Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill

[ABX]

Tell me how this was a repeal again?

[Bigun]

Every person on this planet has a pre existing condition and will die as a result.

[thackney]

I wish both House and Senate leaders would insert a provision that directly refers to the provision within the Constitution that gives Congress the authority to pass this horrible legislation.

There is a constitutional amendment I would support. 

Congress will make no law without including the passage of Constitutional authority for such law.

[Jazzhead]

Coverage for pre-existing conditions combined with no penalty for dropping insurance is a way to break the insurances companies.

Can you imagine not needing to buy car insurance until after the wreck and still being covered?

...not buying home insurance until after the fire/flood and still being covered?

...life insurance purchased after death?

Quite correct - although I prefer the House bill's approach of requiring insurers to cover folks, but at a higher premium cost for a period of time.   Or allowing insurers the option,  instead of denying coverage entirely, to issue policies that don't cover a pre-existing condition.

Free riders are the bane of affordable insurance.   Grappling with the problem of free riders was at the heart of the individual mandate, which of course offended many as a means of "forcing" them  to join the risk pool with the rest of us.

"Community rating" only works if the risk pool includes the entire community.   Selfish types who forego coverage until after they're sick burden hospitals with higher costs, and the rest of us with higher premiums. 

In the end,  while I'd prefer a different approach than what the Senate bill takes,  a strong disincentive to free-ride is crucial if we are to avoid single payer.   Bang 'em hard.   

[Jazzhead]

Tell me how this was a repeal again?

It's not.  It's a reform.  But that doesn't mean it shouldn't be supported.   From this morning's WSJ:

These [the Senate bill's reforms] are enormous conservative policy victories, even if they aren't everything we or other free-marketeers would like.  Democrats built the entitlement state piecemeal over decades, and it will have to be reformed in pieces that are politically sustainable.

  The larger and rarer opportunity is to show that conservative ideas can work in health care.   More progress is possible as voters come to trust Republican solutions, but not if the GOP now panics into defeat. . . . Every consequential legislative reform is difficult, but the GOP anxiety over repeal and replace is excessive.  They should have more confidence in their convictions and how their solutions can improve American lives.

[Jazzhead]

Covering preexisting conditions isn't possible with insurance - because it isn't insurance anymore if you do. It is no longer based on risk and it just becomes a common pool everyone's health care is paid from regardless of risk. And that is single payer in the end. So if you want preexisting conditions to be covered you also want single payer because that is the consequence.

QFT.   A strong penalty to discourage free riders is actually effective insurance against single payer.   

[Jazzhead]

Right... so if you fall on hard times and lose coverage because you failed to make your payment for 90 days, Now you get *none* for six (more) months!

Boy you sure sound like a Dem.   

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

Boy you sure sound like a Dem.

Welp. Plenty of illogic on this point to go around, by both liberals and "conservatives".

Why on earth would anyone spend money on insurance when they could simply buy it  when they got sick?

Without some sort of penalty for not buying insurance the whole thing fails.

[Smokin Joe]

QFT.   A strong penalty to discourage free riders is actually effective insurance against single payer.

I gotta clear the air here. From the time I was 14 I have paid taxes. I have worked all but a couple of those years, and the couple I had off were involuntary separations from employment. Some employers had insurance plans, some did not. I paid into those who did, and when self-employed paid into my own.

This legislation, this ACA, removed my insurance from the marketplace and left two alternatives at a bad time:

Either something that cost nearly FIVE times as much, but had a deductible that was higher than the deductible and co-pay maximum under my old plan, or do without.

That left me with a decision: Pay three and a half times what my family's average out of pocket medical expenses would be for an insurance policy that left me on the hook for an additional nearly twice my family's average medical expenses would be (cost five times average annual medical expenses) of just pay the bill when I needed services. Frankly, that was a no-brainer. There has been no free ride. The bills have been paid, out of pocket.

But I damnsure resent being called a "free rider" when the government shot my horse.

[Silver Pines]

But Team Republican, y'all....better than Hillary, blah, blah...

[jmyrlefuller]

I gotta clear the air here. From the time I was 14 I have paid taxes. I have worked all but a couple of those years, and the couple I had off were involuntary separations from employment. Some employers had insurance plans, some did not. I paid into those who did, and when self-employed paid into my own.

This legislation, this ACA, removed my insurance from the marketplace and left two alternatives at a bad time:

Either something that cost nearly FIVE times as much, but had a deductible that was higher than the deductible and co-pay maximum under my old plan, or do without.

That left me with a decision: Pay three and a half times what my family's average out of pocket medical expenses would be for an insurance policy that left me on the hook for an additional nearly twice my family's average medical expenses would be (cost five times average annual medical expenses) of just pay the bill when I needed services. Frankly, that was a no-brainer. There has been no free ride. The bills have been paid, out of pocket.

But I damnsure resent being called a "free rider" when the government shot my horse.

 

[roamer_1]

Boy you sure sound like a Dem.

You're projecting again, I see.

[roamer_1]

Welp. Plenty of illogic on this point to go around, by both liberals and "conservatives".

Why on earth would anyone spend money on insurance when they could simply buy it  when they got sick?

Without some sort of penalty for not buying insurance the whole thing fails.

But the penalty proscribed assures no one will buy the insurance, or re-up after a lapse.
If you hit hard times, and can't keep up with the payments, and lose your coverage, by the time you could have resumed again, you're not even eligible again for six more months, whereupon you have to pay an exorbitant premium for some further period of time...

