The Dismantling of ObamaCare - Ongoing Updates.

When the rates aren't fixed at the midterms, the GOP will pay the price.

There were a lot of folks who thought HRC could not lose and Trump could not win.

Perhaps that is why we have elections rather than going by what polls and the media tells us will happen.
 
When the rates aren't fixed at the midterms, the GOP will pay the price.

And there is NO way the rates are going to be fixed by 2018

I think the greater danger to the GOP at midterms will be if they repeal aspects of the law that cause people to lose some or all of their coverage, with no safety net in place to catch those who have ongoing medical needs.

That was addressed today by incoming HHS Secretary, Tom Price. Thankfully, he understood this, and swore not to neglect the medically needy during the repeal process.
 
I think the greater danger to the GOP at midterms will be if they repeal aspects of the law that cause people to lose some or all of their coverage, with no safety net in place to catch those who have ongoing medical needs.

That was addressed today by incoming HHS Secretary, Tom Price. Thankfully, he understood this, and swore not to neglect the medically needy during the repeal process.

Its been very apparent that the parts of the law that address medical needs (pre-ex, age 26) will stay in. What I haven't heard is that they will keep the unlimited lifetime max, but I am hoping they will.

Still haven't heard anything that will cause the rates to go down.....
 
Its been very apparent that the parts of the law that address medical needs (pre-ex, age 26) will stay in. What I haven't heard is that they will keep the unlimited lifetime max, but I am hoping they will.

Still haven't heard anything that will cause the rates to go down.....

Probably because there isn't. Short of kicking off all the unhealthy people who now have coverage or magically changing the cost and/or usage of healthcare, it won't get any cheaper.
 
GI is the primary driver of rates and the lack of GI (ie underwriting) is what kept them affordable before.

Until the sick people are put in a separate pool (as they should have been from the get go) health insurance rates for the general population will never come down.

All the other crap (preventive care, annual/lifetime max, etc) individually have minimal impact on rates. Collectively those items add less than 10% to the rates.

If all forms of insurance were forced to adapt to a no-underwriting mandate hardly anyone could afford car insurance, homeowners, liability, etc.

Prohibiting carriers from managing risk, like they have for hundreds of years, was put forth by idiots and the people who voted for them.
 
GI is the primary driver of rates and the lack of GI (ie underwriting) is what kept them affordable before.

Until the sick people are put in a separate pool (as they should have been from the get go) health insurance rates for the general population will never come down.

All the other crap (preventive care, annual/lifetime max, etc) individually have minimal impact on rates. Collectively those items add less than 10% to the rates.

If all forms of insurance were forced to adapt to a no-underwriting mandate hardly anyone could afford car insurance, homeowners, liability, etc.

Prohibiting carriers from managing risk, like they have for hundreds of years, was put forth by idiots and the people who voted for them.

I agree with everything you said..til you called half of America idiots.
 
Help Is On The WAY!! Major Medical Boiiiiii

Republicans plan fast-track procedure to repeal ACA - reports
by Bloomberg 28 Dec 2016

Facing a year’s-long wait before they can fully implement a planned repeal of Obamacare, Republicans lawmakers are exploring how the Trump administration can quickly trim required health insurance benefits under the law and lower the cost of health plans, said key GOP congressional aides.

Republicans plan to use a fast-track procedure to repeal the Affordable Care Act, but with a built-in delay to postpone full repeal for years while they navigate the complexities of passing a replacement. By going after the benefit rules now, however, they can take advantage of the broad authority given to the executive branch when the law passed to make faster changes, said the aides, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the process is ongoing.

Known as “essential health benefits,” the benefit requirements being examined are 10 broad categories of services all ACA plans must cover, such as preventive and wellness care, mental-health services and prescription drugs. Other options the administration could take quickly include narrowing the times and circumstances when people can sign up for coverage under the law, or letting states get more waivers from requirements under the law, according to the Republican aides.

Regulation Roll-Back
The proposals are just one option being considered by Republicans as President-elect Donald Trump’s administration plans a wide roll-back of rules implemented by the Obama White House. Such efforts, which Trump’s administration could do unilaterally, are attractive because they avoid lengthy fights with Congress and fit with the president-elect’s theme of fewer government rules.

Tom Price, Trump’s pick to head health-care efforts, has already mapped out his priorities for undoing the benefits rules. Price, who has been tapped to be Secretary of Health and Human Services, has every year since 2009 introduced legislation that eliminates the essential health benefits and other requirements under the law.

Representatives for the Trump transition didn’t respond to requests for comment. Price’s office declined to comment.

Republicans have favored giving consumers the option to buy low-cost, catastrophic insurance policies with limited benefits -- and limiting the benefit requirements would be a step toward more of those sorts of plans.

Republicans in Congress are grappling with their campaign promises to immediately repeal Obamacare, and what could be a lengthy and difficult process of replacing it with their own policy. Regulatory changes would give the administration something to show immediately, though would likely not go into full effect until 2018 or after.

Rules at Risk
Many of the law’s rules were given to regulators to implement, said Mike Leavitt, former HHS secretary under President George W. Bush, which also means they can be undone. “I think they’ll send more to the states,” Leavitt said. “They’ll say, ‘I think consumers are able to make a lot of these decisions.’” He’s consulting with the Trump team on technical matters in the White House transition.

The political feasibility of cutting some benefits, such as mental-health coverage is less certain, say supporters of the law. Nor is it certain how much eliminating others, like birth control, would actually do to lower premiums that have been rising under the law.

“Are they going to take out mental health?” said Jonathan Gruber, an economics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who is widely considered a key architect of Obamacare. “Are they going to take out prescription drugs? They talk as if there’s all this fluff they can take out and suddenly reduce costs a lot. There’s not.”

Contraception Coverage
The most vulnerable benefit to face the chopping block is contraception coverage, said Timothy Jost, an emeritus professor of law at Washington and Lee University, another backer of the law. (Jost has been a contributor to Bloomberg View.)

“Contraceptives cost money and they also save money,” Jost said. “It would probably cost more to get rid of the requirement than it would save.”

Representative Mark Meadows, the incoming chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, last week sent a memo recommending Trump cancel more than 200 federal regulations, including Obamacare preventive services rules and the mandate for most employers to provide contraception coverage. Jost called such targets “ideological.”

The essential benefits package rules apply only to health plans sold through the marketplaces known as exchanges. They’re also separate from the part of the Obamacare law that requires health insurers provide some services, including contraception, at no cost to the patient.

Douglas Elmendorf, former Congressional Budget Office director from 2009 to 2015 who is now dean of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, said that cutting up-front benefits won’t save consumers money in the long-term.

“We shouldn’t pretend that it just goes away,” Elmendorf said. “You’re paying for it out of pocket instead of a premium.”
 
are a function of claims. Claims are function of utilization and procedure price. We've dealt with procedure price for years. It is minor compared to ACA utilization.

Pre-existing driving utilization is the immediate issue. Either the healthy are enrolled or pre-existing is reinstated. Otherwise healthy go elsewhere. There are currently underwritten major medical with coverage close to ACA plans at 50% of premium.

Penalty is nonexistent for families above subsidy levels to ~$200,000 MAGI. Underwriting is the problem for people in that income ranges.

Groups (50+) are in different pool and rates hover not been impacted nearly as much.

There are things that could be done but politicians don't have the nerve.
 
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