Why have people come to believe health care is a "right" when it actually isn't?

[Spiderman]

Everyone needs healthcare.......the rest of the world has already figured it out

Quit your bitching about covering women's services. Women deserve to pay the same rates as men. They shouldn't pay more just because they are the ones who get pregnant

What about women who choose not to have kids?

And where did I ever say people didn't need health care?

I asked a simple question. How does forcing people to buy coverage for things they don't need or want help them reduce the price of their insurance?

And btw health care and health insurance are 2 completely different things.

Yes, healthcare and health insurance are two different things.......but this country is to stupid to do anything about healthcare

Do you care to answer my question or not?

 

[dblack]

I agree that the right to Health care is hopelessly subjective. However that does not mean that it should not be a right simply because it's hard to define.

As far as other basic necessities, these would fall under the basic right to life mentioned in the declaration of independence. Most courts would agree that a person does have the right to steal a loaf of bread if they are starving, to break into a building if they are in fear of dying from exposure. Most municipal governments do provide food, shelter, clothing and (if it's a necessity) transportation because most people do feel that everyone should have a right to these.

These are not enumerated in the constitution because of the complexity and limits of providing these.

Everyone has a right to seek healthcare. They do not have a right to take from me to pay for another's healthcare.

Insurance companies do it every month.

Not until ACA came along. Prior to that, all our transactions with insurance companies were voluntary. If we didn't like the way they shared risk, or who they shared it with, we didn't have to do business with them. Congress took away our right to make that choice. And the Court let them.

URL="http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/money/industries/insurance/2009-05-28-hiddentax_N.htm"]Insured pay 'hidden tax' for uninsured health care[/URL]

WASHINGTON — The average U.S. family and their employers paid an extra $1,017 in health care premiums last year to compensate for the uninsured, according to a study to be released Thursday by an advocacy group for health care consumers.

Families USA, which supports expanded health care coverage, found that about 37% of health care costs for people without insurance — or a total of $42.7 billion — went unpaid last year. That cost eventually was shifted to the insured through higher premiums, according to the group.

"I don't think anybody has any idea about how much they are paying because of the need to cover the health care costs of the uninsured," said Ron Pollack, the group's executive director. "This is a hidden tax on all insurance premiums, whether it is paid by business for their work or by families when they purchase their own coverage."

Uncompensated care is a phony 'boogieman' here, a flimsy excuse to justify corporate welfare to the insurance industry. If cost shifting were really the concern, it would make far more sense to simply beef up safety nets and repeal EMTALA. But dealing with cost shifting isn't the point. Centralizing control and herding us all into the same pen is.

 

[rightwinger]

I paid into insurance my whole life but barely used it. Irresponsible people did not. Instead they spent their insurance money on BMWs. Then they got cancer while not having any insurance. Now I get to pay for their mistake by paying much higher premiums so that they can get insured with pre-existing.

With Obamacare, that irresponsibility person is going have to pay for insurance to cover their healthcare problems so the rest of use are not stuck with their healthcare costs. One of primary purposes of Obamacare is to increase the size of the insurance pools by adding healthier people who are not buying insurance now thus bringing down the premiums of others who provide for their healthcare. Initially premiums will be higher until healthier people buy insurance but in a few years premiums will start falling as younger healthier people buy insurance.

ROFL you are completely ignorant with regard to how insurance works and also ignorant as to how people work. Everyone in the nation pretty much is gonna end up dropping insurance until they have expensive health care needs, then they will sign up. Congrats, you idiots have killed the health insurance industry. Prices for individual plans are doubling and trippling this year. Prices for group plans will double and tripple next year. The result is healthy people will leave the group en mass. The result of which will be an annual 20-50% increase until the entire system busts. I give it 4years. Then we will have no choice but to go with single payer. That or the fine has to be moved up to 1k a month. You can't get something for nothing. You dorks are agreeing to hand over hundreds of thousands of dollars to people with pre-existing conditions to save them from the indignity of having to meet means testing by using up their assets first.

