ACA Repeal/Replace: Progressives Face Moral Dilemma

[David Horn]

(01-21-2017, 09:31 PM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(01-21-2017, 12:45 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-20-2017, 04:45 PM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(01-20-2017, 03:51 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: It's not the insurance companies who profit from illness it's a subset of the care providers. The insurance companies want you to pay your premiums but make no claims. That's why they make it so painful to have actual claims and why they deny or reduce claims. Meanwhile, certain providers (especially ones that don't take Medicare and who are very selective about which insurance plans they accept) rake it in. Now to be fair, I know some providers who do take Medicare and are being short paid by insurance - they are not exactly raking it in.

I agree with respect to the care providers, and I agree that's how it used to work - and should work - with insurance companies.  However, Obamacare limited insurance company profits to a percentage of medical payouts, giving the insurance companies an incentive to increase overall costs as well.

If costs had risen faster than they had in the past, you might have a point.  They didn't.  In fact, the rate of increase slowed dramatically -- and I say that as someone not well disposed to the ACA.

It's arguable whether the rate increases slowed.  It's pretty clear that when  you include skyrocketing deductibles and not just premiums, health care costs are rising as fast as ever for most people.

And your claim to being "not well  disposed" to Obamacare is questionable since there's every indication you prefer it to what came before.

There's a graph that tells the tale.  Interesting, but not surprising, this US government graph was pulled off the Whitehouse server just after the Trump team took charge, and apparently doesn't reside elsewhere either.  All the non-government data I could find is only good through 2014. 

On what went before, the net benefit of the ACA accrued to the less well off.  Most of the cost, to the more well-to-do.  Eliminating lifetime maximums and precondition exclusions was a huge net benefit to everyone, but the cost to do that is high.  Still, both are very real, so both needed to go.  My biggest complaint is the role of private insurance in the system.  Medicare allows for Medigap plans that are private.  I'm OK with those.  The core is public and single payer -- the best model.  We didn't get that with the ACA.