9 ms·

Personal experience with nearly all health care insurance plans since the 90's: Each year the premiums go up, the out of pocket costs increase, and benefits dec

Personal experience with nearly all health care insurance plans since the 90's: Each year the premiums go up, the out of pocket costs increase, and benefits decrease (beyond more than general inflation).

mgkimsal 11y ago
I understand premiums going up annually. I don't understand 30-50% increases year on year.
- Frondo 11y ago
  When I read this stuff, I'm a little astounded about how bad the situation must be in other states. Here in the Pacific Northwest, my premiums have actually been going down and the plan offerings are getting better. The provider I was on did go out of business so I had to switch, and I'm now paying less for more services. And, to be totally frank, having had a pre-existing condition that kept me from buying any insurance (literally no one would sell to me pre-ACA), the law's been a net positive for me. I feel bad for people in other states, in Oregon it was been a pretty sweet deal for me.
  - mgkimsal 11y ago
    Yeah, it's pretty crappy in NC. First year of ACA we only had one company even offering any insurance in my county. And yeah, it's county-based for some reason - if I lived 2 miles in another direction I'd have had multiple options about 10-15% cheaper than what I had available. Second year we had another option in our county which was about 15% higher than BCBS (which had gone up about 25% from the year before). Apparently some/much of this has to do with our state choosing to opt out of dealing with increased medicaid funding, so... yay... I guess they get to show obama how bad ACA is by... digging in their heels while we all just pay insanely increasing pricing? We are > 100% from where we were wrt premiums from 2012. I expect some increase every year. I don't expect > 100%. Colleague of mine is now facing > $1800/month health insurance pricing. He's... early 50s, married, 3 kids. This is with a $10k deductible. Another colleague with just one spouse and a child was facing going from $1300->$1650 this year, again with a fairly hefty deductible. Given that this is effectively only something you'll get any benefit from if you're in a horrific accident of have a massive illness, this is now just really expensive catastrophic insurance. I might feel slightly better about some of this if I actually knew anyone personally (beyond Frondo now!) who's benefitted. In my social circles, this has not even been close to a win for anyone. Either insurance has gone way up for people who can afford it, or it's still too expensive for some of my friends who are still unable to afford it (because they don't make enough money to qualify for the 'subsidized' pricing). Bring on single payer...
    - maxlybbert 11y ago
      > Apparently some/much of this has to do with our state choosing to opt out of dealing with increased medicaid funding, so... yay... I guess they get to show obama how bad ACA is by... digging in their heels while we all just pay insanely increasing pricing? Well, the increased Medicaid funding is temporary, but comes with permanently higher Medicaid spending. So a state might reasonably not want to accept that offer.
      - jljljl 11y ago
        Doesn't the federal government continue to cover 90% of the costs beyond 2020? That's still a pretty huge increase in funding.
        benjamcal 11y ago
        To clarify, yes. After 2020, the federal government continues to cover 90% of the cost (compared with 60% normally) of the expansion indefinitely. So, for a state government, it is likely the cheapest way to ensure a large number of low income people are insured.
        dragonwriter 11y ago
        60% is not the normal federal share; the normal federal share varies by State, depends on state economic performance relative to other states, and is a minimum of 50% for certain populations, 65% for other populations.
        benjamcal 11y ago
        What you said doesn't contradict the 60%. 60% is the normal federal share. I had a job that specifically involved forecasting state budgets (which obviously involved looking at historical trends) and forecasting the ACA's impact. To clarify, these variations have historically averaged around 60%, and likely will continue to (sans ACA expansion): http://kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/federalstate-share-of-spending/ http://kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/federalstate-share-o...
  - MCRed 11y ago
    The reason nobody could sell you insurance with your pre-existing condition before is that regulations prevented making plans for conditions. EG: You couldn't make a national diabetes insurance plan for people with diabetes (and the economies of scale that go along with a pool of all people with diabetes) because it was effectively illegal. If the ACA had merely fixed that, then your premiums would be going down more and you'd be getting better insurance.
    - Frondo 11y ago
      You know what? My pre-existing condition was that I'd had my gallbladder removed in the early 2000s. That's it. Uninsurable for 10 years because of an operation which I recovered from fully in less than a week. Telling me it's "regulations" that had every insurer reject me? Pull the other one, it's got bells on.
