OMG Politics, I'm over it already.

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micwalt said:
What state are you in?
Is your governor a Republican?
Did he/she decline federal Medicaid expansion funds that were an integral part of the ACA?
Because that might be a big part of the problem right there.
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I am physically in Florida but the folks I know who have been hit the hardest are in several other states. And I don't know the details or mechanics of how things changed for them, just that those costs rose significantly specifically due to the mandates of the ACA. And the rates at my municipality same thing. And I'm not intimately familiar with the details of the plan. And I'm not really one who worries about which party's fault it is. I don't blame the former administration or anything like that. I am not political in that way. My point is, it's not an affordable plan for everyone. It may indeed help many but it is hurting many as well and that I don't think we can fix it by simply creating some "plan". Everyone knows there is widespread fraud in the industry so why make a plan to make sure all of the fraud gets paid for?
 
Devil is Dill said:
Oh, but it is. The people steering the conservative agenda now would choose lining the pockets of people profiting from the system and pursuing "small government" over actually helping people not have to decide between heating their house, putting food on the table or going to the doctor 100 times out of 100. Some of it seems ideological and some of it seems to be purely out of spite for the unwashed masses.
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I understand where you are coming from, and I know the topic is controversial, I originally was just trying to be clever in that affordable care wouldn't be controversial. Either party trying to create a plan that ignores the fraud that causes the costs to be so high in the first place makes no sense. To me, making health care affordable doesn't mean making it free or cheap for some and making it cripplingly expensive for others. And that is honestly what has happened, regardless of how either party may want to spin it. I'm not talking from an ideological standpoint, but from the perspective of those who it has affected. Real people and not some statistic from the news.

And I agree that the industry will line their pockets if there was less government intervention but don't think they aren't lining them now. Again, some paying significantly less, some significantly more. Although I stand corrected about the quote my friend got. It wasn't $1800 it was $1200. But with a $7000 deductible that is over $21000 out of pocket before she would get coverage. I did hear of another who was quoted $800 with the same deductible. That's over $16000 out of pocket. I don't know what is wrong with the plan but it clearly doesn't work.

So what is the answer? We wont find it if our approach is for the Republicans to not participate in finding the answer at the time the plan was being crafted and we wont find it if we have already made up our minds that no matter what they come up with now we are against it. As one of our esteemed forum members announced on Facebook, he is going to do everything in his power to disrupt, ridicule etc. anything the GOP comes up with on any issue. I respect everyone and don't say that to call anyone out but to illustrate that if that is how we are going to approach things, there is no way for the people to ever win. Because as hard as it is to believe, the answer to any issue is not likely the one that one of the party's has developed. It is likely somewhere between the two. But we continue to drive a wedge between each other making it impossible to ever find compromise that benefits the most possible people. The "all or nothing" approach means just as many people lose as win.
 
So I'm not even in the door two minutes this morning when a guy asks me if I took my daughter to DC this weekend "to see all the vaginas." :messedup::annoyed:
 
Johnny N. said:
I understand where you are coming from, and I know the topic is controversial, I originally was just trying to be clever in that affordable care wouldn't be controversial. Either party trying to create a plan that ignores the fraud that causes the costs to be so high in the first place makes no sense. To me, making health care affordable doesn't mean making it free or cheap for some and making it cripplingly expensive for others. And that is honestly what has happened, regardless of how either party may want to spin it. I'm not talking from an ideological standpoint, but from the perspective of those who it has affected. Real people and not some statistic from the news.

And I agree that the industry will line their pockets if there was less government intervention but don't think they aren't lining them now. Again, some paying significantly less, some significantly more. Although I stand corrected about the quote my friend got. It wasn't $1800 it was $1200. But with a $7000 deductible that is over $21000 out of pocket before she would get coverage. I did hear of another who was quoted $800 with the same deductible. That's over $16000 out of pocket. I don't know what is wrong with the plan but it clearly doesn't work.

