<p>What I don’t understand is why would including maternity increase premiums so much? There are only so many babies born? How much can that cost when spread over everyone, male, post menopause? Besides, Many of us with two children need maternity care only for two years while paying the insurance premium for over 30 years. Maternity coverage applies to only a tiny fraction of population and does not explain the shocking increase in premiums.</p>
<p>I wish the emplyer market is affected sooner rather than later to get it all out. With the election next Nov, I fear there will be sugarcoating and we won’t know the full impact.</p>
<p>I am sure we knew this whatever the adm was fronting at the hearings;</p>
<p>For those here with complaints (other than access,) would be interesting to confirm which states. I’ve picked up some of you are CA, WA.</p>
<p>Also, it’s hard to separate smugness from relief, sometimes. And right now I am wondering how representative any one person’s issues with this are.</p>
<p>Poetgrl, post 4903. You missed my posts about my sister, who is disabled, and doesnt qualify for subsidies. She is going to have trouble paying for healthcare. </p>
<p>"Such smugness from those who benefit is as unattractive to me as the attitude of some who do not care if some will get no coverage. </p>
<p>A daughter in the insurance industry. Taxpayer subsidized income. Benefit one for your family. </p>
<p>Two daughters who need strong taxpayer support. Benefit two</p>
<p>The expense you whined about for four straight years being mitigated by the 3X rule and pre existing laws. Benefit three. </p>
<p>The woman cited in the CNN story was given incorrect information several times by the Washington state website. They gave her incorrect premium information and incorrect subsidy information. By the time it all was corrected, she now sees that she can’t afford the premiums.</p>
<p>I leave for several hours to come back to this bickering?</p>
<p>You know what, most of the people subsidize somebody in this society. Just in different ways. Those of us who work at high-paying jobs and get employer insurance, subsidize those who have lower paid jobs by paying higher taxes. I can go on and on.</p>
<p>Let it go (for the purposes of this thread). I did (I think I made my position clear on what I consider fair in the past on this and other threads). </p>
<p>ACA is going to affect many people and IMHO in a negative way. In a strange way it is a good thing, because it might open door to an honest discussion on how to address health care issue in this country.</p>
<p>P.S. MN governor flipped flopped yesterday and now does not support the tweak announced last week.</p>
<p>Because it is employer subsidized insurance, just like other employer subsidized insurance. The employer happens to be taxpayers. Are government employees’ premiums much better than those of other large employers? </p>
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<p>The issue is assigning blame for this. This varies greatly from state to state so if some states are getting it right, how is it the fault of the ACA? The remedy needs to come from the states, the insurance regulators and companies within that state and the doctors within that state.</p>
<p>There are too many attack posts showing up. If people who have no issues stop posting other than provide useful information, this thread would work and otherwise, it will be shut down as a political thread.</p>
<p>Rule of Thumb - If you need to post to SUPPORT ACA or ATTACK ACA, this is not the thread for you. As moderators, we are getting really tired of deleting or editing these posts. </p>
<p>People can have view points but attacking each other about those view points and promoting political talking points is not acceptable. **</p>
<p>“Many of us with two children need maternity care only for two years while paying the insurance premium for over 30 years”</p>
<p>Since I have neither a prostrate gland nor testicles, I don’t want to pay for prostate cancer or testicular cancer treatment. And since I don’t have a *****, either, I’ll throw in Viagra as something I don’t want to pay for, too. ;)</p>
<p>I"m sorry - this is a story about a woman with a teenage son who has an AGI of at least $63K per year, who is unwilling to pay $324-$390 a month for an insurance policy, even though she apparently could pay $280 a month. Alternatively, she earns something within range to qualify for a subsidy, but is being quoted -0- precisely because the premium for the benchmark silver plan is small enough to be affordable (that is, 9.5% of her income or less). </p>
<p>It is unfortunate that her initial eligibility for premium assistance was miscalculated, but those premiums should be affordable on her income. The $390 plan represents less than 7.5% of her income – and as she is self-employed, it may even be a smaller piece, given the number of tax benefits she has. (I’ve calculated that a self-employed person can easily have net earnings of $20K+ over and above the FPL and still have an AGI that qualifies for substantial subsidies – though I do believe that the application process is confusing enough that most self-employed are probably not aware of this.)</p>
<p>Obviously each person has their own budgetary and financial pressures, but the reason that the woman profiled will end up paying tax penalty (of probably more like several hundred dollars than $95, because it will be 1% of her taxable income) is because she has a very unrealistic expectation as to what insurance costs. </p>
<p>I am very dismayed at the poor quality of journalism in these stories – I think that the media should point out the income levels required for subsidy.</p>
<p>^^I’m with you on the Viagra, Emily. After watching too many commercials stating the warnings that if you have a (fill in the blank) for more than four hours, go to the hospital…</p>
<p>I definitely don’t want to pay for that, out of consideration for all those exhausted old ladies!</p>
<p>Since we own a home, we pay about 7k to support local school district (pay another k to support the local hospital district too). I wonder about all those older people in my neighborhood who are probably on medicare whose children left probably 15-20 years ago on why they keep paying so much in taxes rather than downsize.</p>