      - HarryHirsch 11y ago
        Citizen Frondo, you don't understand. If the market says you must not be insured it is right because the market is always right. Why, on this board you had people tell with a straight face that one should not bother to eradicate schistosomiasis and malaria in the African continent because if the continent was meant to be productive people would be spending money in the project right now.
        zo1 11y ago
        If the OP is correct, then it is not the market that is enforcing the insurance scheme to reject cover for him based on pre-existing conditions, but rather the state that is making it illegal for schemes to be tailor-made for specific (pre-existing) conditions.
      - facetube 11y ago
        My preexisting condition was "history of headache". I was denied by every insurer that did business in our state in 2010 and 2011. I wish I was kidding. Had I failed to mention the headache thing and sought treatment, I would have been vulnerable to rescission.
  - Turing_Machine 11y ago
    " Here in the Pacific Northwest, my premiums have actually been going down and the plan offerings are getting better." You are in the minority. Every insurance company that provides Obamacare in Oregon is increasing rates for the average customer this year. http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2015/07/more_than_220000_oregonians_fa.html http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2015/07/more_than... In fact, the State of Oregon has actually ordered some of the companies to increase their rates more than they'd originally planned. http://www.cnbc.com/2015/06/22/oregon-dumps-cold-water-on-low-obamacare-rates.html http://www.cnbc.com/2015/06/22/oregon-dumps-cold-water-on-lo...
    - mgkimsal 11y ago
      That seems really crazy, but then... Frondo just said the company he was with before went out of business. Why? Were they, in fact, not charging enough to cover their costs (supposedly the motivation behind Oregon raising prices)?
  - snatoeusntaoeu 11y ago
    I feel bad for people in other states, in Oregon it was been a pretty sweet deal for me. I moved back to Oregon from California several years ago. I was astonished at how much more expensive insurance was in OR than in CA. I've been told that Oregon has had a lot of protectionism for local health insurers, so they didn't have to compete much. So perhaps you're just seeing Oregon coming into line with other states... (By the way, I had a pinched nerve in my neck when I moved. No insurer would take me, and one told me that they wouldn't insure me until nine years had passed without any symptoms)
  - rbritton 11y ago
    Unfortunately, your situation must be specific to Oregon. I'm in Washington, and the closest plan we could get to what we had pre-Obamacare went from a $2500 deductible to $6300 with a premium increase of around 40-50%. In my opinion, the problem was never the unavailability of insurance. The problem was (and still is) the out-of-control pricing of medical care -- $5000+ for non-sterile gloves [1] is a bit extreme. [1]: http://www.rd.com/health/wellness/wildly-overinflated-hospital-costs/ http://www.rd.com/health/wellness/wildly-overinflated-hospit...
    - cookiecaper 11y ago
      I agree with you. I wish more people would realize their quibbling over a treatment for a symptom when they're hashing out a regulated private insurance marketplace v. single-payer. Our existing insurance system allows a lot of perversions of the marketplace and contributes to the root cause, but having the government sign a blank check isn't the answer either. We need to return ordinary market dynamics to health care if we want something that's sustainable over the long term.
    - briandear 11y ago
      The expensive gloves problem is due to cross subsidization and cost recovery. A good portion of the problem is due to under-market Medicare reimbursement rates; another part of the problem is that certain demographics that aren't eligible for Medicaid due to their lack of legal status incur expensive care (via the emergency rooms) that goes unreimbursed. This problem is especially accute in places like Texas. I would suspect that more free primary care clinics could take some of the burden off of emergency rooms in terms of cost and those free clinics could even be funded by insurance companies from the money their saving from not having to pay for $5000 gloves anymore. A cash-payment medical system would also solve some of these problems. With opaque pricing, hospitals get away with solving budget issues by overcharging. If you actually saw the menu of what things would cost and you were paying out of your pocket, nobody would ever tolerate $5000 gloves. Market forces would fix the cost overages very quickly. As it is now, very few people actually directly pay for their own care and thus are less motivated to care about price. "Insurance covers it," is all many people care about.