So what is the answer? We wont find it if our approach is for the Republicans to not participate in finding the answer at the time the plan was being crafted and we wont find it if we have already made up our minds that no matter what they come up with now we are against it. As one of our esteemed forum members announced on Facebook, he is going to do everything in his power to disrupt, ridicule etc. anything the GOP comes up with on any issue. I respect everyone and don't say that to call anyone out but to illustrate that if that is how we are going to approach things, there is no way for the people to ever win. Because as hard as it is to believe, the answer to any issue is not likely the one that one of the party's has developed. It is likely somewhere between the two. But we continue to drive a wedge between each other making it impossible to ever find compromise that benefits the most possible people. The "all or nothing" approach means just as many people lose as win.
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My point is nobody should have to deal with all this. I'm not attached to Obamacare - it's a half-assed solution to a problem and if it goes away tomorrow and is replaced with something better I'd be perfectly fine with that. I don't trust the people who are now taking upon themselves to fix it. I don't think leaving it up to the free market to sort things out is a solution.
 
Johnny N. said:
It wasn't $1800 it was $1200. But with a $7000 deductible that is over $21000 out of pocket before she would get coverage. I did hear of another who was quoted $800 with the same deductible. That's over $16000 out of pocket. I don't know what is wrong with the plan but it clearly doesn't work.
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So there is the big problem. You and your friends don't understand how health insurance works. It isn't like car insurance where you have a deductible you pay before they kick in. My insurance has a $2000 deductible. But I don't pay the first $2000 before they pay anything. The deductible is for the portions you are responsible for and once you hit the deductible, you pay nothing out of pocket. For instance, the first procedure I had last year was an echo cardiogram. Since I went to a hospital, I was responsible for 20% of the bill (btw, the total bill is significantly less overall because the insurance company negotiates a lower bill before anything is paid). So I paid $850 and they paid $3400. That $850 went towards my deductible. The my wife had hip surgery and it only cost us $1150 out of pocket because after my $850, we were only responsible for $1150 on our deductible, then we paid nothing out of pocket the rest of the year. Also that $1200 a month is tax deductible (and if you can't afford that, the government does offer subsidies) so you should get a big fat refund check come tax time as well.

Is the ACA the best thing since sliced bread, no. But it is much better than the nothing we had before it. I'm all for making it better but for some reason, I doubt the congressional republicans will. If they had a plan to do that, they would have in the last 8 years and Obama would have gladly signed it into law.
 
Thank you @Chad ... that's exactly right. My wife has had 5 surgeries over the past few years and it was 80/20 through most of the year, but once our out of pocket hit a certain limit, we paid nothing for the remainder. So not cheap by any stretch... we still have some that we're still paying on, but I remember one of the surgeries costing $89,000 and if that had been entirely on us, it would have been life crushing for our remaining years. :embarrassed:

I'm thankful that my youngest who just graduated college has been able to stay on our insurance with dental and optical until she could get established in her job.

My oldest had a ruptured disk in her back, and if it wouldn't have been for the ACA, she never would have been able to afford the surgery she got or the therapy that got her walking again.
 
baimun said:
Thank you @Chad ... that's exactly right. My wife has had 5 surgeries over the past few years and it was 80/20 through most of the year, but once our out of pocket hit a certain limit, we paid nothing for the remainder. So not cheap by any stretch... we still have some that we're still paying on, but I remember one of the surgeries costing $89,000 and if that had been entirely on us, it would have been life crushing for our remaining years. :embarrassed:

I'm thankful that my youngest who just graduated college has been able to stay on our insurance with dental and optical until she could get established in her job.

My oldest had a ruptured disk in her back, and if it wouldn't have been for the ACA, she never would have been able to afford the surgery she got or the therapy that got her walking again.
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Our hospital bills were about $60k last year between my wifes accident and my heart issues. Our insurance is pretty much the same as yours and while we had a bunch out of pocket like you said the actual size of the bills would have ruined us financially if we had to pay more than our deductible.
 
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