Insurers claim they lost 15 billion on Obamacare

[Mountainmanbob]

So they are suing our government for the 15 billion dollars they lost. This will go down in history as one of the largest lawsuits ever.
M-Bob

ObamaCare: Insurers Demand Billions In Bailouts

Obamacare was fake and we got fooled by Mr. Obama.

((Obamacare how embarrassing)).

And we the people pick up the bill.

 

[camille70]

Was this before or after Marco Rubio messed up the risk corridors?

 

[Zoii]

MBob. My parents work in health care and have an objective view of Obamacare (as Australians they arent bothered by your politics). The view from their perspective is it provided a service for those that had none which was a very large percentage of your fellow Americans in need. You may be somewhat harsh on that program.

 

[Mountainmanbob]

Obamacare will go down in history as one of America's largest disasters.

Before Obamacare I knew plenty of people that had no insurance yet when they went to the hospital they were never turned away and were treated. Many with operations and all for free.

We should have just expanded our free clinic system which had been working fairly well for decades.

M-Bob

 

[Nithavela]

Won't anyone think of the shareholders?!

 

[Kentonio]

Obamacare will go down in history as one of America's largest disasters.

Before Obamacare I knew plenty of people that had no insurance yet when they went to the hospital they were never turned away and were treated. Many with operations and all for free.

We should have just expanded our free clinic system which had been working fairly well for decades.

M-Bob

Hi Bob, what about the estimated 40,000 people every year who died from preventable illness due to a lack of healthcare pre-Obamacare?

 

[Mountainmanbob]

Hi Bob, what about the estimated 40,000 people every year who died from preventable illness due to a lack of healthcare pre-Obamacare?

What did they not go to the hospital?

Hospitals did not turn people away that did not have insurance.

The were also county hospitals back then that gave free care to everybody in need.

Obamacare is a disaster based on lies.

M-Bob

 

[Nithavela]

What did they not go to the hospital?

Hospitals did not turn people away that did not have insurance.

Hospitals in the US are only required to stabilisise people, which is no big help for people with cancer of other chronic diseases. They still need to pay the bill for that, or go bankrupt, which for people with dependants might just be a fate worse than death.

 

[PeachyKeane]

Obamacare will go down in history as one of America's largest disasters.

Before Obamacare I knew plenty of people that had no insurance yet when they went to the hospital they were never turned away and were treated. Many with operations and all for free.

We should have just expanded our free clinic system which had been working fairly well for decades.

M-Bob

I admire how the OP is quite concerned about the insurance industry's financial woes when the thread was started at 5:38, but 52 minutes later is advising us to not even get insurance because hospitals give away surgeries and cancer treatment for free...

...which I also will require a citation for.

 

[PeachyKeane]

What did they not go to the hospital?

Hospitals did not turn people away that did not have insurance.

They do still charge you for the care.

The were also county hospitals back then that gave free care to everybody in need.

...and that would be why the cost of healthcare is so high.

Obamacare is a disaster based on lies.

M-Bob

You're not being particularly honest with us either.

 

[DZoolander]

Obamacare will go down in history as one of America's largest disasters.

Before Obamacare I knew plenty of people that had no insurance yet when they went to the hospital they were never turned away and were treated. Many with operations and all for free.

We should have just expanded our free clinic system which had been working fairly well for decades.

M-Bob

Nothing is for free. If they were unable to pay - then the cost of their treatment was passed on to those of us that actually had insurance. The growing numbers of uninsured over the past 20-30 years was one of the primary reasons for the increases in price of insurance, and as a result the growing number of uninsured (yeah, it's cyclical like that), that prompted the ACA. It's also the reason why healthcare reform has been an issue for nearly 6 decades.

Heck - Teddy Roosevelt was one of the first people to propose a national healthcare system.

Of course that then begs the question of why rates went up even more after the ACA was passed. THAT answer is due to a combination of things (like health insurance companies being compelled to provide insurance that actually covered things, the effects that subsidization has on the market, etc).

But it's bizarre to me to hear people talk about how "uninsured people were cared for beforehand" - without talking about that's impact upon the cost to those of us that were insured...and it also ignores the reality that in many cases no...uninsured people weren't cared for.

Sure - if you broke your leg and showed up at the ER - they would take care of you. But, say you had cancer and needed chemo, nah, that wasn't happening. lol

 

[Tiberius Lee]

Obamacare will go down in history as one of America's largest disasters.

Before Obamacare I knew plenty of people that had no insurance yet when they went to the hospital they were never turned away and were treated. Many with operations and all for free.

We should have just expanded our free clinic system which had been working fairly well for decades.

M-Bob

Bob, there were no free service at the hospital. Yes the law require that hospital don’t turn away sick people, so hospital would stabilize someone who came to ER and sent them home. The “free” service you are talking, that was passed down to those who have insurance, hospital never lost a dime because they provided service to those who doesn’t have insurance. This is why medical service was going up and up every year because medical service needed to pass down the loss to those who has insurance.