    - 11y ago
  - SwellJoe 11y ago
    It isn't ACA that has caused me problems, or at least the law itself. The description given matched my experience with insurers before ACA. My problem with ACA is Healthcare.gov (still). It is possible to go through the entire application process, make one mistake or fail to provide the right detail, and end up disqualified from buying insurance through Healthcare.gov (in my case, I used a mail forwarding service address, because I travel full-time). There is no do-over, no online process for correcting the problem with the application. You have to go through a protest process that involves mailing physical letters somewhere. Fuck that. I'd go back to the nightmare that is pre-ACA private insurance, before I beg some bureaucrat, by mail, for the privilege of paying too much for insurance. Healthcare.gov got a lot of flack in the beginning for costing too much, delivering too little, and being too flakey. All of those things are still true. It's also dehumanizing.
    - briandear 11y ago
      The traveling full time "problem" affects me as wel. When some company or another asks, "Where do you live?" My response is preceeded by an audible shrug.. I seems that many companies actually plan to come visit me and are put out when I explain that my physical location is really of no concern to them. For example, banking. If I give a Texas address and agree to Texas terms and conditions, why would it matter that I spend 11 months a year in Europe. My mail arrives, I do my transactions online.. So what's the problem? Twentieth century thinking, that's what.
      - zo1 11y ago
        Those are most likely regulations enforced on to the banks. By the time it gets to the low-level employee that checks/asks/confirms your address, it's probably morphed a bit, and each employee has their own interpretation of what is "okay" when it comes to addresses.
    - dragonwriter 11y ago
      The federal exchanges (for which healthcare.gov is the portal) were never intended to be a good choice (or even to have to exist at all), they were in the law as a minimal fallback to be applied for states that failed to implement their own exchangees.
  - akulbe 11y ago
    Who's your carrier currently? I'm in Oregon as well, and I'm not impressed with the offerings here, at all.
- rconti 11y ago
  I believe 18-20% was the norm for the past decade or two. Nationwide, I think the growth has supposedly slowed very slightly. That doesn't make it any easier if you're one of the people who are getting screwed, though.
  - mgkimsal 11y ago
    I've been buying insurance for a more than a decade, in multiple states. (direct, not via employers). I can't say I've seen annual rate increases of 20% year in year out for 2 decades. That's simply not sustainable. By way of example, my $100/month policy would be $3800/month after 2 decades of 20% year on year growth.
    - HillRat 11y ago
      I believe 8% annual inflation has been the normal rate for many years -- slightly decreased following ACA enactment, but rates then increased by a few points due to less-healthy enrollees, so it's a bit of a wash (not counting all the people who now have health insurance, to be sure). Premiums also only cover part of the cost increase; higher deductibles and reduced coverage are also used to defray costs, and aren't as obvious to the end consumers. Finally, plans that don't conform to ACA minimum coverage requirements have been killed off, so some individuals are seeing their rates increase commensurate with their improvement in coverage.
      - deleted 11y ago
        [deleted]
- stvswn 11y ago
  It's was pretty easy to predict: allowing enrollment after a diagnosis was politically popular but a terrible economic disincentive to not buy insurance (because at that point, it isn't insurance -- it's a subscription plan for your treatments). The young and healthy needed to enroll for the economics to work, but the individual mandate was delayed for years -- because coercion isn't popular politically, and there was a reelection to win in 2012. Without the coercion, why would a 20-something buy insurance? So begins the death spiral. The only thing that can save it is very high penalties for failing to get insurance on the individual marketplace. This would be politically disastrous -- "we know the plans are expensive, but it will be even more expensive to not get one!" isn't a great selling point. It's not only that you have to pay up so that others may wait until they're sick -- you have to buy a plan that covers things you don't need. I have to pay for all sorts of treatments I'll never use -- addiction counseling, prenatal care (I'm a man), etc. -- because it was considered unfair that I should pay less for consuming less (why this argument doesn't transfer to auto insurance, where men pay higher rates, I don't know). I know liberals are going to argue "that's why you need to take the market out of it and have single payer." It's a consistent argument only if you believe that you'd be better off with single payer. Some people would be; I know I wouldn't be. I'd end up paying even more for everyone else who isn't paying. But, politically, that's dead on arrival. Democrats just voted to abolish the cadillac tax. Everyone knows the ACA is an albatross on the Democrats' neck. The sorts of anecdotes in this thread are all over the place. "We just didn't go far enough, try single payer" is not going to win the day anytime soon. If a Republican wins the presidency, we'll see a full repeal of the entire thing (Dems will not filibuster