I’m not sure why anyone takes 2027 projections too seriously. If history is any guide, Congress will pass an extension for some of these expiring tax cuts or else the Democrats will be in power again and pass their own major tax reform by 2027.
I’m not worried about 2027, I’m worried about 2019! As it stands our household will have a tax increase
“It hurts poor people by breaking the insurance market and driving out all insurers from an area. Then the poor people would be entitled to buy subsidized insurance, but there would be no insurance for them to buy.”
Many states only have one or two choices now. My parents’ medicare provider is leaving the area after 15-20 years.
The CBO report says “The number of people with health insurance would decrease by 4 million in 2019”, meaning they already have insurance. The only reason they would drop it if the individual mandate is repealed, is if they are currently paying for some or all of the premium, which has nothing to do with Medicaid.
You don’t get to believe the good parts but not the bad parts. It’s not going to be true both that the deficit is “only” increased by $1.5 trillion and that the tax cuts for individuals stick around. Either you believe the predictions or you don’t. Either the tax cuts sunset, and the $1.5 trillion number is correct, or the tax cuts don’t sunset and the deficit skyrockets much more than the $1.5 trillion. Pick one.
I’m not worried about 2027 either. I’m worried about the fact that my tax burden is quadrupling next year with no change in income.
That’s intuitively correct, but factually wrong. It sounds right, but it turns out, as Rom explained, that people are eligible for Medicaid and don’t know it. When they try to sign up for insurance, they discover they can have Medicaid for free.
In general, Medicare Advantage is profitable and insurers are not leaving that segment of the market, though of course as with all businesses, companies enter and leave markets all the time.
Even if all the Medicare Advantage insurers leave an area, seniors will still have coverage because they’ll be eligible for traditional Medicare. So it’s not analogous to individual insurance, where if all insurers leave a market, there will be no insurance at any price for people who want to buy it.
Many people who are eligible for Medicaid don’t know they are. Now that they’re not required to have insurance, they won’t bother trying to get it.
@romanigypsyeyes - why wouldn’t they sign up if they’re eligible?
Lack of knowledge, lack of access.
I’m just going to post this exchange between romanigypsyeyes and threebeans, with my bold, and my request that people read posts before responding to them.
The CBO document mentioned in #1209 does not address this population.
What the CBO document says, and this is a direct quote:
These are people who already have insurance, not people who don’t have insurance and no longer have a stick to make them discover they could get it for free.
If you have a reference to a CBO document or something else addressing people who don’t currently have insurance and don’t know they can get it for free, please post a link.
@“Cardinal Fang” - I take your point. I was thinking about it from another angle. After being required to have insurance now for several years, people have learned they are eligible for medicare. So if now they are not required to have it, they “won’t bother trying to get it” ?? My questions was for those who have learned they’re eligible - why wouldn’t they continue to sign up for it? If no insurance is the alternative and medicare is available- why would you not “bother”?
People’s eligibility for Medicaid shifts around. It’s not a matter of someone learning they are have been eligible for Medicaid all along and will continue to be eligible. Rather, people move in and out of eligibility. It’s incorrect to say “people have learned they are eligible for [Medicaid].”
There’s a lot of churn. Millions of people are eligible for Medicaid at some point in a year and ineligible at another point.
Not really. People at the margin cycle in and out of eligibility for Medicaid and private insurance. If some people cycle out, but the people who were going to cycle in don’t cycle in, then the total number of people with insurance coverage will decrease.
Medicare isn’t the same as Medicaid.
Simple way to remember: “Care for the elderly/disabled and aid for the poor.”
But no, many people have NOT learned they are eligible for medicaid. I have worked with signing people up and there are a whole slew of reasons why people don’t know they’re eligible (in addition to what CF has listed). And if they’re poor enough to be eligible for medicaid but don’t know they’re eligible, they don’t bother looking because they assume they can’t afford it.
Note that the issue of people not knowing that they may be eligible for Medicaid can also apply to subsidized ACA plans where people may not know that they are eligible for subsidies.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/11/28/news/economy/senate-revised-tax-bill/index.html
A summary of the Senate version.
There are a lot of reasons people don’t sign up for medicaid. They don’t want the government in their lives. They think they are able to sign up whenever they want. They work in some months and not others. Undocumented parents don’t sign up their eligible kids.
I have one probably eligible brother who is in the ‘I don’t want to do the paperwork’ group. I have another self employed brother who isn’t eligible for medicaid or a subsidy who just pays the $2k tax ‘fine.’ He had insurance pre ACA, his policy was cancelled without him being told, he searched for other insurance and couldn’t find anything for less than $1000/mo premium and a $6k deductible and another $5k before he hits the stop loss, so he’s looking at $20k per year before he sees much benefit. He just pays OOP for any health care he needs.
Repealing the individual mandate for health insurance won’t only affect Medicaid. It will also affect the private market,. It saves the government money because some people who would be eligible for health insurance subsidies based on their income will elect not to get health insurance, so the government won’t need to subsidize their insurance premiums. Those opting out will be disproportionately the healthiest people, leaving the insured pool with a higher percentage of people with costly severe and/or chronic medical conditions. They won’t opt out because they’ll calculate they need the insurance. That will inevitably lead to higher premiums for private insurance, because we’ll end up with a higher cost risk pool. So indirectly, it’s a tax on sick people to free up money to give bigger tax cuts to corporations and the mega-wealthy. Pretty cruel and cynical, IMO. And it could set off the “death spiral” in the private insurance market that certain politicians have been falsely claiming already exists.
I’m pretty steamed about this because my daughter turns 26 in June and will no longer be covered by the health insurance I get through my employer. She’s healthy, but there’s no way she’s going to go without health insurance. She’s currently working part time while pursuing a graduate degree, so her only option will be to purchase individual insurance in the private market… She’ll end up paying much more for health insurance than she would if we kept the individual mandate. Just unconscionable that we’re saddling young people who are trying to do the right thing by buying health insurance with this additional cost so we can throw money at people and organizations that don’t need it.