I agree with some of what you said. They didn't have to raise the lowest plans in order to still charge the same amount for the highest plans, but that is what they are all doing.
I completely agree that they are making good business decisions, but it completely immoral. The whole point of the discussion/legislation is to shift the image of the healthcare industry from being a business to a service, which is what it should be. I don't think the profit motive should be an acceptable excuse for industries that profit from blood money.
It was a service before. It was a for profit service with competition in a market economy. What Obamacare has done is changed it into a socialist system and a mandatory tax on the american people. The health care industry had it's problems before, and the insurance companies were shady, but there were better ways to deal with it. Who will control the prices when there is no market? The government? That's scary to me.
It would be a service if it was actually ironclad in supplying the service you pay for: there is a yearly limit, the providers can deny coverage for certain procedures, mainly the ones that you actually need assistance with, not the affordable everyday flue shots or physicals, the providers can drop you entirely if you get sick, and previous to the passing of the Affordable Healthcare Act is was hardly a service if you had pre-existing conditions. And I don't understand why you would fear the government controlling the price of healthcare over the market. The government is supposed to be by and for the people, meanwhile the market is driven purely by the profit motive. Why is that you fear that an institution that is supposed to have your best interests at heart would scam you over a system that it literally designed to seek maximum profit for minimum expenditures? And let me shed light on our nations other "socialist" programs that are some of the publics' most popular programs: medicare, medicaid, and social security. Now let me explain what the free market has done to healthcare. Due to the fact that device manufacturers and big pharma hold monopolies in their respective industries, and that hospitals lack regulations, they control the prices. Let me give you an example. An artificial joint replacement made by manufacturer costs $250 to make. They sell this part to the hospitals for $15,000. Then the hospital charges $35,000 for the part, not including the cost of the surgery(there was a video clip that I couldn't find, but the initial and final figure are 100% accurate). Right now Americans pay more for healthcare for their coverage in comparison to our average income than any other country. Over the past decade our healthcare costs have been raising faster than our incomes, at a higher margin each year. Our current system has been criticized and been deemed insufficient by both sides of the political spectrum. The Affordable Healthcare Act was made with bipartisan support, and was deemed constitutional by the Supreme Court. One of the right wing's biggest anti-obamacare advocates, Ted Cruz, dsecribed it as "the sugar" meaning that once we get a taste of it we'll like it, and won't want to get rid of it. And we probably will; look back at history, each time one of those programs I mentioned earlier was rolled out, they were met with heavy opposition from the right, and now they love them.
I agree with you 100%. This should have been regulated by the government. The pre-existing condition part of AHA could have been passed without AHA attached to it. It's actually been in effect for 2 years now without the individual mandate.
Do you really think the government has our best interests at heart? Our government is ran by corporations, lobbyists, interests groups and Wall Street. All those "socialist" programs are complete failures and are kept afloat purely on debt. I'd be surprised if social security is still around by the time you retire. Popular does not equal successful.
I agree with you on this point too. This is the single biggest problem with the healthcare industry and it should have been regulated. Again, no need for AHA, just regulation. This goes back to the problem of our government being ran by interest groups. How is this the insurers fault? They're the ones that have to cover these outrageous mark-ups, and that's why premiums keep skyrocketing. The free market only works if there are no monopolies, and if a monopoly exists, then it needs to be regulated. Obamacare does nothing to fix this, it just makes it worse by taxing these companies. It doesn't actually address the problem.
I agree with all of this but I think there are subpoints that need to be acknowledged. I agree that social security will collapse before I get to benefit from it despite still having put in so much money into it, but that is only if it undergoes no reform. This is something already gaining awareness amongst the public and I have faith that this will be put under the microscope before it collapses, "you can always count on Americans to do the right thing, after they've exhausted all other possibilities"(Churchill), a quote I like. I am not well enough researched on medicaid and medicare to comment on the programs themselves, but these are loved by the right which feature more likeness to socialist programs than the AHA, which is a counter point to the main argument. I do agree though that popularity does not have a direct correlation with success, but I think it helps serve the point in this case. I also agree that the government is ran by corporations, interest groups, etc, but you still have to acknowledge the morality and ethics of the interest groups associated to each party. Not to say that there aren't bad interest groups on both sides, but more overwhelmingly on the right. An example would be the top contributors to each presidential campaign: all but one of the twenty highest contributors to the GOP were banks and firms, many of the institutions that left our economy in ruin recently; though Obama's features banks and firms as well, it also features four of the most prestigious universities in America, and prestigious companies such as Google, Microsoft and IBM. The only corporation that doesn't have a tainted reputation that made the list and donated to the GOP was GE and they still donated more to the Obama Administration. So it is evident that one party is more likely to hold the interests of businesses and the nations citizens, and that is the party I align myself with.
