4 ms·

According to the German Wikipedia article every Dutch person is required by law to have a "legally defined" healthcare contract. Sounds quite different to the U

According to the German Wikipedia article every Dutch person is required by law to have a "legally defined" healthcare contract. Sounds quite different to the US system.

283627283637 7y ago
At face value, this is almost exactly what Obama did. It killed most of the cheap options for people who just want emergency coverage and was essentially a tax in disguise which many Americans objected to.
- PaulDavisThe1st 7y ago
  This is false. "Catastrophic coverage" was ended because of the sheer wealth of data that these insurance policies did not in fact provide their customers with what the customers were expecting. That is: a person with such a policy who unfortunately suffered a major accident or severe illness would find the insurance company wriggling out of any financial responsibility. The rules were tightened up, and without any explict legal language banning them, insurance companies dropped such policies because they knew they could not satisfy the new rules requiring actual coverage.
  - 283627283637 7y ago
    I'm not contesting that there were people who didn't understand their plans, there are people who don't understand their plans now. That doesn't change that they were low cost insurance products that could be combined with an untaxed HSA to produce a comparatively strong safety net at a low price for the consumer. It also doesn't change the all around price inflation that happened following the market consolidation that came in wake of the changes you mention.
creato 7y ago
It sounds quite similar to the Obamacare individual mandate. Of course that's gone now...
- olliej 7y ago
  private health insurance in the US is (even under Obamacare) expensive, and the deductibles are high if you're on those cheap plans. Under an Obamacare cheapest possible insurance option you're not going to be bankrupted by (for example) a heart attack, but you'll still be paying the bill for a long time. That ignores hospitals like SF general that charge you directly (and are out of network) so you can still be trivially bankrupted.

According to the German Wikipedia article every Dutch person is required by law to have a "legally defined" healthcare contract. Sounds quite different to the US system.

283627283637 7y ago

At face value, this is almost exactly what Obama did. It killed most of the cheap options for people who just want emergency coverage and was essentially a tax in disguise which many Americans objected to.

PaulDavisThe1st 7y ago
This is false. "Catastrophic coverage" was ended because of the sheer wealth of data that these insurance policies did not in fact provide their customers with what the customers were expecting. That is: a person with such a policy who unfortunately suffered a major accident or severe illness would find the insurance company wriggling out of any financial responsibility. The rules were tightened up, and without any explict legal language banning them, insurance companies dropped such policies because they knew they could not satisfy the new rules requiring actual coverage.
- 283627283637 7y ago
  I'm not contesting that there were people who didn't understand their plans, there are people who don't understand their plans now. That doesn't change that they were low cost insurance products that could be combined with an untaxed HSA to produce a comparatively strong safety net at a low price for the consumer. It also doesn't change the all around price inflation that happened following the market consolidation that came in wake of the changes you mention.

creato 7y ago

It sounds quite similar to the Obamacare individual mandate. Of course that's gone now...

olliej 7y ago
private health insurance in the US is (even under Obamacare) expensive, and the deductibles are high if you're on those cheap plans. Under an Obamacare cheapest possible insurance option you're not going to be bankrupted by (for example) a heart attack, but you'll still be paying the bill for a long time. That ignores hospitals like SF general that charge you directly (and are out of network) so you can still be trivially bankrupted.