4 ms·

>universal affordable health care I'm not so sure about the affordable part. Maybe all I see is people posting letters about their rates going up though. What

>universal affordable health care I'm not so sure about the affordable part. Maybe all I see is people posting letters about their rates going up though. What is the argument against that from people who still support this legislation? Is it denied that prices have gone up in general or accepted and justified because of increased benefits on the plans?

darkandbrooding 13y ago
If all you see are reports about people's rates going up, then you are in a filter bubble - just like everyone else who consumes a majority of their news through personalized online sources. There are people in neighboring filter bubbles whose ACA-related stories are almost entirely about people saving money because of the new exchanges.
- beauzero 13y ago
  Please post links with people saving money. I have yet to see one that was genuine. I have seen actual evidence of people getting coverage that could not before.
  - mahranch 13y ago
    A search on google for the term "how obamacare has helped people" provides over 24 million results. Here are couple reports you can read at your leisure: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/six-stories-of-obamacare-already-making-a-difference-20131016 http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/six-stories-of-oba... http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/10/ted-cruz-obamacare-helps-texas http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/10/ted-cruz-obamaca... http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/05/i-am-obamacare-_n_4046470.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/05/i-am-obamacare-_n_4...
  - gnaritas 13y ago
    > I have yet to see one that was genuine. Because you don't want to, it's as simple as that. If you were actually looking there's plenty of stories to find.
dragonwriter 13y ago
> Maybe all I see is people posting letters about their rates going up though. What is the argument against that from people who still support this legislation? That what you see is not representative, because along with those I see plenty of people that could not get private insurance at any price (e.g., for whom the cost was infinite) due to preexisting conditions that can get health insurance because of the ACA. > Is it denied that prices have gone up in general For like benefits, costs have gone down since the ACA was introduced, in part because of parts of the ACA that went into effect earlier, like the limit on profits which required refunding excess premiums (because health insurance, even prior to the ACA, was not an ideal competitive market but an oligopolistic one in which rents were being extracted, and this was a limit on the rents that could be extracted.) With the minimum benefit levels effective for non-grandfathered plans some low-cost, low-benefit plans are going away. This, on its own, would increase the minimum price of private insurance after this stage of implementation of the ACA above what it was prior to this stage of the implementation. In addition, changes to rules on what factors can be used in price setting have shifted costs so that, compared to what they would be without those rule changes, prices for plans for young, currently healthy individuals have gone up, while prices for everyone else have (again, considering only the effect of that rules change) gone down. Expanding the size of risk pools as the mandate does should slightly reduce overall prices, but that may be a lagging effect since it can't be factored in fully without a clear picture of the magnitude and how many people will opt out in favor of paying the penalties for non-insurance. Additionally, subsidies have been made available to people at the low end of the scale to which the individual mandate applies; this doesn't help with total costs (ignoring the effect that coverage vs. non-coverage has on total healthcare costs, which is significant in the long term, but not necessarily the short term) but does help with affordability. Even moreso, except in states that opted out of it, Medicaid expansion means a lot of people are getting coverage with no out-of-pocket cost that could not afford any coverage before. But, yes, the people that could afford insurance and who paid the least for the coverage they were getting because of youth and current health are often going to be paying more.
mkramlich 13y ago
> Maybe all I see is people posting letters about their rates going up though. a data point: I also see a lot of people talking about God and Jesus and how they have a personal relationship with them, etc, etc. Personally I've never seen them. I have a guess as to the status of things in those situations. Also I see a lot of "people" saying how Justin Bieber is, "like, so cute. OMG. he's so hawt! and a genius! omg. like, amazing. omg. omg". So clearly, this must be factually true, correct?
- praxeologist 13y ago
  >So clearly, this must be factually true, correct? I didn't say that. You shouldn't try to put words in someone else's mouth. I was mainly looking for some credible, unbiased facts. A lot of the positive anecdotes seem to be ignoring price reductions due to tax credits or something but I am not sure. Huffington Post's story has a family of 5 getting insurance for $100-something, while I see people saying their family went from like $600 to $1,000+.
  - mkramlich 13y ago
    > I didn't say that. You shouldn't try to put words in someone else's mouth. I didn't say you said that. boggle My point was to bring up the general phenomenon of: -- some people are stupid -- some people are ignorant (and/or draw conclusions from a very limited or ephemeral data set) -- some people are liars -- some people are malicious -- some people spin -- some "people", on the web, don't exist, or they're sock puppets -- some people have subjective tastes ("Burgers taste bad." --> Therefore, all burgers taste bad for everybody. What?)