This country's health insurance industry is done, put a fork in it.

No they won't

Because they will be paying a penalty for not having coverage. When their kid breaks an arm riding his bike, they are not going to stop at the local Obamacare office to sign up for coverage. They will get stuck with a bill for thousands of dollars and wonder why they are paying NOT to be insured

 

[RKMBrown]

With Obamacare, that irresponsibility person is going have to pay for insurance to cover their healthcare problems so the rest of use are not stuck with their healthcare costs. One of primary purposes of Obamacare is to increase the size of the insurance pools by adding healthier people who are not buying insurance now thus bringing down the premiums of others who provide for their healthcare. Initially premiums will be higher until healthier people buy insurance but in a few years premiums will start falling as younger healthier people buy insurance.

ROFL you are completely ignorant with regard to how insurance works and also ignorant as to how people work. Everyone in the nation pretty much is gonna end up dropping insurance until they have expensive health care needs, then they will sign up. Congrats, you idiots have killed the health insurance industry. Prices for individual plans are doubling and trippling this year. Prices for group plans will double and tripple next year. The result is healthy people will leave the group en mass. The result of which will be an annual 20-50% increase until the entire system busts. I give it 4years. Then we will have no choice but to go with single payer. That or the fine has to be moved up to 1k a month. You can't get something for nothing. You dorks are agreeing to hand over hundreds of thousands of dollars to people with pre-existing conditions to save them from the indignity of having to meet means testing by using up their assets first.

This country's health insurance industry is done, put a fork in it.

No they won't

Because they will be paying a penalty for not having coverage. When their kid breaks an arm riding his bike, they are not going to stop at the local Obamacare office to sign up for coverage. They will get stuck with a bill for thousands of dollars and wonder why they are paying NOT to be insured

Oh so now your gonna try to force people to pay at the hospital? ROFL

You'd rather pay 18k a year + thousands in co-pays even though you don't use it at all? ROFL I'll bank my 18k and pay cash when I have to.

What's the penalty 1% the first year, 2% the following, and 2.5% thereafter? ROFL I suppose if I was making over 500k a year I might want to make sure I got insurance to avoid the fine. ROFL OR maybe I'll just make sure I don't have a refund by claiming extra dependents. It would seem if you don't have a refund coming they can't take the fine. ROFL

 

[rightwinger]

ROFL you are completely ignorant with regard to how insurance works and also ignorant as to how people work. Everyone in the nation pretty much is gonna end up dropping insurance until they have expensive health care needs, then they will sign up. Congrats, you idiots have killed the health insurance industry. Prices for individual plans are doubling and trippling this year. Prices for group plans will double and tripple next year. The result is healthy people will leave the group en mass. The result of which will be an annual 20-50% increase until the entire system busts. I give it 4years. Then we will have no choice but to go with single payer. That or the fine has to be moved up to 1k a month. You can't get something for nothing. You dorks are agreeing to hand over hundreds of thousands of dollars to people with pre-existing conditions to save them from the indignity of having to meet means testing by using up their assets first.

This country's health insurance industry is done, put a fork in it.

No they won't

Because they will be paying a penalty for not having coverage. When their kid breaks an arm riding his bike, they are not going to stop at the local Obamacare office to sign up for coverage. They will get stuck with a bill for thousands of dollars and wonder why they are paying NOT to be insured

Oh so now your gonna try to force people to pay at the hospital? ROFL

You'd rather pay 18k a year + thousands in co-pays even though you don't use it at all? ROFL I'll bank my 18k and pay cash when I have to.

