<p>Goldenpooch fundamentally here is objecting to “community rating,” where everyone of a certain age pays the same insurance rate. The problem is real for people in our age group, because some people aged 50-65 have very expensive health needs, and if we spread out their costs, we all have to pay a lot. And those of us who are lucky enough to be healthy are now having to pay more, in some cases quite a lot more, to cover people who have expensive health needs. </p>
<p>There are ways around this. But there are no ways around it that don’t charge the cost to somebody. In the medium term, we can try to reduce health care costs across the board, but in the short term, somebody is going to have to pay. Goldenpooch doesn’t want to be that someone, which is understandable. But the money is not going to come from magic pixie dust.</p>
<p>Busdriver, in my perfect world there would be a plethora of good jobs that would minimize the need for subsidies. I wonder why that isn’t a priority.</p>
<p>Your ideas dont work. Subsidies are not free. You can have faith or wish or whatever, but the numbers have to add up. If subsidies were given out and werent paid for, the costs would explode. Then we would have people complaining about cost explosions. :)</p>
<p>I would like to spend 1 million and after I spend it, I would like to have the $ 1 million back.
I am in NYC right now and there are a few things I would like to buy here. There are a couple of nice places on the west side and upper west side that look interesting, but I dont think my cpa would approve. ;)</p>
<p>busdriver, I understand the part about not wanting to pay more money, but I don’t quite understand the part about “everyone having the same bad policy.” These policies don’t look bad to me. Goldenpooch talks about “narrow networks,” but we already know that all the providers aren’t listed yet, so we can’t yet say how narrow the networks are. So I just don’t believe that these policies are bad policies. The Kaiser policies are what Kaiser policies always were, and they are costing in the ballpark of the other policies. So why should I believe the other policies are bad?</p>
<p>There’s a limited market and a zero sum game. You’ve been hogging all the cookies whether you realize or it or not. The goal is to have enough cookies to go around.</p>
<p>texaspg – (“I guess if I wanted to go independent, declaring myself self employed seems the way to go go for insurance costs.”) – bear in mind that you have to make enough money from self-employment to cover both the costs and your self-employment tax. So it won’t work to simply “declare” yourself self-employed – you need the self-employment income to go with it.</p>
<p>You can argue that the only way to lift the poor is by redistributing wealth from the rich, but what Obama and the proponents of this law never said is that they intended to include the middle class in that group. I can promise you if there was truth in advertising in the selling of this law, and the middle class, unsubsidized people were told what was going to happen to them, this law would have never happened. </p>
<p>There were two huge falsehoods disseminated by the Administration. 1) If you like your policy, you can keep it. 2) the middle class was going to get better coverage at a lesser cost. Both assertions are demonstrably false.</p>
<p>People can actually make cookies. And if they sell enough cookies, then they can hire other people to deliver or pack them. Then all of those people can have good income and need fewer subsidies. People have made cookies for generations without government intervention.</p>
<p>I had a great time meeting zoosermom. Next time, maybe for wine instead of coffee!! I just started a rapid sensitivity to coffee (it’s killing me, as a 3 cup a day person), but the wine is still working just fine.</p>
<p>Do not buy in NYC, dstark!!! Way too expensive for what it’s worth.</p>
<p>I just think there is a philosophical difference between people that will be impossible to resolve. There are those that think there is only a limited amount of “pie” or cookies…be it money, health care, whatever. If some people get more, than automatically others get less.</p>
<p>There are those of us who think differently…ie, just make more pie. Sure, some of us might pay more to make other people’s pie, but you don’t need to also take from others who have the pie…plus make them pay more for their smaller slice. I just don’t think it works that way, and if you can’t resolve that basic difference, I don’t see a way to agree. So be it. I am very happy that people who haven’t been able to get health care can now get it.</p>
<p>And how any will still be uninsured or under insured after ACA is fully implemented? I think the CBO says 30 million. Plus lots of unintended consequences. Is that the best we can do? The best we deserve?</p>
<p>I’m all in favor of policies that create more employment, but they do nothing to solve the problem Goldenpooch identifies. Goldenpooch’s premium costs have nothing to do with the subsidies. They are high because goldenpooch has to pay the average health care cost of someone in their age group, and that average cost is high.</p>
<p>If we suddenly had 4% unemployment, that would be wonderful. Fewer people would have health care subsidies, because people would have higher incomes. And that would change Goldenpooch’s premium costs not at all.</p>
<p>Goldenpooch isn’t paying high premiums because of subsidies. Goldenpooch is paying high premiums because of community rating. The only ways to bring down the average cost are to make people healthier, and/or to deliver health care more cheaply.</p>