willing to repeal Obamacare as a prerequisite to universal Medicare/Medicaid? Because that is a compromise I can live with. Otherwise, it seems like piling more government spending and regulations on an already over-regulated industry.

 

The Dems didn't think they could do an expansion of Medicare like that, because they believed that with the insurance industry ganging up with the conservatives they'd lose support to do it. Born from their experience in 1993 when that was exactly what happened. So they figured that if they adopted what was essentially a conservative proposal they'd have more success. Though I wish they had tried. If they had promoted it as a Medicare expansion as opposed to a "single payor" they might have been able to do it.

 

But the private medical industry in countries with "single-payer" are virtually nonexistent compared to the US's private market. Other countries may spend less per capita, but that is because they are largely incapable of accessing a robust private market to spend money in. In other words, countries with single-payer may have individuals who WANT to spend more of their money on healthcare, but simply cannot access the healthcare they want because of constraints on supply.

 

I don't claim expertise in other countries health care system, but I believe some of them do have single payor systems or elements of it.

But in my analysis you quoted, I did not rely on comparisons with other countries for my argument, but data from our own system.

 

Destroy the private health insurance market?????

10 million new customers and record profits.

 

Yes, but don't you think the results of single-payer in other countries is instructive? And I'm somewhat confused. By "single-payer", do you mean universal Medicare/Medicaid, or do you mean only one entity (the government) pays for all healthcare? I believe "single-payer" in other countries means that the government assumes sole responsibility for the financing of healthcare. I could be wrong, but that's what "single" payer implies to me.

And the same argument applies. Medicare and Medicaid save money by paying lower rates, but that creates the potential for reducing the supply of medical care. In other words, if physicians are unwilling to provide healthcare for the rates that Medicare and Medicaid are willing to pay, then Medicare and Medicaid patients cannot access that supply even though they might have been willing to pay market rates for it in a private system.

 

Obama is one terrible communist

 

My understanding of single payor is like Medicare, where the services are provided by private companies, but the services are paid for by the Govt per negotiated rates (which, because of its market power, are much lower than what private insurers do).

There aren't many ways you can reduce health care costs without 1) getting private insurance out of the loop, and 2) paying the providers less.

While there is a lot of variation, health care providers are amongst the richest corporations and that is where much of the health care cost increases have been. You are correct that cutting down that $$$ flow may have some adverse effects on health care provision, but there seems to be a *lot* of fat in the system that could be cut out before you see a marked decrease in health care services. The fact that Medicare pays significantly less doesn't seem to have dramatically negatively affected health care provision to seniors, judging from the Medicare approval ratings.

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LOL, no (*)(*)(*)(*).

 

Maybe you would care to explain why the liberal gods you worship didn't do this instead of the screwed up mess they created?

Grubers Goobers are bearing the fruit Americans tried to warn about

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Actually he's an inept liar, and a wannabe communist

 

In a universal system, doctors would have a choice. They could settle for the reimbursement rates or go wait on tables. Nowhere in the world are physician heinies powdered like they are here.

 

Maybe you'd care to read the thread first?

http://www.politicalforum.com/showthread.php?t=410069&page=4&p=1065034042#post1065034042

 

as we said all along, you can't trust private insurers to reduce rates on their own, we need a public option

 

Read yesterday, 25% of those having insurance aren't using it because of the high deductible and co-pay they have to pay. Then we learn many have to pay the government back on subsidies they got when filing income tax.

 

That's if they get insurance at all.

Private based health care coverage sucks.

 

Oh so that's the excuse it was the republicans fault

 

This is so totally unexpected. </sarcasm>

I hope the premiums especially increase for the ObamaCare supporters to teach them a damn lesson.

And don't come back here blaming the increases on Bush or the Republicans.

You lefties voted for this and have continually defended it from day one.

So, now own it!

12 States Release Proposed Premium Increases