Even More Sisyphean
By Mitch Berg
Hundreds of peoples’ battles with Healthcare.gov; in this case, getting switched to higher-cost, higher-deductible plans, with no further questions asked:
If you have an insurance plan that isn’t compatible with the Affordable Care Act, your insurance company might be automatically rolling you into the plan “most similar” to your own.
For one Washington state resident interviewed by The Daily Caller, his new “Bronze” plan is 80 percent more expensive for him and his wife. His wife is paying $220 more and he’s paying $150 more with higher deductibles.
The insurers are sending letters to subscribers when their existing plans juuuuust didn’t provide all the goodies they didn’t want to pay for in the first place, telling them that it was the insurance company’s best guess, and to check in if they want to downgrade.
“It’s a confusing thing for people. Most of the plans didn’t contain all the provisions that were under the law. We had no choice,” [Rachelle Cunningham strategic communications manager for insurance company RegenceBlueShield ] said. “We’re trying to make it clear for them.”
Fearless prediction: not a few Obamacare defenders among the pundosphere will chalk this up to stupid customers.
December 5th, 2013 at 8:02 am
I’m wondering how many people will have to get screwed before they literally take to the streets. No, I’m not advocating violence, but politicians live in a world wholly disconnected from the general population. The only way they’re gonna realize this was a bridge too far is if the population shows up in their driveways.
We really need to run ’em off now, and it’s not the GOP old guard that’s gonna do it, it’s the Tea Party. But the Tea Party needs the old guard’s infrastructure, organization & credibility.
It’s essentially the same problem William Wallace faced in the 11th Century.
I’m hoping we’ll see a general truce between the TP & GOP. They stop calling us radicals, we’ll stop calling them surrender monkeys. We share most of the same goals, and if we electorally beat the left bloody next year there will be no need for real Americans to give any ground legislatively.
But Boehner and his crew are gonna have to go, however. Too much water under that bridge, and he’s got no credibility with anyone anyway.
December 5th, 2013 at 8:29 am
Swiftee is onto something. Beltway politicians have steeped in wonk-think so long they can’t remember how ordinary people think.
Example: your new computer cost more than last year’s model but has more features so considering bang-for-buck, it’s equal value; therefore, it’s not counted in the CPI rate of inflation, even though it took more dollars to buy it.
Second Example: your new health care plan costs more than the old plan but it has more features so bang-for-buck, it’s a better value. You’re spending less money then you would have spent to acquire those features; therefore, the average family is “saving” $2,500 per year through Obama-care.
The fact you didn’t want and can’t use the features is irrelevent. Next year, your premium will jump again but they’ll add out-of-network coverage for medical services provided on Mars, Jupiter and Saturn so bang-for-buck, you’re saving even more money which bends the medical-cost curve down to eventually not only balance the budget but pay off the debt, as well.
What’s not to love?
December 5th, 2013 at 9:52 am
Life is always better when YOU can decide what facts, terms and numerical values REALLY mean, as opposed to ummm…….the truth.
December 5th, 2013 at 11:47 am
“The fact you didn’t want and can’t use the features is irrelevent. ”
This is critical. It does not matter if individual consumers make choices that some central economic authority believes are incorrect, they are still better than the choices that would be made by the central economic authority. The reason that Obamacare requires people to buy contraception and maternity services isn’t because it makes economic sense, it requires people to buy these services for political reasons. The consumer looks for value, the government looks for public policy results. This is why command economies crash and burn.