So it turns out that the new healthcare bill that all the Democrats are touting as the greatest thing since sliced bread, will force individuals to buy health insurance or pay a penalty. What a terrible thing for insurance companies. ‘Oh the poor insurance companies’ cry the Republicans. The worry was that private companies would not be able to compete with a government health plan. But this bill seems to fix that problem by forcing people to buy health insurance. Of course the drafters of the bill were very kind to include a provision to allow those eligible to apply for a hardship waiver.
There is nothing that makes me feel warm and fuzzy about my government than when legislators help everyone by forcing them to buy policies from the poor health insurance companies. I certainly hope that the 30 million new customers they are getting through this bill will not hurt their bottom line.
The two sections that struck me the most were the following (as summarized by PBS)
- Individual mandate | Individuals will be required to purchase health insurance, or pay a penalty fee. Some people would be eligible to apply for a hardship waiver.
- Affordability subsidies | People who earn between 150 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty level would be eligible for subsidies on a sliding scale to purchase insurance through the exchange. Those subsidies would ensure that people who make 150 percent of the poverty level would not have to pay more than 3 percent of their income in premiums, while those who make 400 percent of the poverty level could pay up to 12 percent of their income in premiums.
You do realize that this already takes place for auto insurance when purchasing cars. It is mandatory, and people face penalties (tickets) when discovered driving without insurance.
Shocking how most people forget these things and fail to examine their own lives closely when so consumed with ranting and raving about how everything sucks. Perhaps your reasoning does, too?
No, it doesn’t. Nobody is required to have collision insurance. Collision insurance provides for repairs to one’s own vehicle. People are required to pay for and maintain liability insurance, which is something entirely different. Liability insurance is for in case there is an accident and you are at fault. It is a backup for in case you hurt someone else.
Please make sure you understand the relevant concepts before you make assertions.
I am not going to kill or harm anyone with my migraine headache. I am going to kill someone if I lose control of a 2 ton vehicle and slam it into them. And since I personally cannot afford to pay the millions of dollars in damages that could ensue, I get car insurance. If I can pay for my medical care and have the money and means, it’s not the governments business.
Why does the government have to force me to do anything? Before this bill gets finalized the only thing that was required by the government was to voe and pay taxes, now we have to buy health insurance. And the only reason they want to have all peoples buy is because the healthy have to pay for the sick. I believe Marx said it best “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.” And The Soviets are doing just fine…wait they are no longer.
People choose to have cars. People choose to drive without insurance. Even when people eat healthily, exercise etc. sometimes it still goes horribly wrong and people get ill. Not their choice I’m sure.
You can choose to go without a car, as do many people living in cities with public transportation- however, you cannot choose to go without your body. Therefore automobile insurance is not mandatory, and neither should be health insurance. There is a difference and should be a difference between automobiles and humans.
You realize that you’re only required by law to purchase liability insurance for your car to protect others if I cause an accident. Should I CHOOSE to not purchase collision insurance then any damage to my car is my responsibility. Your rationalization only works if The government is requiring me to buy insurance to protect people I might sneeze on.
But Progressive Liberal logic doesn’t have to be logical. It just has to give you that warm fuzzy feeling without actually doing anything cept pay your taxes. It’s like Kennedy’s bill that made you able to get paid for volunteer work, defeats the purpose and that is a job.
I have a choice to drive a car or take public transportation. I don’t have to pay insurance on a car, because I don’t have to own a car. This bill would force me to have health insurance. Well, I guess I could choose not to live, but that choice isn’t very practicle.
You are only required to buy car insurance if you have a car, & in that case you only need enough coverage to pay for the other guy’s damages. You always have a body, until you die. Until now what you did with it was your business. Now the government has made it their business.
You do realize that you have the right to not buy a car and ergo not have car insurance legally. What this does is tax everyone for being alive.
Unfortunately, there is one major flaw with this plan. The public option that a lot of the more liberal members of congress require in a health reform bill is supposed to be run at no profit. There are 3 ways this will happen: 1) It will run at no profit, offering “health insurance” from the government at a rate which will then destroy the private health insurance institutions; 2) The program will run at a profit, inefficiently enough that the rates will be comparable, yet this will result in a drastic reduction in the quality of service offered; or 3) The program will indeed run at a profit, which makes it a business, not government.
My understanding of insurance is this. The insured pay a premium (in the case of the Public Option, to the government). When a claim is filed, it is paid out of the pool of premiums received. This is exactly what private insurance companies do, except they add a very large administrative fee. If the government runs the insurance, the policy holders pay for the claims of other policy holders. The exception is that the government doesn’t get the huge admin fee (not for profit). Without a public option, the health insurance reform bill is a disaster and a kick in the face to me and all others who enthusiastically supported Obama’s “Change!”
