Dire Obamacare Prediction Falls Hilariously Flat

[Purveyor]

The story of Obamacare over the last year has in many ways been a story about how the various claims made by conservatives about why the law would collapse have systematically fallen apart as the Affordable Care Act has gone into effect. The website debacle was so bad that nobody was going to sign up. Actually, lots of people signed up. The net number of people insured was going to go down, not up, because Obamacare would force insurers to cancel their plans. Nope, the uninsured rate has gone down.

One of the scariest claims was that premiums were going to shoot up because only the sick and the old would sign up. The danger, of course, was that this would set off the so-called death spiral, where high prices prompt people to drop their coverage until eventually the whole project collapses in failure and shame.

Back in March, the Hill published a representative story under the headline, “O-Care Premiums to Skyrocket.” Here’s the gist:

Health industry officials say Obamacare-related premiums will double in some parts of the country, countering claims recently made by the administration.

The expected rate hikes will be announced in the coming months amid an intense election year, when control of the Senate is up for grabs. The sticker shock would likely bolster the GOP’s prospects in November and hamper Obamacare insurance enrollment efforts in 2015.

more...

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-08-12/dire-obamacare-prediction-falls-hilariously-flat#r=rss

[tularetom]

1. It isn't that Obamacare is a very good program

It's just that it is a bazillion times better than what we had before.

By contrast it looks wonderful to a shitload of people.

And all these predictions of dire consequences that never happened are making it look even better.

[TlalocW]

2. I don't get why these experts don't understand how insurance works

In a rather simplistic view of it, people with insurance are a group of people paying money so that if one of them has something happen to them the money (or some) everyone has paid into the insurance fund will be used to help that person. That makes it sound all rosy, altruistic, and like everything will be sunshine and giggles, but that's essentially it.

The more people you have with insurance, the more the cost is spread around. Even more simplistically, do you want to join an insurance group that only has the cost being split between 10 people or an insurance group where it's split between 1 million?

TlalocW