if they know what's good for them). If a Democrat wins, we'll see gradual repeal, marketed as tweaks and improvements. Personally, I'm fine with a strong subsidized public option for the truly indigent (oh wait, I just invented Medicare). After that, let the market bring costs down by removing regulations. It's no coincidence that laser eye surgery, teeth whitening, cosmetic surgery is all generally affordable -- markets and competition have formed. A good market would be one where you paid your doctor out of pocket for recurring, predictable costs and then bought insurance from a private company in order to guard against unforeseen catastrophes -- kind of like how your auto insurance policy doesn't pay for oil changes and car washes. And what if someone is irresponsible and didn't qualify for Medicare but also didn't buy insurance? What happens if they get cancer? I hope they have family and friends to bail them out. It would be great for charities to lend a hand. I don't think the role of government is to take care of you, because it isn't the government taking care of you. It's the government coercing others to take care of you, against their will. It is not charitable to hold a doctor at gunpoint and force him to perform a surgery. So for everyone who believes that healthcare is a "right," I expect that you're freely giving away your excess time and money away? Or do you just expect others to? I'm already paying someone else's medical bills -- I can calculate how much I give to Medicare each year, it's more than enough for someone else in this country to see a doctor for the entire year. I'm also paying way more than I should for my family's insurance plan because I'm indirectly subsidizing others. I wonder how many people are getting free healthcare on my dime, and what excuses they have for not being able to afford it on their own. I'm a little tired of being told how great it would be if I just paid a little more and others paid a little less.
- Shivetya 11y ago
  Because the ACA is the largest transfer of wealth from the youth to the aged that has ever been attempted. It also is because the fines for not buying into the system are too low that participation by healthy people isn't sufficient to pay for the sick. The process is designed to make people so irritated with insurance companies that they demand the government take over as payer when it is the government that created the mess in the first place, approved the rates, and then set up the impossible system of not forcing everyone paying. I am all for a system that pays for checkups and catastrophic but lets be honest, if the system is wholly free so much money will be lost to worry warts it won't be funny. there needs to be a deductible but not so high that people who need something done don't
powertower 11y ago
Not like this. Right before Affordable Care Act went into effect I checked my insurance quotes so I could later compare how much money I would save getting affordable health insurance (which is how Obamacare was sold - that it would put the insurance companies in check and make everything affordable). It was a 300% increase.

mgkimsal 11y ago

I understand premiums going up annually. I don't understand 30-50% increases year on year.

Frondo 11y ago
When I read this stuff, I'm a little astounded about how bad the situation must be in other states. Here in the Pacific Northwest, my premiums have actually been going down and the plan offerings are getting better. The provider I was on did go out of business so I had to switch, and I'm now paying less for more services. And, to be totally frank, having had a pre-existing condition that kept me from buying any insurance (literally no one would sell to me pre-ACA), the law's been a net positive for me. I feel bad for people in other states, in Oregon it was been a pretty sweet deal for me.
- mgkimsal 11y ago
  Yeah, it's pretty crappy in NC. First year of ACA we only had one company even offering any insurance in my county. And yeah, it's county-based for some reason - if I lived 2 miles in another direction I'd have had multiple options about 10-15% cheaper than what I had available. Second year we had another option in our county which was about 15% higher than BCBS (which had gone up about 25% from the year before). Apparently some/much of this has to do with our state choosing to opt out of dealing with increased medicaid funding, so... yay... I guess they get to show obama how bad ACA is by... digging in their heels while we all just pay insanely increasing pricing? We are > 100% from where we were wrt premiums from 2012. I expect some increase every year. I don't expect > 100%. Colleague of mine is now facing > $1800/month health insurance pricing. He's... early 50s, married, 3 kids. This is with a $10k deductible. Another colleague with just one spouse and a child was facing going from $1300->$1650 this year, again with a fairly hefty deductible. Given that this is effectively only something you'll get any benefit from if you're in a horrific accident of have a massive illness, this is now just really expensive catastrophic insurance. I might feel slightly better about some of this if I actually knew anyone personally (beyond Frondo now!) who's benefitted. In my social circles, this has not even been close to a win for anyone. Either insurance has gone way up for people who can afford it, or it's still too expensive for some of my friends who are still unable to afford it (because they don't make enough money to qualify for the 'subsidized' pricing). Bring on single payer...