I think it’s great that finally people who don’t do a thing will be getting the help they need. I am glad to see the burden of life being shared by all, and who cares if the rich get hosed in the process I’m sure they had some back alley deals and this is just the interest on those deals.
“Who cares if the rich get hosed in the process”? Wow, how compassionate. Since when are human beings reduced to a label according to their income. I am so tired of the labels. Rich, poor, black, white, dems, republicans, liberals, conservatives…..why not look at people as people? I personally can’t even afford health insurance right now, but I certainly don’t blame this on the people who have enough money to pay for health insurance for my entire neighborhood. There are plenty of “rich” people that earned their money honestly, and are good, compassionate, loving people. Why so much hatred? I don’t hate my neighbors that are not in debt, like myself.
The rich get blamed for everything because they are the only ones with money to pay to “fix” it (whatever it is). Interesting little fact all the Dem leadership are Lawyers. Reid, Pelosi, Obama, not captains of industry but people who make it harder for people to make lesser and lesser amounts of money.
Ok….. I found your comment disgusting. Hum….. where to start. ” I think it’s great that finally people who don’t do a thing will be getting the help they need.” You think its great that people that stay home and leech on society should be getting the same things as the ones who go out and work for what they have? Hum….. why dont I just let them move into the house that MY FAMILY has worked so hard to get. Or maybe it should be yours!!! I feel that if you are not willing to work, to pay your taxes and bills, you should have squat!!!! “and who cares if the rich get hosed in the process I’m sure they had some back alley deals and this is just the interest on those deals.” How would you feel if you worked hard, scrimped saved and went through a lot of hardship to get the money you have, and now there are millions of people “on the system” so you now have to pay more taxes because they refuse to get a job? I have a great example……. Bill Gates. No matter how much we all hate windows at times, he legally earned his money. Also, when he passes away, he is leaving his kids a mear .01% of his estate and the rest is going to charity. But yes, he should now have to pay out his nose and ass to support everyone else while he is living also. Let me guess, you are unemployed, sitting on medicaid, food stamps, financial assistance, probably pregnant with fatherless baby number, oh I’m thinking 6, you have no intrest in getting a job, or moving out of goverment houseing, and still bitching about how much the world owes you. Correct?????
kt, I think you missed the rampant sarcasm in that post. Consider the site you’re on…
As Orillion said, I think kt should read the post they’re responding to while concidering the website your looking at the post on. Something called sarcasm, and if you can’t recognize it, look at the tutorial on this site.
Well, if I worked hard and became a success, why would I want to give what I have earned to people who don’t have any motivation to be productive members of society? We should reward people who continue to have children just to receive more welfare? We should give money to those who don’t want to work and don’t even try?
The government does not need to interfere with everything that its private citizens do. I understand the need for auto insurance because of accidents that happen between two parties; it holds someone responsible for the cost of repairing vehicles and medical expenses involved so that someone isn’t left in the lurch because someone else hit their car. Medical insurance is a choice, and not everyone will be able to afford these new premiums. Plus we have to get on one of their approved programs within five years or whenever anything changes (i.e. premium goes up, terms change, etc.). It means we’ll all be grandfathered in within a year or so…but the main issue is, even if this program was the best thing since sliced bread, we can’t afford it. Look at the unemployment rate. One of my best friends got laid off yesterday. If the insurance rates are kept low by the government, what will happen as a result? Less services. Also, the taxpayers will foot this bill…about 3 trillion dollars worth. Hey, if we want to make health care available, a catastrophic package could be arranged for those people for a fraction of the cost. But we have to insure those who are already insured? We have to make others pay for it who are already hurting to pay their bills?? We’re going to trust the government who was responsible for Fannie and Freddie Mac, loaning money to those who could never pay it back, failed stimulus money, the post office going belly up, the cars for clunkers program and of course, the DMV, run a sixth of the private sector and take that over too??? I suppose we’ll be like Canada and Europe, where we hope and pray we don’t get cancer and have to wait 3-5 years for treatment.
I’m not sure who manufactures your particular brand of Kool-Aid, but European healthcare systems do not work like this. At least, not in Sweden, UK, nor even Germany.
this is how it works in Canada……
Somehow I just cannot see it working without Swiss-style regulation of health insurance companies, so that the poor poor insurance giants cannot claim, “oh whoops, you had cancer/AIDS/ADHD/whatever before you signed up with us? Sorry, can’t help ya. Next!” nor force people to renew like some kind of computer antivirus software.
Hate to say it, but it unfortunately makes perfect sense. No, you won’t kill anybody (directly) from your migraine, but you just might by spreading that nasty cough around. Cut yourself at work? Are you sure your body contains no bloodborne pathogens? Can’t think so simplistically. Do I like it? No, but frankly, I’m sure I fall in the ‘150% of poverty level’ area and considering my job doesn’t even bother to offer health insurance, I’ll be glad to have it.