Who the hell is going to do that when you are barely affording this pile of crap in the first place?

When this exact scenario happened to me back when we had a free market in health care, when I re-signed, there was no penalty. there was no significant increase in cost. The actual insurance kicked in immediately, and the only difference was that pre-existing was not covered for 1 year.

[RoosGirl]

I gotta clear the air here. From the time I was 14 I have paid taxes. I have worked all but a couple of those years, and the couple I had off were involuntary separations from employment. Some employers had insurance plans, some did not. I paid into those who did, and when self-employed paid into my own.

This legislation, this ACA, removed my insurance from the marketplace and left two alternatives at a bad time:

Either something that cost nearly FIVE times as much, but had a deductible that was higher than the deductible and co-pay maximum under my old plan, or do without.

That left me with a decision: Pay three and a half times what my family's average out of pocket medical expenses would be for an insurance policy that left me on the hook for an additional nearly twice my family's average medical expenses would be (cost five times average annual medical expenses) of just pay the bill when I needed services. Frankly, that was a no-brainer. There has been no free ride. The bills have been paid, out of pocket.

But I damnsure resent being called a "free rider" when the government shot my horse.

After all the gov't fails, they still have no idea about the Law of Unintended Consequences.  Our gov't, as it runs now, is a fail; the unintended consequences of sticking their damn noses in where they never should have been.

[roamer_1]

That left me with a decision: Pay three and a half times what my family's average out of pocket medical expenses would be for an insurance policy that left me on the hook for an additional nearly twice my family's average medical expenses would be (cost five times average annual medical expenses) of just pay the bill when I needed services. Frankly, that was a no-brainer. There has been no free ride. The bills have been paid, out of pocket.

Try one of the various Christian Brotherhood systems... That is what my brother is doing, and he is paying out about what he was prior to this debacle... The 'premium' is not a fixed fee though. it wavers a bit... everyone is just pitching in in real-time to pay each other's medical bills, with under 10% going to the company to administer. He put in a claim earlier this year, and received 1k more than he needed to pay himself off... Of course, he took what he needed and rolled the rest right back in.

Looks like a good way.

[thackney]

...pre-existing was not covered for 1 year.

That was key to making it work in the private system.  It prevented most people from dropping insurance for the purpose of waiting until they were deeply sick to sign back up.

[roamer_1]

That was key to making it work in the private system.  It prevented most people from dropping insurance for the purpose of waiting until they were deeply sick to sign back up.

So what you get instead, is a continuous penalty that cannot be paid, which will cause people not to sign up until they're deeply sick.

I don't see any difference.

[thackney]

So what you get instead, is a continuous penalty that cannot be paid, which will cause people not to sign up until they're deeply sick.

I don't see any difference.

I agree the proposed plan, and the current Obama care, are not real improvements.

Government is the source of the problem.  Believing they will also be the solution seems silly.  They need to become farther removed, not deeper involved.

[roamer_1]

I agree the proposed plan, and the current Obama care, are not real improvements.

Government is the source of the problem.  Believing they will also be the solution seems silly.  They need to become farther removed, not deeper involved.

That's right.

[txradioguy]

Every person on this planet has a pre existing condition and will die as a result.

Yup your path to dying begins the moment you're born.

[LateForLunch]

I gotta clear the air here. From the time I was 14 I have paid taxes. I have worked all but a couple of those years, and the couple I had off were involuntary separations from employment. Some employers had insurance plans, some did not. I paid into those who did, and when self-employed paid into my own.

This legislation, this ACA, removed my insurance from the marketplace and left two alternatives at a bad time:

Either something that cost nearly FIVE times as much, but had a deductible that was higher than the deductible and co-pay maximum under my old plan, or do without.

That left me with a decision: Pay three and a half times what my family's average out of pocket medical expenses would be for an insurance policy that left me on the hook for an additional nearly twice my family's average medical expenses would be (cost five times average annual medical expenses) of just pay the bill when I needed services. Frankly, that was a no-brainer. There has been no free ride. The bills have been paid, out of pocket.

But I damnsure resent being called a "free rider" when the government shot my horse.

One of the best posts on the thread, IMO.

[XenaLee]

I gotta clear the air here. From the time I was 14 I have paid taxes. I have worked all but a couple of those years, and the couple I had off were involuntary separations from employment. Some employers had insurance plans, some did not. I paid into those who did, and when self-employed paid into my own.

This legislation, this ACA, removed my insurance from the marketplace and left two alternatives at a bad time:

Either something that cost nearly FIVE times as much, but had a deductible that was higher than the deductible and co-pay maximum under my old plan, or do without.

That left me with a decision: Pay three and a half times what my family's average out of pocket medical expenses would be for an insurance policy that left me on the hook for an additional nearly twice my family's average medical expenses would be (cost five times average annual medical expenses) of just pay the bill when I needed services. Frankly, that was a no-brainer. There has been no free ride. The bills have been paid, out of pocket.

But I damnsure resent being called a "free rider" when the government shot my horse.

Then again..... being called a "free rider" by a stuckonstupid commie is probably a badge of honor, when you think about it. 

[EC]

Psst. Vote's been postponed. http://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php/topic,269266.msg1370401/topicseen.html#msg1370401

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

Psst. Vote's been postponed. http://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php/topic,269266.msg1370401/topicseen.html#msg1370401

Kick that can, GOP.

[EC]

Kick that can, GOP.

Meh. When in doubt, stick with what you know. They're good at can kicking.