What's the penalty 1% the first year, 2% the following, and 2.5% thereafter? ROFL I suppose if I was making over 500k a year I might want to make sure I got insurance to avoid the fine. ROFL OR maybe I'll just make sure I don't have a refund by claiming extra dependents. It would seem if you don't have a refund coming they can't take the fine. ROFL

If you don't have a policy, yes you will pay at the hospital and at the doctors office and at the pharmacy

See how your plan works when you have a burst appendix and you ask the ambulance to stop at the Obamacare office so you can sign up for coverage

 

[RKMBrown]

No they won't

Because they will be paying a penalty for not having coverage. When their kid breaks an arm riding his bike, they are not going to stop at the local Obamacare office to sign up for coverage. They will get stuck with a bill for thousands of dollars and wonder why they are paying NOT to be insured

Oh so now your gonna try to force people to pay at the hospital? ROFL

You'd rather pay 18k a year + thousands in co-pays even though you don't use it at all? ROFL I'll bank my 18k and pay cash when I have to.

What's the penalty 1% the first year, 2% the following, and 2.5% thereafter? ROFL I suppose if I was making over 500k a year I might want to make sure I got insurance to avoid the fine. ROFL OR maybe I'll just make sure I don't have a refund by claiming extra dependents. It would seem if you don't have a refund coming they can't take the fine. ROFL

If you don't have a policy, yes you will pay at the hospital and at the doctors office and at the pharmacy

See how your plan works when you have a burst appendix and you ask the ambulance to stop at the Obamacare office so you can sign up for coverage

18k a year... In no time, I'll have hundreds of thousands of my own money to fund my own health care.

Again I ask, why do I have to pay at the hospital are you gonna refuse to give me my free health care? I thought it was a right now.

RKMBrown's insurance. Number of Members, non disclosed, but we have lots of people in the shopping cart. Deductible, zero. Co-pays, zero. Premium costs, zero. Everything we can afford, covered. Hospital emergency care, free.

 

[Meister]

If you like your insurance company, you can keep it, Period.
If you like your doctor, you can keep it, Period.

This is how it was packaged and sold. If the stipulations were announced at the time, there wouldn't have been enough democrat votes to get it passed, period

 

[hunarcy]

Ok, show me ONE RIGHT JUST ONE, that is provided to us in the bill of rights. Or perhaps you want to change your statements. Numerous posts including this one, have shown you talking about rights supposedly provided in the bill of rights. "a complete list" as if the bill of rights is a partial list, which follows from all of your prior statements. The bill is clearly poorly named, or perhaps meant to shut up the ignorant.

You have to right to worship as you choose. You have the right to express your political beliefs without limitation.

Those rights are "mentioned" they are not provided by the bill or rights. The Bill of Rights explicitly prohibits the federal government from restricting those rights. There is a fundamental difference between providing a right and restricting someone from taking the right away from you. While you may be somewhat confused in so far as the results of the two views are similar. However, they are not the same. The result of a belief system where our rights are "provided" by government is one in which people assume they have none unless they are listed.

The bill of rights restricts the power of government, it does not provide us with liberty.

You misunderstand my argument. I believe that we are born with these rights and the Bill of Rights merely protect them. I was not understanding your point, but I now believe we are actually saying the same things in different ways.

 

[hunarcy]

Only a barbarian believes a person does not have a right to healthcare

I don't think that anyone wants to deny anybody from healthcare, leftie. I just think people don't want to have to pay for your healthcare.

I am perfectly able to pay for my insurance and have no problem with my country supporting those who are unable to pay

Only the let em die Republicans feel otherwise

It is not the role of the government to "support those who are unable to pay". NOR, does the (Un)Affordable Care Act do that. It merely shifts insurance from being a choice to being an edict.

 

[hunarcy]

It is providing a vital service to American citizens. Millions of Americans are finding themselves priced out of the healthcare market. Even those not at the poverty level

No, it is dictating that we all have to buy the insurance that some person in Washington feels is the "better" plan, not providing a service.

 

[hunarcy]

Health care insurance started going downhill in this country during the Great Depression and World War II, despite the numerous technical advances that were made during that period.

Then-President FDR clamped huge restrictions onto many parts of the economy during the Depression (resulting in that depression stretching out further than any ever had in world history), and they became even worse during WWII. One of them was wage and price controls, which became onerous as many able-bodied men joined the armed services to fight in the war.