 

[DZoolander]

As for them taking "15 billion in losses" - to be honest - I take all of the stuff I hear coming from health insurance and big pharma with a huge grain of salt. Until they show their books to actually show the losses and explain them - in a market where they are being paid thousands of dollars per month in premiums to cover families...combined with the huge number of people that never even come close to meeting their deductibles...I have a healthy suspicion.

For example big pharma. They'll tell you "It costs $3 Billion to take a drug to market!"

Then you ask them to explain that.

"Well, it's a combination of the cost of the development of the drug, combined with the cost of every other drug that didn't make it to market, combined with the opportunity cost of the investors."

Of course I'll accept the cost of the specific drug in their computation. I'll even allow them to throw in the cost of other failed products (although I do that with NO other market sectors...your bad decisions are your bad decisions... but pharma is important enough that I'll allow it)..

But - opportunity cost of the investors? That's where it gets dicey. Are you only including the opportunity cost for this drug? Or are you including the opportunity cost of every other drug as well? And how exactly are you computing the opportunity cost? What alternate investment are you judging it against? Are you being conservative in your comparison and picking an alternate investment with an average rate of return - or are you picking some wildly high return alternate investment?

And...opportunity cost if fairly balanced needs to also factor in the rate of return going forward relative to other investment opportunities. If it doesn't, it's a dishonest adjustment.

There's a lot of gamesmanship that goes on with this type of stuff...and they ain't exactly the most honest people out there. lol

 

[whatbogsends]

Obamacare will go down in history as one of America's largest disasters.

Before Obamacare I knew plenty of people that had no insurance yet when they went to the hospital they were never turned away and were treated. Many with operations and all for free.

We should have just expanded our free clinic system which had been working fairly well for decades.

M-Bob

There's no such thing as "free". If it was free for the person receiving treatment (a claim of which i'm highly skeptical), someone else was footing the bill.

 

[CRAZY_CAT_WOMAN]

What did they not go to the hospital?

Hospitals did not turn people away that did not have insurance.

The were also county hospitals back then that gave free care to everybody in need.

Obamacare is a disaster based on lies.

M-Bob

The county hospital doesn't give away free service. Tax payers typically pay for people on medical. The only medical applied to was pregnant women and maybe women on welfare , their kids and the disability. And people on Medicare. If it wasn't for Obama most poor people couldn get medical. Also county hospitals seem to cost a lot. Atleast thats what I notices when family members got their bills. From county hospital.

 

[Steve Petersen]

Was this before or after Marco Rubio messed up the risk corridors?

Yeah, he did that all by himself. The rest of the Senate just sat back and watched.

 

[trunks2k]

(a claim of which i'm highly skeptical), someone else was footing the bill.

As you should be. It's more that the hospital is required to stabilize the patient regardless of ability to pay. Then the patient is billed. If the patient can't afford to pay, in the best case scenario, the hospital works out some deal with them and passes the cost of whatever the patient didn't pay on to other patients. In the worst case scenario, the patient gets sent to collections, suffers a big hit to their credit, and the cost of the patient not paying is passed onto other patients.

 

[Vylo]

Part of this thread needs to be emphasized even more:

Hospitals are only required to stabilize patients who can't pay, and they used our money (assuming we are all people paying into this system) to do it.

They stabilize them. Then again because the problem wasn't fixed. And again. And again. Again. Another time. Finally they die.

You just paid hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars for someone to still die (likely with a lot of pain and suffering mixed in), instead of paying less to simply fix it, even less than that by heading off the condition before it came to fruition.

This is not financially, nor morally sound.

 

[jayem]

What did they not go to the hospital?

Hospitals did not turn people away that did not have insurance.

The were also county hospitals back then that gave free care to everybody in need.

Obamacare is a disaster based on lies.

M-Bob

Don't be naive. Medical care was never free. The cost of unreimbursed care was shifted onto everyone else. Patients who can't pay for treatment raise the costs for all us who can. That's why the Heritage Foundation (a conservative think tank) came up years ago with the concept of mandatory insurance coverage. Which is not primarily about promoting health. It's to ensure financial responsibility. If you get sick or injured, and need costly medical treatment, you have a resource to pay for it. You won't saddle the rest of us with your bills. And if that's not the essence of conservative economic thinking, I don't know what is.

 

[Steve Petersen]

Don't be naive. Medical care was never free. The cost of unreimbursed care was shifted onto everyone else. Patients who can't pay for treatment raise the costs for all us who can. That's why the Heritage Foundation (a conservative think tank) came up years ago with the concept of mandatory insurance coverage. Which is not primarily about promoting health. It's to ensure financial responsibility. If you get sick or injured, and need costly medical treatment, you have a resource to pay for it. You won't saddle the rest of us with your bills. And if that's not the essence of conservative economic thinking, I don't know what is.

Yeah, except medical insurance is crap these days. High premiums and out-of-pockets. At my job, premiums and out-of-pockets amounted to 25% of my GROSS pay.

This says nothing about dental coverage. Typical plans pay out less than you pay in premiums.