  - maxlybbert 11y ago
    > Apparently some/much of this has to do with our state choosing to opt out of dealing with increased medicaid funding, so... yay... I guess they get to show obama how bad ACA is by... digging in their heels while we all just pay insanely increasing pricing? Well, the increased Medicaid funding is temporary, but comes with permanently higher Medicaid spending. So a state might reasonably not want to accept that offer.
    - jljljl 11y ago
      Doesn't the federal government continue to cover 90% of the costs beyond 2020? That's still a pretty huge increase in funding.
      - benjamcal 11y ago
        To clarify, yes. After 2020, the federal government continues to cover 90% of the cost (compared with 60% normally) of the expansion indefinitely. So, for a state government, it is likely the cheapest way to ensure a large number of low income people are insured.
        dragonwriter 11y ago
        60% is not the normal federal share; the normal federal share varies by State, depends on state economic performance relative to other states, and is a minimum of 50% for certain populations, 65% for other populations.
        benjamcal 11y ago
        What you said doesn't contradict the 60%. 60% is the normal federal share. I had a job that specifically involved forecasting state budgets (which obviously involved looking at historical trends) and forecasting the ACA's impact. To clarify, these variations have historically averaged around 60%, and likely will continue to (sans ACA expansion): http://kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/federalstate-share-of-spending/ http://kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/federalstate-share-o...
- MCRed 11y ago
  The reason nobody could sell you insurance with your pre-existing condition before is that regulations prevented making plans for conditions. EG: You couldn't make a national diabetes insurance plan for people with diabetes (and the economies of scale that go along with a pool of all people with diabetes) because it was effectively illegal. If the ACA had merely fixed that, then your premiums would be going down more and you'd be getting better insurance.
  - Frondo 11y ago
    You know what? My pre-existing condition was that I'd had my gallbladder removed in the early 2000s. That's it. Uninsurable for 10 years because of an operation which I recovered from fully in less than a week. Telling me it's "regulations" that had every insurer reject me? Pull the other one, it's got bells on.
    - HarryHirsch 11y ago
      Citizen Frondo, you don't understand. If the market says you must not be insured it is right because the market is always right. Why, on this board you had people tell with a straight face that one should not bother to eradicate schistosomiasis and malaria in the African continent because if the continent was meant to be productive people would be spending money in the project right now.
      - zo1 11y ago
        If the OP is correct, then it is not the market that is enforcing the insurance scheme to reject cover for him based on pre-existing conditions, but rather the state that is making it illegal for schemes to be tailor-made for specific (pre-existing) conditions.
    - facetube 11y ago
      My preexisting condition was "history of headache". I was denied by every insurer that did business in our state in 2010 and 2011. I wish I was kidding. Had I failed to mention the headache thing and sought treatment, I would have been vulnerable to rescission.
- Turing_Machine 11y ago
  " Here in the Pacific Northwest, my premiums have actually been going down and the plan offerings are getting better." You are in the minority. Every insurance company that provides Obamacare in Oregon is increasing rates for the average customer this year. http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2015/07/more_than_220000_oregonians_fa.html http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2015/07/more_than... In fact, the State of Oregon has actually ordered some of the companies to increase their rates more than they'd originally planned. http://www.cnbc.com/2015/06/22/oregon-dumps-cold-water-on-low-obamacare-rates.html http://www.cnbc.com/2015/06/22/oregon-dumps-cold-water-on-lo...
  - mgkimsal 11y ago
    That seems really crazy, but then... Frondo just said the company he was with before went out of business. Why? Were they, in fact, not charging enough to cover their costs (supposedly the motivation behind Oregon raising prices)?
- snatoeusntaoeu 11y ago
  I feel bad for people in other states, in Oregon it was been a pretty sweet deal for me. I moved back to Oregon from California several years ago. I was astonished at how much more expensive insurance was in OR than in CA. I've been told that Oregon has had a lot of protectionism for local health insurers, so they didn't have to compete much. So perhaps you're just seeing Oregon coming into line with other states... (By the way, I had a pinched nerve in my neck when I moved. No insurer would take me, and one told me that they wouldn't insure me until nine years had passed without any symptoms)
- rbritton 11y ago
  Unfortunately, your situation must be specific to Oregon. I'm in Washington, and the closest plan we could get to what we had pre-Obamacare went from a $2500 deductible to $6300 with a premium increase of around 40-50%. In my opinion, the problem was never the unavailability of insurance. The problem was (and still is) the out-of-control pricing of medical care -- $5000+ for non-sterile gloves [1] is a bit extreme. [1]: http://www.rd.com/health/wellness/wildly-overinflated-hospital-costs/ http://www.rd.com/health/wellness/wildly-overinflated-hospit...
