Is ObamaCare saving you money?

[hamchan]

Keeping insurance premiums artificially low by means of excluding those who need insurance the most from being able to purchase it at any cost is the very definition of evil. It's just f---ing evil.

[autoxer]

It's funny how everyone assumes that because their rate has gone up, it is due to the ACA. My rates have gone up every single year my entire working life. That's just the way it works. It has nothing to do with the ACA.

It seems like the ACA is only going to add cost by extending coverage to everybody and ignoring pre-existing conditions. Won't this cause everybody's rates to rise? Is the ACA actually doing anything to lower healthcare costs, or is it just trying to expand insurance coverage?

How is the affordable care act affecting your business?

[asmom]

a lot of people are picking up the cost for owebamacare. You can't add uninsureable people to the rolls without the cost being picked up by another group.

Don't you know that you have already been picking up the cost for the uninsured and the uninsureable? Do you think those people haven't been getting healthcare all along? At least this way, there is a chance healthcare costs will go down if those people can get care before they show up in the ER in crisis.

[Spiffster]

Our premiums are going up only slightly this year... which is a relief when comparing the last decade of premium increases.

Keeping insurance premiums artificially low by means of excluding those who need insurance the most from being able to purchase it at any cost is the very definition of evil. It's just f---ing evil.

I agree with this statement. On the other hand, the trick is getting (some) of those people to take better care of themselves.

Don't you know that you have already been picking up the cost for the uninsured and the uninsureable? Do you think those people haven't been getting healthcare all along? At least this way, there is a chance healthcare costs will go down if those people can get care before they show up in the ER in crisis.

People seem to always gloss over this fact, especially those who oppose ACA.

[kyrie]

more analysis

Lou Dobbs recently spoke about this. The upfront costs are not rising dramatically for most for a number of reasons, partially because it is not yet fully implemented. Once that happens, the skyrocketing will occur in greater visibility.

[ua_guy]

a lot of people are picking up the cost for owebamacare. You can't add uninsureable people to the rolls without the cost being picked up by another group.

WILL you act like a grownup and stop calling it "owebamacare", please? We get it, you're not a fan. It's no longer cute or chic when you use it multiple times in a thread.

The cost of the uninsured/underinsured is twofold. It hurts the balance sheets of hospitals that have to provide free care, and it hurts the cost of insurance premiums. Even worse yet, the costs of seeing uninsured patients is usually more severe than seeing insured patients and those who stay on top of their health. Why? For simple health maintenance issues, the uninsured put off seeing a doctor. High blood pressure is a great example. It can be mitigated with relatively cheap medicine if a lifestyle change isn't possible or realistic, but left untreated, it can lead to a stroke, heart attack, or worse. What's more expensive, a couple of $150 office visits and $35/month for meds, or landing in the hospital without insurance and racking up a $300,000 tab because you've had a heart attack? Who pays for it? Usually not the insured. The hospital eats the loss, or worse, if it's a county hospital, you as a taxpayer foot the bill.

By no means do I agree that ACA is perfect, but the economics behind increasing the pool of insured people to spread out cost, with a focus on preventative health maintenance and financial incentive for participating (free, in a lot of cases) --is very sound.

If you hate "Owebamacare" so much, remember that conservative president Reagan is who made free healthcare a right via EMTALA, and so many of the principles behind ACA were vetted by conservative leaders (See, "Romneycare").

[KTP]

It will be interesting how things work out in 2015 when we quit our employer, who provides a HDHP and tosses in $3,000 of HSA cash. Probably will be near the end of 2015 so might not really see saving until 2016.

Right now it looks like for a married couple ages 46 and 47 we will pay around $60 a month for a subsidized silver plan with a maximum out of pocket per year of $4500. This is if we keep our income around $22,000.

It says "You are guaranteed access to a Silver plan with an actuarial value of 94%. This means that for all enrollees in a typical population, the plan will pay for 94% of expenses in total for covered benefits, with enrollees responsible for the rest."

Before ACA, would there have been any hope for a 46 and 47 year old retired couple to get health insurance for $60 a month?

[Gailete]

Don't you know that you have already been picking up the cost for the uninsured and the uninsureable? Do you think those people haven't been getting healthcare all along? At least this way, there is a chance healthcare costs will go down if those people can get care before they show up in the ER in crisis.

I do beg to differ with you. My husband has been uninsured for all the time I have known him due to costs and prior health conditions. We have always paid for his care in full, including one four day stint on the cardiac floor for atrial fib the first year we were married. We got no concession on that bill, not for one red cent. Nobody and no taxpayer paid a blessed nickel. It was tough going but after 4 years it was paid off. When he had atrial fib again about three years ago, He called the hospital before we even left to ask them what to do as he told them we didn't have money to pay. They said to come anyhow. Everyone who came near him in the hospital from the docs to the cleaning person he told them he couldn't pay them. They all said okay, especially the docs and then promptly sent us the bills barely before we got him out of the hospital. We have been paying off the doctor bills at our own pace, seeing threats on the bottom of the bills that say this is your last chance to pay before it is sent to a credit bureau. I kept paying the same thing each month. Last month we had an inflow of money that was unusual and I managed to send them a final payment for those bills. For the hospital we did apply for charity care. the bill at this point for the same problem and same amount of time in the hospital was now $10K MORE than the previous visit 7 years prior! Since that point we have never heard back from the hospital, but in the application we did remind them that we had told them ahead of time that we couldn't pay and they had said to come anyway. Except for that bill we have covered ALL his bills including routine check-ups. It gripes me when people just assume that all uninsured people don't pay anything for their medical care, and it isn't all hospitalization. Let me tell you when calling to make a payment plan, the first thing they want you to do is plunk the whole bill on a credit card, which if anyone thinks that bankruptcy is in their future would probably be a bad move as I think a medical bill is looked at differently than a credit card bill. Someone else may want to confirm that. If you tell a doctors office that you can't pay a bill they too will generously offer to let you charge it.