The point I'm making is that these companies that you're defending were already reporting record profits, with absurd returns for their capital inputs, and deal in human misery. Also, despite the name the Affordable Healthcare Act, its staple wasn't to reduce the price of healthcare for the general public, it is to make insurance affordable to those that could not afford it before. And with this it is successful; yes it increases the cost for some, but the margin of those that can now afford healthcare that couldn't prior to the passing of AHA, is much higher than those that will have their costs raised. And the insurance companies aren't just covering their mark-ups, they will probably make more than ever now. Hidden in your insurance costs before, was paying for the uninsured. That is the purpose of the individual mandate, so you are no longer paying for people that don't have insurance. This seems like it should align with the party of personal responsibility but it is misinterpreted somehow. So even though you should no longer be paying for the uninsured, which was supposed to counter act insurers having to cover the mark ups, they over-raise the price anyways. The silver-lining though is that your healthcare is at least better now for your dollar. And you keep calling for regulations while defending the insurance companies for raising their premiums. The only way to reduce the price we be to instill regulations that would prevent them exploiting their customers, so if you want regulation to reduce costs, don't defend their actions, you can't have it both ways. And if these regulations were put in place they would be much more socialist in ideology than the subsidies that you have an issue with right now. Americans are indoctrinated against an ideology that many would agree with, simply from a moral, humanistic perspective. You're calling for regulation without socialism, but regulation is socialism.
I agree with this. It sounds bad to say that one party is better than the other in terms of ethics and righteousness... but it's kinda historically true. That's not to say there aren't non-corrupt politicians on the right (like Ron Paul, even if I disagree with many of his ideals), but it's an inherent problem with many of them coming from business-related backgrounds. Their priorities involve increasing the profits of businesses, which may involve themselves and their political funding, despite what consequences may come of it. Much of the money on the left comes from institutions who know they probably will not see a direct monetary return from their donations. The priorities of the left fall more with using the government to help the people as a whole, which I entrust far more than those whose job it is to maximize profits. People just don't want to say there is more corruption on the right because it makes them look politically biased.
I agree with this as well.
Yeah it will be interesting to see how the Republican party is affected by this, their public approval rating is at an all time low of 18% right now. And like you, said it's funny because even the special interest groups like the Koch Brothers, that are usually one of the entities running the Republican sphere, were urging for the right to fold because they were losing so much money from the shutdown, and this was like a week ago before the last caucus. I actually think the Tea Party is in control of the Republican party right now, and they are destroying their platform from within.
1-800-FUCK YOU, reroutes you to 1-800-F1UCK-YO. Which is the official number. Apparently this is old news, I just happened to stumble across it yesterday and was shocked.
I think the Republican Party has been folding at its core for a while. We've gotten to a point where the stereotypical Santorum-types aren't even accepted. But unfortunately for the right-wing, their media figures and spokespeople still cling to these establishment Republican ideologies when they could actually be seeing success with a different approach. I really think it won't be long before it's moreso libertarians vs moderate liberals, since they're the two actually being respected in politics. And libertarians should be differentiated from the Tea Party. I think that hurt their cause when it could've been much better.
I don't think that's fair to say really. I think it's moreso that the center-right is painted as moderate liberals, like I'd describe Obama as center-right, but actual moderate liberals are painted as extreme leftists.
Its really hard to find non-biased articles on her, I think this NY times one is pretty good though.
I would agree with you about outside manipulation of the government not being possible if the government still went by the constitution. Corporations are now considered people, lobby influence is too strong and a private bank controls our currancy. Too much corruption...
None of those things strictly breaks the consitution though, there wasn't such a thing as a corp. back then so they would have nothing to put in the constitution.