Score:4, Insightful, as /. terms it.
Unless you make less than $16,245 annually, you do not fall within the 150% bracket for a single person household. According to the 2009 Federal Poverty guidelines, the poverty threshold for a single person household stands at a meager $10, 830 / year. I think we can all agree that unless you flip burgers and wear your name on your shirt, no one is falling in the 150% range, not even people on Welfare.
Even with bloodborne pathogens aside- what happens when that nasty migraine that affects only you comes on when you’re driving down the highway, causing you to get into an accident which you at least thankfully have auto insurance for? Or when you have to to miss work because that migraine is killing you, and everyone at the office has to bust their asses to cover for you?
Or what about when the migraine is actually a vascular headache, because you have a brain tumor, and you don’t want to get it looked at because you don’t want t0 or cannot afford to spring for health insurance. Then, lo and behold, suddenly you’re dead and not only is your family responsible for all your medical bills, but they all have to take bereavement days to try and arrange your funeral. (Not to mention the problems caused if you have kids or dependants relying on your support.)
The notion that your health affects only you is a little capricious.
Auto insurance and health insurance are apples and oranges. But to go along with what’s been posted – The govt. doesn’t make me pay a ‘penalty’ if I don’t have it. I can buy a car and not purchase insurance and drive it. Most of the illegals in LA are doing just that. So, technically, while it may be ‘mandatory’ it isn’t enforced via penalty. I can also opt to not drive. I can’t not opt to get sick.
Coughing on somebody while you have SARS is a natural and inevitable event. This does not mean that health insurance should be mandated. Driving a car is NOT a natural thing. Plus, maybe i’m living in bliss, but I haven’t seen any million+ dollar law [nuisance] suits due to someone getting ill while out in the public domain.
Lastly, who’s gonna pay now for auto insurance claims that health care is being forced down every ‘legal’ American? If we all have health insurance, why do I require any auto insurance other than theft, collision/vandalism, etc…. This should drastically reduce the car insurance for most American drivers while simultaneously reducing profits and the work force in another area of the private sector. Sweet. Love the the entire notion of Robin Hood, err, I mean socialism.
Also, even though my family may be left with bills (this is not the case for every death in america. not even 25%) it’s the burden they must face. Not something the govt. should be shoving down the throat of every hard working citizen. Or I should have stated, the one’s that actually do work and don’t live off the hand of big govt.
You know, the hilarity of all of this is that the US government already spends proportionally more on healthcare than any other developed nation, and your system consistently fails people who don’t have insurance (and don’t give me the bullshit line about “people sitting on their arses doing nothing” – you don’t have 15+% unemployment, at least not yet. I also know plenty of hardworking Americans who simply can’t afford it). In fact, it consistently fails people who do have insurance, because of course private insurers will never pay out if there’s any chance they can weasel out of it.
While you’re all wailing, let me tell you about the Australian system: there’s a free, government run hospital system, which also subsidises some other medical services, and there’s the private health system. If you want to spend your money on private health insurance that’s your right, and you’ll probably get faster treatment than if you have to go into the waiting list in the public system. But, and this is very important, NO ONE IS DENIED TREATMENT.
And you fail to realise this is why other Western Countries find this debate so laughable. We had these discussions decades or centuries ago, and despite what the bullshit propaganda you get fed says, the government spends less money as a proportion of GDP and more sick people get better than happens in America. But Americans, so terrified of having their government actually do anything for them, reject anything like this.
If you’re not from or a citizen of America – STFU. I find it laughable that you non-residents are all up in our business. What I find laughable is that in our short existence as a nation we are the super power – economically and militarily. We have innovated and created the majority of the worlds advancements in technology/medicine and science in the modern era and in doing so have created many jobs in impoverished areas of countries such as China, Mexico, etc… etc…
What I find laughable is you. Don’t tell me how to spend my money once I have earned it.
Ah, good times. For starters, your status as a super-power is related to many things – geographical isolation and political isolationism during a period when the historical super-powers of Europe were smashing each other senseless in two world wars. When you opened up to the world post WW2 you were well placed for ascendency. I could also point out that the Soviet Union achieved super power status throughout the 20th century, despite only being created in 1917 from a largely peasant-based economy, and despite being hammered by Germany in WW2 (over 10 million dead). Yep, the USSR eventually collapsed because their economic model was unsustainable. How’s barely-regulated pure free-market capitalism working for you guys lately? Not so well?
As for innovation and creating “the majority of the worlds advancements in technology/medicine and science in the modern era”, what a laughable bunch of horsehit. Your country has certainly done a lot, but so has Germany in the fields of industry and science, Japan in high technology, most of Europe in the realm of science and medicine. Hell, penicillin was invented by an Australian, and two of the three people who proved the existence of DNA were Canadian. Incidentally, America has also done a lot to artificially cripple the economies of developing countries, so don’t pull that “sweatshops are good for other countries” rot with me.