  - cookiecaper 11y ago
    I agree with you. I wish more people would realize their quibbling over a treatment for a symptom when they're hashing out a regulated private insurance marketplace v. single-payer. Our existing insurance system allows a lot of perversions of the marketplace and contributes to the root cause, but having the government sign a blank check isn't the answer either. We need to return ordinary market dynamics to health care if we want something that's sustainable over the long term.
  - briandear 11y ago
    The expensive gloves problem is due to cross subsidization and cost recovery. A good portion of the problem is due to under-market Medicare reimbursement rates; another part of the problem is that certain demographics that aren't eligible for Medicaid due to their lack of legal status incur expensive care (via the emergency rooms) that goes unreimbursed. This problem is especially accute in places like Texas. I would suspect that more free primary care clinics could take some of the burden off of emergency rooms in terms of cost and those free clinics could even be funded by insurance companies from the money their saving from not having to pay for $5000 gloves anymore. A cash-payment medical system would also solve some of these problems. With opaque pricing, hospitals get away with solving budget issues by overcharging. If you actually saw the menu of what things would cost and you were paying out of your pocket, nobody would ever tolerate $5000 gloves. Market forces would fix the cost overages very quickly. As it is now, very few people actually directly pay for their own care and thus are less motivated to care about price. "Insurance covers it," is all many people care about.
  - 11y ago
- SwellJoe 11y ago
  It isn't ACA that has caused me problems, or at least the law itself. The description given matched my experience with insurers before ACA. My problem with ACA is Healthcare.gov (still). It is possible to go through the entire application process, make one mistake or fail to provide the right detail, and end up disqualified from buying insurance through Healthcare.gov (in my case, I used a mail forwarding service address, because I travel full-time). There is no do-over, no online process for correcting the problem with the application. You have to go through a protest process that involves mailing physical letters somewhere. Fuck that. I'd go back to the nightmare that is pre-ACA private insurance, before I beg some bureaucrat, by mail, for the privilege of paying too much for insurance. Healthcare.gov got a lot of flack in the beginning for costing too much, delivering too little, and being too flakey. All of those things are still true. It's also dehumanizing.
  - briandear 11y ago
    The traveling full time "problem" affects me as wel. When some company or another asks, "Where do you live?" My response is preceeded by an audible shrug.. I seems that many companies actually plan to come visit me and are put out when I explain that my physical location is really of no concern to them. For example, banking. If I give a Texas address and agree to Texas terms and conditions, why would it matter that I spend 11 months a year in Europe. My mail arrives, I do my transactions online.. So what's the problem? Twentieth century thinking, that's what.
    - zo1 11y ago
      Those are most likely regulations enforced on to the banks. By the time it gets to the low-level employee that checks/asks/confirms your address, it's probably morphed a bit, and each employee has their own interpretation of what is "okay" when it comes to addresses.
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    The federal exchanges (for which healthcare.gov is the portal) were never intended to be a good choice (or even to have to exist at all), they were in the law as a minimal fallback to be applied for states that failed to implement their own exchangees.
- akulbe 11y ago
  Who's your carrier currently? I'm in Oregon as well, and I'm not impressed with the offerings here, at all.
rconti 11y ago
I believe 18-20% was the norm for the past decade or two. Nationwide, I think the growth has supposedly slowed very slightly. That doesn't make it any easier if you're one of the people who are getting screwed, though.
- mgkimsal 11y ago
  I've been buying insurance for a more than a decade, in multiple states. (direct, not via employers). I can't say I've seen annual rate increases of 20% year in year out for 2 decades. That's simply not sustainable. By way of example, my $100/month policy would be $3800/month after 2 decades of 20% year on year growth.