Attracting talented people to fulfill the jobs they left was tough enough with so many good men joining up, and the govt's wage controls made the situation worse when employers found they couldn't offer higher wages to get people to hire on. Whether this was justifiable, not to say effective, by the war emergency is debatable.

Employers screamed bloody murder as their businesses approached collapse due to unfilled jobs, and while government refused to lift its wage and price controls, they announced the employers could offer benefits in lieu of pay to attract workers. One benefit was a tax exemption for employer-provided health insurance.

This helped somewhat, but with an employer only able to offer a few insurance plans, it locked employees into fairly uncompetetive market unless he changed jobs. And FDR's relatively new policy of "tax withholding" was extended to the employee part of the payments for insurance, further insulating the employee fro the gut-check of having to write weekly or monthly checks to the insurance company.

Employers offered "Cadillac" plans in their efforts to attract workers, and the employees seldom saw the actual cost of those expensive plans, which often paid for routine medications and office visits formerly not covered by real insurance plans. That, plus the lack of competition most insurance companies found themselves facing, removed a lot of their impetus to pare costs. And employees became used to health care which "seemed free", and started thinking of it as something akin to a "right", since it (sort of) appeared to cost nothing.

When the war ended, government did NOT remove the tax exemption for employer-provided health insurance even though the circumstances that made it desirable were now gone. And so health insurance has existed in a strange nether world ever since for most people, with employees of a company locked into the few (or one) insurance plan offered by that company with little likelihood they will ever leave it. At the same time it appeared to cost little or nothing, with even routine services (far beyond the major-event coverage real insurance is for) included and seeming "complimentary".

Fast forward to the 21st century. Now we have self-serving politicians screaming from the rooftops that health care is somehow a "right", though it comes nowhere close to resembling a right to liberty, right to speech, right to self-defense etc. - all of which are based on the fundamental right to be left alone and to associate only voluntarily with others. And most people, used to generations of "free" health care that was caused by that very government long ago, are actually believing it, despite the clear unworkability of the idea, the unnecessary expense and clumsiness of one-size-fits-all (or even three-sizes-fit-all) policies administered from thousand of miles away in Washington.

The cockeyed notion that we somehow have a "right" to have a broken arm set or an infection cleaned and treated by others, came (as so many cockeyed ideas do) from government intrusion into private matters in the first place.

We should be thankful that the government didn't offer tax breaks for food purchased by one's employer. Or by now, the same deluded people would be screaming that they had a "right" to food (some actually believe this one too, after generations of food stamps). Ditto for rent, phone service, etc., all of which have been tainted at one time or another by government programs to make them nearly "free".

Weaning Americans off these destructive addictions to "free" necessities and "rights" that aren't rights and never were, will be painful, as breaking an addiction always is. But it is no less necessary, if we are to survive as sovereign citizens in a free society.

In the constitution there is no explicit right to privacy, right to a fair trial, right to a Jury of your peers, or the right to healthcare. When someone speaks of the right to healthcare or their right to travel, or have kids, they can't be referring to a right in the constitution because there is no such explicit right. Does that mean we no right to travel or have kids? Of course not. Those are rights because we accept them or the courts rule they are via interpret of the constitution. In 20 years or so, healthcare will certainly be accepted as a right even thou it's not in constitution.

NO one opposes health care for everyone. That said, it's not the job of the government to force us to buy a product like insurance, nor force us to buy coverage we don't need.

 

[hunarcy]

I agree that the right to Health care is hopelessly subjective. However that does not mean that it should not be a right simply because it's hard to define.

As far as other basic necessities, these would fall under the basic right to life mentioned in the declaration of independence. Most courts would agree that a person does have the right to steal a loaf of bread if they are starving, to break into a building if they are in fear of dying from exposure. Most municipal governments do provide food, shelter, clothing and (if it's a necessity) transportation because most people do feel that everyone should have a right to these.