What’s really sad is that I apparently care more about your countrymen than you do. It really saddens me that 44,000 Americans die every year because they don’t have health cover, and many more have appalling quality of life. It saddens me that medical expenses are the number one cause of bankruptcy in your country. All because you want to hoard every cent you can.
For the record, I pay 40 cents in tax for every dollar I earn. Yeah, it’d be nice to keep more of that, but I look on the bright side – I’m saving a fortune in what I might have to spend if I went to hospital.
Driving is a privalage therefore it is reasonable to mandate insurance to protect others property. Taxes for health care with the threat of imprisonment is even better, who needs the constitution?
Stop your ranting and raving you non liberals; pay up or go to jail like a good little sheep.
This is getting ridiculous. What was the health care reform bill originally supposed to do? Rein in ever-increasing health care costs. But through distraction and distortion by opinion-makers, we have a health care reform bill that has nothing to do with cutting health care costs, it only perpetuates the failed solution that has been in place for decades — private health insurance. The insurance industry hasn’t ever done anything to cut our medical bills for us, they have only manipulated the markets to increase their revenue, margins, and share prices year after year. When medical costs rise, the insurance industry just passes those rises on to us to maintain their benefit loss ratio per their obligation to shareholders. Real health care reform would require an assault on Wall Street’s interests, but as Wall Street owns Capitol Hill that will never happen unless people start working together and stop falling victim to the fear and hatred spread by mainstream media.
KT, your comment disgusts me. I personally grew up on my moms government assistance, not because she refused to work, but because no one would hire a BLIND LADY. So yea, people who refuse to get jobs and such should not be living on the governments taxes, but NOT EVERYONE CAN HELP IT. I for one, left the house as soon as I was 18 so I wouldnt continue to benefit by government money.
However, also feel that the government should be watching what the people DO with their money… my mom mostly bought drugs with it for herself and her son.
(Obviously, I refused to take any part in that, and I did all I could to expose it… too bad the police sympathized with the f’in blind lady and didnt do anything but warn her every time they caught her. They must have not gotten the memo that she was buying those drugs with their taxes…
Ok people, First of all, I love this site. Secondly, you all make some interesting points. Thirdly..I am that mother of 4 who lives in public housing, who was born into a poverty stricken home..foodstamps..bla bla bla. My babies do have a daddy, I was married thank you very much. I use all of “the system” to get myself through school. I have not a mother, or a father supporting me. I am now a sophomore working towards a bachelor of science in nursing. What I want to know is..if i’m poor and on all of this stuff, and dieing to get off of welfare and make it in this world, then how am I going to be able to if this new bill cuts nurses salaries? That was my whole point of going to college. Get off welfare, prove to my children that just because they grow up poor that they can still have dreams and achieve them. In theory, change the future of my line. Isn’t that what Obama wants? To shorten the gap between the rich and the poor by bringing the poor up and the rich down (communism i think). If I am entitled to liberty and the pursuit of large irreconcilable debt then I should be able to work as a nurse without fear of politics right?
I am a success story of the system. I was raised in public housing, by a mother who struggled to pull herself out of the system.
I’m not on welfare, I’m not on medicaid, I’m not on food stamps, I have no children, and have been a taxpaying, productive member of society for 10 years. I am a 25 year old college student paying my way through school with an office job. I cannot afford health care. I am not eligible for any public assistance, because I scrape to pay for school. I eat on less than 100 a month. I have no heat in the winter, and cool my apartment with a window fan in the 100+ summer weather.
Is it fair that I am unable to afford health care?
According to the painfully ignorant opinion of many Americans, I am a burden to your society. I cost “the American Taxpayer” nothing. Is the future of your society bound to crumble if you offer a helping hand to one in need?
If this bill passes, I will still be ineligible for subsidies. Should I be forced to sacrifice food to insure that Health Insurance Companies continue to turn a profit?
And beyond that, what’s 1 trillion in Healthcare?
We’ve blown 900 billion in foreign wars in the past 10 years, with another 200 billion out the door this year, our priorities are screwy.
The reason why health insurance needs to be compulsory for everyone is that otherwise, those less likely to fall sick will choose not to get coverage while those at greater risk will rush to get insurance. This will result in what is known as a “death spiral”, forcing providers to increase premium or reduce coverage (or both). And let’s not forget that uninsured people don’t get treatment until it is a medical emergency, when it can’t be legally denied to them. Emergency treatment is a lot more costly and less effective than regular treatment.
There are of course legitimate issues to be discussed such as misaligned tax incentives, cost control and malpractice lawsuits, but those aren’t the only problems with the current healthcare system.
Sorry for not being very sarcastic, I decided that the post could use an enlightened comment or two.