  - HillRat 11y ago
    I believe 8% annual inflation has been the normal rate for many years -- slightly decreased following ACA enactment, but rates then increased by a few points due to less-healthy enrollees, so it's a bit of a wash (not counting all the people who now have health insurance, to be sure). Premiums also only cover part of the cost increase; higher deductibles and reduced coverage are also used to defray costs, and aren't as obvious to the end consumers. Finally, plans that don't conform to ACA minimum coverage requirements have been killed off, so some individuals are seeing their rates increase commensurate with their improvement in coverage.
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
stvswn 11y ago
It's was pretty easy to predict: allowing enrollment after a diagnosis was politically popular but a terrible economic disincentive to not buy insurance (because at that point, it isn't insurance -- it's a subscription plan for your treatments). The young and healthy needed to enroll for the economics to work, but the individual mandate was delayed for years -- because coercion isn't popular politically, and there was a reelection to win in 2012. Without the coercion, why would a 20-something buy insurance? So begins the death spiral. The only thing that can save it is very high penalties for failing to get insurance on the individual marketplace. This would be politically disastrous -- "we know the plans are expensive, but it will be even more expensive to not get one!" isn't a great selling point. It's not only that you have to pay up so that others may wait until they're sick -- you have to buy a plan that covers things you don't need. I have to pay for all sorts of treatments I'll never use -- addiction counseling, prenatal care (I'm a man), etc. -- because it was considered unfair that I should pay less for consuming less (why this argument doesn't transfer to auto insurance, where men pay higher rates, I don't know). I know liberals are going to argue "that's why you need to take the market out of it and have single payer." It's a consistent argument only if you believe that you'd be better off with single payer. Some people would be; I know I wouldn't be. I'd end up paying even more for everyone else who isn't paying. But, politically, that's dead on arrival. Democrats just voted to abolish the cadillac tax. Everyone knows the ACA is an albatross on the Democrats' neck. The sorts of anecdotes in this thread are all over the place. "We just didn't go far enough, try single payer" is not going to win the day anytime soon. If a Republican wins the presidency, we'll see a full repeal of the entire thing (Dems will not filibuster if they know what's good for them). If a Democrat wins, we'll see gradual repeal, marketed as tweaks and improvements. Personally, I'm fine with a strong subsidized public option for the truly indigent (oh wait, I just invented Medicare). After that, let the market bring costs down by removing regulations. It's no coincidence that laser eye surgery, teeth whitening, cosmetic surgery is all generally affordable -- markets and competition have formed. A good market would be one where you paid your doctor out of pocket for recurring, predictable costs and then bought insurance from a private company in order to guard against unforeseen catastrophes -- kind of like how your auto insurance policy doesn't pay for oil changes and car washes. And what if someone is irresponsible and didn't qualify for Medicare but also didn't buy insurance? What happens if they get cancer? I hope they have family and friends to bail them out. It would be great for charities to lend a hand. I don't think the role of government is to take care of you, because it isn't the government taking care of you. It's the government coercing others to take care of you, against their will. It is not charitable to hold a doctor at gunpoint and force him to perform a surgery. So for everyone who believes that healthcare is a "right," I expect that you're freely giving away your excess time and money away? Or do you just expect others to? I'm already paying someone else's medical bills -- I can calculate how much I give to Medicare each year, it's more than enough for someone else in this country to see a doctor for the entire year. I'm also paying way more than I should for my family's insurance plan because I'm indirectly subsidizing others. I wonder how many people are getting free healthcare on my dime, and what excuses they have for not being able to afford it on their own. I'm a little tired of being told how great it would be if I just paid a little more and others paid a little less.
Shivetya 11y ago
Because the ACA is the largest transfer of wealth from the youth to the aged that has ever been attempted. It also is because the fines for not buying into the system are too low that participation by healthy people isn't sufficient to pay for the sick. The process is designed to make people so irritated with insurance companies that they demand the government take over as payer when it is the government that created the mess in the first place, approved the rates, and then set up the impossible system of not forcing everyone paying. I am all for a system that pays for checkups and catastrophic but lets be honest, if the system is wholly free so much money will be lost to worry warts it won't be funny. there needs to be a deductible but not so high that people who need something done don't

powertower 11y ago

Not like this. Right before Affordable Care Act went into effect I checked my insurance quotes so I could later compare how much money I would save getting affordable health insurance (which is how Obamacare was sold - that it would put the insurance companies in check and make everything affordable). It was a 300% increase.