These are not enumerated in the constitution because of the complexity and limits of providing these.

Everyone has a right to seek healthcare. They do not have a right to take from me to pay for another's healthcare.

Insurance companies do it every month.

Insured pay 'hidden tax' for uninsured health care

WASHINGTON — The average U.S. family and their employers paid an extra $1,017 in health care premiums last year to compensate for the uninsured, according to a study to be released Thursday by an advocacy group for health care consumers.

Families USA, which supports expanded health care coverage, found that about 37% of health care costs for people without insurance — or a total of $42.7 billion — went unpaid last year. That cost eventually was shifted to the insured through higher premiums, according to the group.

"I don't think anybody has any idea about how much they are paying because of the need to cover the health care costs of the uninsured," said Ron Pollack, the group's executive director. "This is a hidden tax on all insurance premiums, whether it is paid by business for their work or by families when they purchase their own coverage."

And that'd be a private transaction which I can terminate when I choose by dropping the coverage or changing plans. It does not have the power and weight of government behind it.

 

[RKMBrown]

You have to right to worship as you choose. You have the right to express your political beliefs without limitation.

Those rights are "mentioned" they are not provided by the bill or rights. The Bill of Rights explicitly prohibits the federal government from restricting those rights. There is a fundamental difference between providing a right and restricting someone from taking the right away from you. While you may be somewhat confused in so far as the results of the two views are similar. However, they are not the same. The result of a belief system where our rights are "provided" by government is one in which people assume they have none unless they are listed.

The bill of rights restricts the power of government, it does not provide us with liberty.

You misunderstand my argument. I believe that we are born with these rights and the Bill of Rights merely protect them. I was not understanding your point, but I now believe we are actually saying the same things in different ways.

Agreed, it's tough to discuss stuff where the terminology is whack from the first four words. It should have been called The Bill of Amendments to Protect Rights.

 

[Flopper]

I paid into insurance my whole life but barely used it. Irresponsible people did not. Instead they spent their insurance money on BMWs. Then they got cancer while not having any insurance. Now I get to pay for their mistake by paying much higher premiums so that they can get insured with pre-existing.

With Obamacare, that irresponsibility person is going have to pay for insurance to cover their healthcare problems so the rest of use are not stuck with their healthcare costs. One of primary purposes of Obamacare is to increase the size of the insurance pools by adding healthier people who are not buying insurance now thus bringing down the premiums of others who provide for their healthcare. Initially premiums will be higher until healthier people buy insurance but in a few years premiums will start falling as younger healthier people buy insurance.

ROFL you are completely ignorant with regard to how insurance works and also ignorant as to how people work. Everyone in the nation pretty much is gonna end up dropping insurance until they have expensive health care needs, then they will sign up. Congrats, you idiots have killed the health insurance industry. Prices for individual plans are doubling and trippling this year. Prices for group plans will double and tripple next year. The result is healthy people will leave the group en mass. The result of which will be an annual 20-50% increase until the entire system busts. I give it 4years. Then we will have no choice but to go with single payer. That or the fine has to be moved up to 1k a month. You can't get something for nothing. You dorks are agreeing to hand over hundreds of thousands of dollars to people with pre-existing conditions to save them from the indignity of having to meet means testing by using up their assets first.

This country's health insurance industry is done, put a fork in it.

First off the majority of people in the country are going to carry insurance not because the law requires it but rather because they need the protection for themselves and their family.

I think there will be very few people who drop insurance and sign up when they have expensive health care needs. Here's why. The insurance exchanges will be open only a little over a month a year and if you don't sign up, you'll have to wait up to a year. Also once you sign up for insurance there's a waiting period for the policy to take effect. You might be able to delay treatment for nagging knee problem, but you can't delay treatment for a suspected heart problem. The penalty for not carrying insurance is low in 2014 but increases yearly. For most people who might consider not carrying insurance, it will be about 2,000/yr in a few years. This is quite a bit of money to give the federal government for the privileged of going without healthcare coverage.