I tried to apply for ACA insurance for him and was told he wasn't eligible for help on his payments even though the preliminary questions showed that he would be. So now I have to have my brain screwed on right to tackle THAT application process again. If we had had the money for insurance in the first place, we would have. People don't avoid insurance on principal, it is a cost they just can't afford, so now they are told that if you don't sign up we will bill you to help provide benefits for those that do sign up. There is something wrong with that system. The fine is supposed to make those with money pick up insurance, but it sure doesn't help the poor person any, just adds pressure to a life that is already full of pressure do to finances.

[hamchan]

I do beg to differ with you. My husband has been uninsured for all the time I have known him due to costs and prior health conditions. We have always paid for his care in full, including one four day stint on the cardiac floor for atrial fib the first year we were married. We got no concession on that bill, not for one red cent.

That's only you though. That's not the norm. What do you think happens when people just CAN'T pay those bills? What do you think happens to everyone else's cost when people (like me) are forced to file for bankruptcy because of medical bills? Medical bankruptcies are virtually unknown in every other first world nation, but here they account for half.

Oh, there is no difference in how medical bills and credit cards are treated with regards to bankruptcy. None.

[ua_guy]

That's only you though. That's not the norm. What do you think happens when people just CAN'T pay those bills? What do you think happens to everyone else's cost when people (like me) are forced to file for bankruptcy because of medical bills? Medical bankruptcies are virtually unknown in every other first world nation, but here they account for half.

Oh, there is no difference in how medical bills and credit cards are treated with regards to bankruptcy. None.

Gailete, Hamchan has a point. I see a lot of financial data for healthcare facilities during the course of my day at work. People like Gailete are a rare exception to the financial class of people that we'd call "True Self-Pay" -meaning they have no insurance coverage at all. And that doesn't count all the people who DO have medical coverage who simply don't pay their portion after insurance has already paid what they agreed to (the remaining balance being deductibles, copays, percentages of charges that aren't fully covered by insurance, etc).

What do hospitals and providers do? They try to see if the patients can qualify for Medicare or Medicaid, if not, they try to work out a payment plan with the individual. Some hospitals offer charity care and also self-pay discounts. But for the charges that don't get assigned a liability, the hospital and providers eat them. Or, if you're a county or otherwise taxpayer-funded hospital, the cost of those charges gets taken right out of my paycheck and yours! Hospitals and other providers get to write off bad debt for tax purposes, but that doesn't solve the problem.

And yes, more than 50% of bankruptcies in the US are because of medical debt. That's absolutely ridiculous, and also unheard of at that rate in other developed nations.

No, it is treated no differently than consumer/credit card debt in BK. Hamchan is also correct about that.

I suppose I should also answer the question, as to not get too far off topic.

Yes, ACA is saving me money. My plan for 2014 is staying, but it comes with more coverages this year, and after is all said and done, the cost is staying the same.

[Gailete]

As I said I was sure how medical debt was handled.

I realize that many people don't pay their bills whether insured or not, however SOME do and as someone that has been struggling for years to get my husbands medical bills paid for, I get tired of seeing everyone dumping all uninsured people into the same bucket and claiming they don't pay anything at all.

I was a nurse before I became disabled and one of the things I did was case management. I still remember the day an Amish boy with a spinal cord injury was being admitted to our hospital. The Amish came with $50,000 in cash/check to pay for the beginning of his care and would make payments as needed. For the Amish children that went to our local Shriners hospital, where NO child has to pay, almost every room had Amish quilts and Amish made rockers. So even if they didn't have a bill to pay, they were still 'paying' their way.

I guess that is all I was trying to say, some of us pay our own way, even with very low incomes. When you start lumping all people together then you are making assumptions that can be very incorrect. Between my health care needs and hubby's, we are very conscious of costs and as a routine matter we research to find the least expensive care, or we don't make the bill at all. It would be great if more people did that, but some don't have the resources to do so and some just don't have the brain power to figure things out. I was working on the ACA app for hubby again last night. Each of the programs available had names that were so similar that it was hard to figure out which was which and clicking the wrong button could cost you thousands in benefits.

[hamchan]

You don't always have a choice. If we didn't have insurance our annual medical expenses would exceed our annual income. And we are not by any means low income.

[hamchan]

To further put this into perspective, last year for several months the monthly cost of just TWO of my husband's medications without insurance would have been about a thousand dollars more than our average monthly take home pay. That's just two of the ten or so he has to take, and of course does not include any of the surgeries, hospitalizations, doctor visits, wound care visits, infusion visits, labs, imaging, etc. There are no options to go without, and no cheaper options. These are lifesaving drugs.

[greenskeeper]

Lou Dobbs recently spoke about this. The upfront costs are not rising dramatically for most for a number of reasons, partially because it is not yet fully implemented. Once that happens, the skyrocketing will occur in greater visibility.

ding...ding...ding. This is only the beginning of the problems with owebamacare. Once the employer mandate kicks in (if they ever allow it, already delayed past the midterm elections) the whole effect of owebamacare will be felt my many.

Owebamacare is so fantastic even Baroke Owebama himself decided to delay part of the law. What a joke.

[neatdesign]

Owebamacare is so fantastic even Baroke Owebama himself decided to delay part of the law. What a joke.

Oh it's a joke, alright.

Wait, I don't think we're referring to the same thing. Moving on...