darkandbrooding 13y ago

If all you see are reports about people's rates going up, then you are in a filter bubble - just like everyone else who consumes a majority of their news through personalized online sources. There are people in neighboring filter bubbles whose ACA-related stories are almost entirely about people saving money because of the new exchanges.

beauzero 13y ago
Please post links with people saving money. I have yet to see one that was genuine. I have seen actual evidence of people getting coverage that could not before.
- mahranch 13y ago
  A search on google for the term "how obamacare has helped people" provides over 24 million results. Here are couple reports you can read at your leisure: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/six-stories-of-obamacare-already-making-a-difference-20131016 http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/six-stories-of-oba... http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/10/ted-cruz-obamacare-helps-texas http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/10/ted-cruz-obamaca... http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/05/i-am-obamacare-_n_4046470.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/05/i-am-obamacare-_n_4...
- gnaritas 13y ago
  > I have yet to see one that was genuine. Because you don't want to, it's as simple as that. If you were actually looking there's plenty of stories to find.

dragonwriter 13y ago

> Maybe all I see is people posting letters about their rates going up though. What is the argument against that from people who still support this legislation? That what you see is not representative, because along with those I see plenty of people that could not get private insurance at any price (e.g., for whom the cost was infinite) due to preexisting conditions that can get health insurance because of the ACA. > Is it denied that prices have gone up in general For like benefits, costs have gone down since the ACA was introduced, in part because of parts of the ACA that went into effect earlier, like the limit on profits which required refunding excess premiums (because health insurance, even prior to the ACA, was not an ideal competitive market but an oligopolistic one in which rents were being extracted, and this was a limit on the rents that could be extracted.) With the minimum benefit levels effective for non-grandfathered plans some low-cost, low-benefit plans are going away. This, on its own, would increase the minimum price of private insurance after this stage of implementation of the ACA above what it was prior to this stage of the implementation. In addition, changes to rules on what factors can be used in price setting have shifted costs so that, compared to what they would be without those rule changes, prices for plans for young, currently healthy individuals have gone up, while prices for everyone else have (again, considering only the effect of that rules change) gone down. Expanding the size of risk pools as the mandate does should slightly reduce overall prices, but that may be a lagging effect since it can't be factored in fully without a clear picture of the magnitude and how many people will opt out in favor of paying the penalties for non-insurance. Additionally, subsidies have been made available to people at the low end of the scale to which the individual mandate applies; this doesn't help with total costs (ignoring the effect that coverage vs. non-coverage has on total healthcare costs, which is significant in the long term, but not necessarily the short term) but does help with affordability. Even moreso, except in states that opted out of it, Medicaid expansion means a lot of people are getting coverage with no out-of-pocket cost that could not afford any coverage before. But, yes, the people that could afford insurance and who paid the least for the coverage they were getting because of youth and current health are often going to be paying more.

mkramlich 13y ago

> Maybe all I see is people posting letters about their rates going up though. a data point: I also see a lot of people talking about God and Jesus and how they have a personal relationship with them, etc, etc. Personally I've never seen them. I have a guess as to the status of things in those situations. Also I see a lot of "people" saying how Justin Bieber is, "like, so cute. OMG. he's so hawt! and a genius! omg. like, amazing. omg. omg". So clearly, this must be factually true, correct?

praxeologist 13y ago
>So clearly, this must be factually true, correct? I didn't say that. You shouldn't try to put words in someone else's mouth. I was mainly looking for some credible, unbiased facts. A lot of the positive anecdotes seem to be ignoring price reductions due to tax credits or something but I am not sure. Huffington Post's story has a family of 5 getting insurance for $100-something, while I see people saying their family went from like $600 to $1,000+.
- mkramlich 13y ago
  > I didn't say that. You shouldn't try to put words in someone else's mouth. I didn't say you said that. boggle My point was to bring up the general phenomenon of: -- some people are stupid -- some people are ignorant (and/or draw conclusions from a very limited or ephemeral data set) -- some people are liars -- some people are malicious -- some people spin -- some "people", on the web, don't exist, or they're sock puppets -- some people have subjective tastes ("Burgers taste bad." --> Therefore, all burgers taste bad for everybody. What?)