This Is What Obamacares Critics Wont Admit Or Simply Dont Understand

[Jimbo101]

Huffington Post

Real people with serious medical issues are finally getting the help they need.

To hear President Donald Trump, House Speaker Paul Ryan and other Republicans tell it, Obamacare has been a disaster, even for those who obtained coverage through the law. Hammers has a very different perspective. She’s a freelance writer and editor, which means she has no employer-provided insurance. In the old days, if she’d gone shopping for a policy with her cancer diagnosis, she would have struggled to find a carrier willing to sell her one.

What American Health Care Used To Look Like

Gary Rotzler, a quality engineer at a defense contractor in upstate New York, lost his family coverage in the early 1990s when he lost his job. He ended up uninsured for two years, while he juggled stints as an independent contractor. His wife, Betsy, made do without doctor visits even after she started feeling some strange pains. By the time she got a checkup, she had advanced breast cancer. Desperate efforts at treatment failed. After she died, Gary, a father of three, had to declare bankruptcy because of all the unpaid medical bills.

[OKNancy]

1. I'm sure someone has probably done a study - medical bankruptcy

I wonder if "medical bankruptcy" has gone down with the advent of ACA?

[SHRED]

6. I'm sure it has...for example

Obamacare lifted coverage caps.
Before Obamacare insurance companies could halt coverage when you reached an arbitrary limit like say $1 million. After that you were paying.

Also, the ACA created "maximum out of pocket" limits.

[OKNancy]

9. ... sort of maximum out of pocket

My husband has a bronze plan. Last year he was diagnosed with cancer at the base of his tongue.
We had great doctors and it looks like he will be ok! However our out of pocket was listed at $6500. but it was actually closer to $9,000.
That's because some radiologists and anesthesiologists were out of the Blue Cross network so we had to pay for some of that.

Actually with the premiums and everything, our expenses were about $16,000. We had to cash in some of our IRA. Which made our income go up, which made our subsidy less this year! That is one thing that they could fix IMO.

... and it all starts up again this year but hopefully not as much.

It's better than $202,000 which was last years total. SO, no bankruptcy for us.

---------------

[SHRED]

11. I know

Good points. We've been through thousands per year also not counted.

And good to hear he will be okay!!

[dawg]

2. That goes for critics on the "left" as well.

We have to stop letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Almost all of us, even "Third Way" types, would rather have single payer. But, in the meantime, the plan we *do* have is saving lives and keeping families from bankruptcy.

[flamingdem]

4. I agree. Some people don't remember that Obama tried to get Medicare for all

and Joe Lieberman nixed it.

[Trust Buster]

3. KISS - YOU CANNOT INSURE THE MOST EXPENSIVE CUSTOMERS (pre-existing conditions)

WITHOUT EXPANDING THE INSURANCE POOL (individual mandate). The insurance model falls apart. This is precisely why insurance companies do not offer flood insurance. No need to bog down the message with complexity.

[flamingdem]

5. And disgustingly the right reframes the mandate as a "freedom"

issue. Very few have been charged for not paying and many can get a hardship exception. Facts don't matter with the crazed repugs though.

[Trust Buster]

7. Yes, the dopes claim that the government cannot means test the uninsured and require them to

put skin in the game to the extent they can afford. Their idea of freedom is to go back to "forcing" the insured to pay higher premiums to cover the cost of the uninsured showing up in our emergency rooms.

[vlyons]

8. This is what ACA critics won't admit

Everything else is a lying bullshit smokescreen. They don't like the ACA for 3 main reasons

1. Rich people and corporations don't want to pay the 3.8% excise tax. So if your family policy costs $500 per month, the excise tax on the policy would be $19.00.

2. Medical insurance companies do not want to be limited to a "mere" 20% in profits on the insurance plan that it sells you. Any profit in excess of 20% has to be plowed back into healthcare and health services for its customers. rather than be pocketed by CEO bonuses, advertising, marketing, administration fees.

3. They resent that a black man in the Whitehouse could ever be smart enough to win anything. Black men are supposed to have low IQ and be lazy and have criminal inclinations. Good at tap dancing and raiding the watermelon patch.

So if you manage to get your Republican senator or congressman to do a town hall, ask them why they never mention items 1 and 2 above.

[tblue37]

10. They understand. They just don't give a damn. nt