Your expectation that the cost of insurance will double and triple and the industry will collapse is certainly not shared by the insurance companies. There stocks have out performed the market over the last 12 months. and there CEO's are looking for substantial growth in earnings over the next 5 years.

 

[Flopper]

Not until ACA came along. Prior to that, all our transactions with insurance companies were voluntary. If we didn't like the way they shared risk, or who they shared it with, we didn't have to do business with them. Congress took away our right to make that choice. And the Court let them.

It sounds like you believe there was a free market for healthcare insurance before the ACA where we could really choose a plan that best met our needs. The fact is 85% percent of the people were covered by either:

• The plan(s) their employer chose for them
• Medicare if they were seniors
• Medicaid if they were poor
• VA if they were Vets.

The rest of us had to deal with the individual healthcare market which in most places only had a few plans available with crappy coverage, sky high premiums, and pre-existing condition limitations.

We have never had an open free market for healthcare insurance.

 

[dblack]

Not until ACA came along. Prior to that, all our transactions with insurance companies were voluntary. If we didn't like the way they shared risk, or who they shared it with, we didn't have to do business with them. Congress took away our right to make that choice. And the Court let them.

It sounds like you believe there was a free market for healthcare insurance before the ACA where we could really choose a plan that best met our needs. The fact is 85% percent of the people were covered by either:

• The plan(s) their employer chose for them
• Medicare if they were seniors
• Medicaid if they were poor
• VA if they were Vets.

The rest of us had to deal with the individual healthcare market which in most places only had a few plans available with crappy coverage, sky high premiums, and pre-existing condition limitations.

We have never had an open free market for healthcare insurance.

You have a point, to be sure. It was nothing like a free market. But we could at least choose not to play at all. Now we've lost that last shred of freedom, thanks to the sellouts in Congress.

 

[Flopper]

Not until ACA came along. Prior to that, all our transactions with insurance companies were voluntary. If we didn't like the way they shared risk, or who they shared it with, we didn't have to do business with them. Congress took away our right to make that choice. And the Court let them.

It sounds like you believe there was a free market for healthcare insurance before the ACA where we could really choose a plan that best met our needs. The fact is 85% percent of the people were covered by either:

• The plan(s) their employer chose for them
• Medicare if they were seniors
• Medicaid if they were poor
• VA if they were Vets.

The rest of us had to deal with the individual healthcare market which in most places only had a few plans available with crappy coverage, sky high premiums, and pre-existing condition limitations.

We have never had an open free market for healthcare insurance.

You have a point, to be sure. It was nothing like a free market. But we could at least choose not to play at all. Now we've lost that last shred of freedom, thanks to the sellouts in Congress.

The idea behind the ACA is to increase the number of people buying individual insurance thus increasing the competition and bringing down insurance costs. This will take years not months. The CBO is projecting 7 million people will move from employer sponsored insurance to the exchanges by 2023. The long term outlook is for continued growth of individual insurance. If this comes about, then we will see increased completion for customers, more choice for buyers, the cost of providing insurance taken off the back of employers, and health insurance will move with the employee from job to job. I think there will be changes in the law that promotes this but that will take time with the highly polarized political environment, I don't think anything in the law will change for a couple of years.

 

[dblack]

It sounds like you believe there was a free market for healthcare insurance before the ACA where we could really choose a plan that best met our needs. The fact is 85% percent of the people were covered by either:

• The plan(s) their employer chose for them
• Medicare if they were seniors
• Medicaid if they were poor
• VA if they were Vets.

The rest of us had to deal with the individual healthcare market which in most places only had a few plans available with crappy coverage, sky high premiums, and pre-existing condition limitations.

We have never had an open free market for healthcare insurance.

You have a point, to be sure. It was nothing like a free market. But we could at least choose not to play at all. Now we've lost that last shred of freedom, thanks to the sellouts in Congress.

The idea behind the ACA is to increase the number of people buying individual insurance thus increasing the competition and bringing down insurance costs.

