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Well it ain't that simple. ObamaCare forced insurers to pay out a minimum of 85% of premiums as losses, and any less is returned to policyholders. So they put a cap on profits. Since companies were forced to take all comers, they also put in a stop loss for when companies had combined ratios above 100%. That is the risk corridor. The problem is, for all the companies who lost money, the government hasn't been paying out. So they capped profits, forced companies to take poor health risk, and promised to spread the wealth across the industry. But they didn't make good on that promise of spreading the wealth.

It is just another case of bad government policy hurting the market. I wouldn't support a bailout. They deserve to lose money for playing ball with the ObamaCare. Everyone in insurance knew it is a house of cards.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

What I had read was the Republicans in congress (house I assume) are trying to use up to three years to real and replace. The theme was there are too many aspects that are accepted and no longer negotiable by anyone as far as have to stay. Examples are the up to year 26 thing and pre-existing conditions. For the life of me I cannot see how they work that one out. Morally it makes sense but making an insurance company pay for something that did not begin "under their watch" so to speak seems bad business.

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Elections have consequences.

Obamacare was terrible and doomed to fail. Medicare for all is the only thing that's going to work. We tried it the Republicans' way and it failed. We tried it the Democrats' way and that failed too. The only attempt left is "the rest of the developed world's way."

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How is that way paid for?

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Taxes in lieu of private health insurance payments combined with increased purchasing power for the government. You'd come out ahead. And if you want to fight passionately against it ever happening like Hillary Clinton, you can go get lost in the forest with her.

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Don't you worry. Trump will negotiate the deal. It'll be terrific. Everyone will be amazed at what a tremendous win he will negotiate.

Not sure I buy that.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

No way to repeal Obamacare. Modifying it is the only thing that will happen.

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Be well

GO BEARS!!!

As long as I'm not paying more each year and I don't have to wait 10 years to get a surgery, I don't really care what system we have.

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You will be paying more each year no matter what happens.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

We all pay for the health care of others already because we as a society (rightfully) don't allow people to die simply because they can't pay for an ER visit. That should be the starting point of the discussion.

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Obamacare was put in place as a poison pill to make a later generation have to go to single payer because every other option is fucked beyond belief. Nobody involved with Obamacare's design could have actually thought it would work long term.

Medicare today is designed to bankrupt you if you really get sick with something that can be treated with medications. Before she died earlier this year, my mom was paying $2500/month for prescriptions (well check that, I was paying it) for her at-home cancer meds because she had gone over the upper limit on prescriptions and had to pay 40% of list the rest of the year. Imagine taking that model and applying it to the parents of a 4-year-old with some horrible disease where the kid probably will live to 14-15, but not to 35, and will probably never be well enough to work a day in his or her life. A kid sick enough that one of his parents will have to stop working to be able to be home enough because daycare is not an option.

I'm not reflexively for completely single payer. I like the fact that the physician group I go to has instituted $35 video calls for really routine things, where they will not bill insurance, period. This is DuPage County, most of us can afford $35.

But one of the major national medical groups sent our COO a letter during the W administration stating in a barely veiled way, "hey, if your employee with brain cancer doesn't get around to dying this year, we're going to drop your company as a client because we can't make any money on you." So I don't mind seeing the medical insurance companies have to fear for their survival just a little bit.


edited to clear up a typo.

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"When people want their version of the truth, they go find it, no matter how baseless their beliefs." -- Ken Rosenthal

free penis reduction here we come!!

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Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

We need to invest more in preventing hospital visits in the first place. Beefing up public health programs. Implementing better health education programs in school. Expanding low to no income public clinics to encourage visits before it gets to the ER point. The ACA was designed to do this but instead focused on fucking down insurance companies as much as possible.

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The ACA was designed to make it illegal not to buy those companies' products. Poor them!

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So leash really is leaving the board then ...

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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

Pelosi and Biden knew that.

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Elections have consequences.

The ACA was the largest mandate in the history of the United States forcing consumers to purchase a product from private companies.

That said, it's not like the ACA was necessarily good for these companies. The regulations crippled them (not that I give a shit) by regulating their combined ratio to an absurd point. They have basically been turned into public utilities who have a cap on how much profit they can earn (if any). The saving grace is that they added no value even before ACA. Health insurance is nothing but a way for "insurers" (they are not really insurers) to offer a product for a monthly fee with unlimited use and roll the dice that most of the people who use it won't use it much or at all. It's an actuarial game that does nothing to encourage cost reduction or preventative measures to reduce costs. They also take a piece of the action every time they profit (until the government doesn't allow them to).

We may as well just adopt a single payer system or privatize the whole thing... or at the very least, stop tying health insurance to employment. The way we currently do things is one of the most bizarre and inefficient systems one could dream up.

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The only solution is single payer full on. Or you eliminate the crap and just reimburse people their private premiums. Both have pitfalls. Obamacare was in between and worse. The poison pill was the right comment. It was just a step to make the electorate accept healthcare is government's responsibility.

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Elections have consequences.

Fuck you pal.

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Fuckin A leash. You knocked that shit out of the park. You keep talking like that, and I'll be heading down to Naperville to present you with some rare bottle of Bourbon.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

And I'll be there to relieve him of it shortly thereafter.

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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

I would fuck both of you.

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It's fucking hilarious that minus your professional expertise MANY like myself said this same thing when Obamacare was adopted. But wtf do I know? I was a racist righty whack job.

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Elections have consequences.

Probably

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Be well

GO BEARS!!!

People have to apply for or renew Obama Care before January 1. Trump takes office on Jan 20.

He's gotta keep it for one more year. Then change it for the following year. That's what he'll do.

Well, I don't disagree with you, but it's honestly pretty simple. I have no expertise in health insurance whatsoever. I work in actual insurance, as does Dennis. My observations are really just that... observations. Anyone can recognize that if you don't allow for-profit companies to profit, things won't make a lot of sense. The thing I think people didn't - and still don't - realize is that private health insurance companies honestly add no value to society whatsoever and never did. They're not insurance companies. They are basically banks with actuaries who write shitty policies and cross their fingers that they're profitable. They've always been like that. It's why I don't think a single payer option is a bad alternative. If anyone wants to talk about how bad the government would administer things, I would simply point them to a private insurer because it can't be much worse.

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Yes Leash. That was my argument so long ago. It just doesn't make sense at all. But others argument as sometimes goes... what about the people hurting? I basically said write blue cross a government check or single payer. You can't do both.

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Elections have consequences.

I used to try to be honest and straight-forward with most people.

Then I started working in PBM.

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