dagblog - Comments for "The Times "Pity Party""

Would, then, the Republicans

Resistance — Tue, 31 Dec 2013 06:50:05 +0000

In reply to Would, then, the Republicans

Would, then, the Republicans have put their prints all over single payer?

Maybe the progressives would have gotten what they wanted all along, without trying to kiss up to the obstructionists, who told us to take a hike anyway.

WE the people could have defended against the sole Socialism criticism; now we have to defend against the Socialism charges anyway, along with the privacy issues.

Would, then, the Republicans

Peter Schwartz — Wed, 25 Dec 2013 19:41:12 +0000

In reply to There was a crime committed

Would, then, the Republicans have put their prints all over single payer?

And had single payer gone through, would they not have "warned the people" about imminent socialism just as Reagan did with Medicare back in the 1960s?

The Republicans didn't "warn" anyone about anything. All they did was sing that old Groucho Marx song: "Whatever it is, I'm against it."

"...if you think life is

Peter Schwartz — Wed, 25 Dec 2013 19:35:37 +0000

In reply to The Times "Pity Party"

"...if you think life is rough with a six figure salary, imagine like at $40,000 a year, which is what most people live with."

This is almost a meaningless discussion. Is $100,000 a lot or a little for someone living in Manhattan? Is it adequate or is it inadequate?

It all depends on the life you want to lead. If you want to have a family of four and you want to send your kids to private school, then maybe it's not enough.

But who ever said that having a family of four, sending your kids to private schools, and living in Manhattan was some kind of necessity?

My brother lives at 90th and Columbus and makes about $40,000 and does "fine." But that's because he's made certain choices which anyone else could make if they wanted to do "fine" on the Upper West Side making $40,000.

If you keep the choices static and drop someone's income from $100K to $40K, then they are probably going to get the bends unless, at $100K, they are living way below their means. Even so, the inability to save what they're used to saving will give them the willies, I'm sure.

Keep the choices static and up someone's income from $40K to $100K, then they will feel like instant millionaires unless their spending habits also adjust upwards proportionately, which they may well do.

It's true that $100K "doesn't go far" in Manhattan, but the easy cure for that is not to live in Manhattan. It's also true that 100K goes a LOT further in Manhattan than $40K goes.

"Here they are with a front

Anonymous PS — Wed, 25 Dec 2013 03:27:08 +0000

In reply to The Times "Pity Party"

"Here they are with a front page story telling us about the tragic situation of the Chapmans, a New Hampshire couple making $100,000 a year who will have to spend $1,000 a month for insurance with Obamacare. This would come to 12 percent of their income. The piece tells readers:

“Experts consider health insurance unaffordable once it exceeds 10 percent of annual income.”

"That’s interesting. If we go to the Kaiser Family Foundation website we find that the average employee contribution for an employer provided family plan is $4,240. The average employer contribution is $11,240. That gives us a total of $15,470. Most economists would say that we should treat the employers payment as a cost to the worker since in general employers are no more happy to pay money to health insurance companies than to their workers. If they didn’t pay this money as health insurance then they would be paying it to their workers in wages."

(Sorry. Don't know why this is formatting in this way.) The above is Dean Baker's quote from Kos. I would say two things about this: 1) 12% isn't that far off of 10%. And, assuming that they're getting better insurance--a point they seem to allude to--the extra 2% doesn't strike me as a bad deal.

2) Whether the extra $11,240 would be paid to the employee, as Baker assumes and you question, is beside the point. The average worker's insurance costs $15,470 however that cost gets divvied up. Under Chapman's ACA plan, it's going to cost $12,000 for what we can only assume (perhaps incorrectly) is equivalent or better coverage. (Not all employer-provider coverage is all that good as we can see with the mini-meds offered by places like McDs.) And, as you hint, he's stuck at his job if he wants to get his illusory discount. He couldn't go out on his own (pre-ACA) if he wanted to keep his "cheap" insurance. And if the employee were to get some of this money in higher salary, then the point is even stronger, IMO.

One other point that I haven't seen mentioned elsewhere. The whole idea behind the exchanges is that they are marketplaces where insurance companies would be competing for the individual's business against other insurance companies. Well, making these marketplaces work takes time.

Right now, insurance companies are hedging their bets, because they have to set prices in advance (right now for 2015, I believe) without knowing who or how many people or other companies will participate in the exchanges. They haven't felt the sting of other companies stealing their customers by giving them a better deal, etc. They haven't had to sharpen their pencils to steal other companies' customers. And so on. Market places take time to get going and work well.

In my experience, they are

Anonymous PS — Wed, 25 Dec 2013 03:06:37 +0000

In reply to Also, here's my prediction

In my experience, they are NOT "mostly HMOs."

There were a lot of PPOs when I signed on. And not all that expensive.

Ninety percent of the

Anonymous PS — Wed, 25 Dec 2013 03:03:05 +0000

In reply to Where the NYT is often

Ninety percent of the country’s uninsured population have incomes that fall below that level, according to one recent analysis. As a result, the subsidies “are well targeted for people who are uninsured or underinsured,” said Sara R. Collins, an executive with the Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation that finances health policy research. “That is really where the firepower of the law is focused.”

Even before the announcement on Thursday giving people with canceled plans the option of buying catastrophic coverage, the law permitted people to select such plans if the price of premiums in their area exceeded 8 percent of their income. The catastrophic plans are often less expensive and include three doctor visits and free preventive care, but require someone to pay almost all of the medical bills up to a certain amount, which is usually several thousand dollars.

You're cherry picking the article...for one...as is clear from the above. In fact, the article itself is sensationalizing a phenomenon whose prevalence, they admit, they have no knowledge of. How many people are we talking about?

For two, one relatively easy solution to this would be to eliminate cliffs and make cut-offs gradual.

Your last paragraph is pure

Peter — Tue, 24 Dec 2013 18:55:16 +0000

In reply to Also, here's my prediction

Your last paragraph is pure fantasy, Art or you have been hitting the eggnog a bit too hard. Single Payer or at least the Public Option were very popular when this dog of a program was being constructed and the Ruling Class ignored the public then and even arrested some of them for begging to be heard so why should they listen now or any time in the future. Thinking that Hillary, even with the smiley face, will do anything vaguely Socialist like Single Payer is just begging to be disappointed again.

There was a crime committed

Resistance — Mon, 23 Dec 2013 23:56:12 +0000

In reply to Since Obamacare is a

There was a crime committed and the republicans wanted no prints on this.

Did they not warn the people?

Single payer would have protected our privacy; something the Obama administration tramples and scoffs at.

Give up your right to privacy and this government will give us Health care?

'Ease the pain the economy

ANON.NCD — Mon, 23 Dec 2013 23:03:08 +0000

In reply to Single payer seems more

'Ease the pain the economy inflicts on us' sums it up alright.

Americans wanted single payer. Obama's weakness in not holding out for at least baby steps toward single payer gave us the complex labyrinth of ACA.

Single payer seems more

Aaron Carine — Mon, 23 Dec 2013 21:42:24 +0000

In reply to (1) 72% of Americans polled

Single payer seems more sensible to me than Obama's effort to force the market to work the way he wants it to. Such schemes usually don't work. The traditional social welfare state isn't an attempt to control the economy, but to ease the pain the economy inflicts on us.