I understand the idea, and it's just plain wrong. It would be like forcing everyone else to buy the kind of food you like so groceries could deal in higher volumes and bring the prices down. But some people don't like the kind of food you like and you have no fucking right to force them bend to your will for your convenience, regardless of whether you 'vote' on it or not.

 

[RKMBrown]

With Obamacare, that irresponsibility person is going have to pay for insurance to cover their healthcare problems so the rest of use are not stuck with their healthcare costs. One of primary purposes of Obamacare is to increase the size of the insurance pools by adding healthier people who are not buying insurance now thus bringing down the premiums of others who provide for their healthcare. Initially premiums will be higher until healthier people buy insurance but in a few years premiums will start falling as younger healthier people buy insurance.

ROFL you are completely ignorant with regard to how insurance works and also ignorant as to how people work. Everyone in the nation pretty much is gonna end up dropping insurance until they have expensive health care needs, then they will sign up. Congrats, you idiots have killed the health insurance industry. Prices for individual plans are doubling and trippling this year. Prices for group plans will double and tripple next year. The result is healthy people will leave the group en mass. The result of which will be an annual 20-50% increase until the entire system busts. I give it 4years. Then we will have no choice but to go with single payer. That or the fine has to be moved up to 1k a month. You can't get something for nothing. You dorks are agreeing to hand over hundreds of thousands of dollars to people with pre-existing conditions to save them from the indignity of having to meet means testing by using up their assets first.

This country's health insurance industry is done, put a fork in it.

First off the majority of people in the country are going to carry insurance not because the law requires it but rather because they need the protection for themselves and their family.

I think there will be very few people who drop insurance and sign up when they have expensive health care needs. Here's why. The insurance exchanges will be open only a little over a month a year and if you don't sign up, you'll have to wait up to a year. Also once you sign up for insurance there's a waiting period for the policy to take effect. You might be able to delay treatment for nagging knee problem, but you can't delay treatment for a suspected heart problem. The penalty for not carrying insurance is low in 2014 but increases yearly. For most people who might consider not carrying insurance, it will be about 2,000/yr in a few years. This is quite a bit of money to give the federal government for the privileged of going without healthcare coverage.

Your expectation that the cost of insurance will double and triple and the industry will collapse is certainly not shared by the insurance companies. There stocks have out performed the market over the last 12 months. and there CEO's are looking for substantial growth in earnings over the next 5 years.

2k a year is nothing compared to the 20k a year for insurance premiums this beast is gonna be at in two years. Further, you don't have to pay the 2k fine, if you don't have a rebate coming back to you. Why on earth would anyone pay 1500-2k a month for something they don't use?

As to the CEOs.... most could give a shit. They were already wrong because the rates have already doubled and trippled for individual plans. My point is, they will not only double and triple they will continue to increase exponentially. They will take their Obama provided windfall cash rewards from the taxpayers and run for the hills when the companies belly up.

What you have to calculate is what is the most expensive customer. Yeah that person is the only one that will be left, everyone else is gonna leave. Shared pain does not work when people have the option of opting out.

 

[RKMBrown]

Not until ACA came along. Prior to that, all our transactions with insurance companies were voluntary. If we didn't like the way they shared risk, or who they shared it with, we didn't have to do business with them. Congress took away our right to make that choice. And the Court let them.

It sounds like you believe there was a free market for healthcare insurance before the ACA where we could really choose a plan that best met our needs. The fact is 85% percent of the people were covered by either:

• The plan(s) their employer chose for them
• Medicare if they were seniors
• Medicaid if they were poor
• VA if they were Vets.

The rest of us had to deal with the individual healthcare market which in most places only had a few plans available with crappy coverage, sky high premiums, and pre-existing condition limitations.

We have never had an open free market for healthcare insurance.

Corporations don't all provide company managed health care. In fact most corporations shop on the open market. They are exempted from Obama Care this year. Rates for Corporations go up next year. Unless of course Obama exempts them again.