From its introduction in Congress, the Affordable Care Act (nee Obamacare) has been the subject of controversy. It was sold to the public – and to a lot of members of Congress – on the improbable promises that all the uninsured would get good health coverage at a low cost – and any one could keep their doctor. None of that turned out to be true.
To make it even marginally viable, the law had to force everyone to purchase an Obamacare health plan or face a fine. The less they could afford, the worse the coverage and the higher the deductible. In some cases, the annual deductible was so high – up to $6000 dollars – that a healthy young person would have zero coverage for normal health needs – like a bout of the flu or a broken arm.
While it promised health coverage for all, it expanded to less than half of the estimated 30 million Americans without insurance. And the promise that you could keep your doctor was proven to be false as many doctors simply refused to take Obamacare patients. Why? Because many could not pay the deductible and Uncle Sam is a very slow payer. It is the same reason not every doctor will take Medicate and Medicaid patients.
No promise was more disingenuous than the assurance that premiums would be low and reasonable. Thanks to economist Robert Genetski, we can now know just how badly we the people were deceived by President Obama and his team of advisors. This was not a mistake or an unanticipated outcome. Obama’s senior advisor, Jonathan Gruber, later admitted that they had lied … yep, told a whopper … in order to get Obamacare passed.
Genetski recently did a formal economic analysis of Obamacare’s impact on insurance premiums. It is worse that we thought. The first paragraph of his report is a stunner. He reads:
“An analysis of health insurance premiums, out of pocket expenses and deductibles indicates the Affordable Care Act (aka, ACA or Obamacare) has added $10,000 a year or more to the average family’s cost of health insurance.”
The report went on to say:
“Once the ACA was fully implemented, its impact increased the total annual cost of health insurance to individuals by $3,400 to $4,400 and to families by $10,000 to $12,000.”
According to Genetski’s report, “The US Department of Health and Human Services estimates the average premium for the most popular individual Obamacare policy increased by 182% from 2013 to 2018.”
When Obamacare took effect in 2013, the average annual premium for a family was approximately $5,000. In a normal trajectory – not impacted by Obamacare – the 2014 average annual premium would have been in the $5,200 range. But because of Obamacare, it soared to $7,000 per year. If you look at 2018, the normal increase would have had the average family premium in the $6,200 range. But thanks to Obamacare, the 2018 figure is a whopping $14,000 per year.
Thanks to Democrat obstructionism and Republican ineffectiveness, the frequent promise to repeal and replace the Obamacare failed to be realized. The removal of the mandate requiring the purchase or facing a penalty was a step in the right direction. Despite the political fighting, Obamacare will be replaced some day because it is currently economically not viable or sustainable. It will crash at some point in the future – and then even its defenders will have to concede defeat
We were famously told by Speaker Nancy Pelosi that we would have to pass the legislation to see what is in it. We did and we can now see what is in it – and it is not a pretty picture.
So, there ‘tis.
It wasn’t just Obama advisors who lied to get it passed.
Mitt Romney sent his advisors on his failed Romneycare to help craft Obamacare and had to intentionally lose his presidential bid against Obama to make sure Obamacare went into full effect so Romneycare would go away and he could have deniability.
If not for the Romneycare template in Massachusetts, we would not have had Obamacare!
Unfortunately, nobody who is, or was, opposed to the ACA came up with any viable alternative to provide health care of any kind to the 30 million people who did not have it.
If there had been no mandatory requirement, healthy young people would not have contributed, placing the burden on older and sick people to carry the entire health care system (for young and old). We would have continued to overload the hospitals’ emergency care systems to cope with every sick or injured yet uninsured person. This in turn increased costs to hospitals which got passed on to those who did have coverage, which in turn increased their insurance premiums. Thus started the out-of-control spiraling costs of insurance. The biggest mistake made by ACA was making keeping insurance in the private sector whose ONLY motive was to make profits for shareholders – none of whom had any interest in providing CARE to people who needed it. GREED is the fundamental cause of our disgustingly exaggerated costs of all aspects of our healthcare system. Oh – and let’s remember this – centrally controlled Medicare functions incredibly well in general terms, even though there are aspects of it that are poorly implemented (like Part D for medications). But it’s better than any other affordable healthcare system in private hands.
Why isn’t my comment showing up in the comment section?
Another problem with mandated coverages and configuration is the monopoly effect. By this we find monopoly pricing take effect. It would be exaggerated in a government run system.
The goal of a monopoly is to maximize profit, not to expand coverage. Indeed, you make more money by eliminating marginally profitable customers.
To add to my previous note, I’ll have you know that I am no less patriotic than you are, yet I am a proud liberally oriented voter who considers this the best country in the world. I just wish that the divisiveness that is splitting us apart could be change into productive disagreement, and not the verbal and emotional hatred I have encountered. It’s degenerating into a kind of civil war.
Total BS… My own premiums for individual coverage jumped to nearly $1,000 a month. What I noticed, more than anything, it was a fast track to enroll people into MEDICAID, you know, FREE coverage for anyone earning under a particular PRE-determined income. Those of us who actually worked, mostly middle class, we were stuck with astronomical premiums to cover the losers who preferred to work as little as possible or not at all.
The entire premise behind the Unaffordable Careless Act had one goal in mind …. Bankrupt the participating insurance companies and forcing socialized “single payor” on every one of us. What else would there be once the insurance companies were bankrupt
Anyone who has knowledge of morbidity and actuarial tables know exactly what amount of premiums must be collected to pay out billions in claims. By forcing these companies to to insure MEDICAID recipients, those paying $5, $10 or in some cases $0 premiums, it becomes an impossibility to withstand the pay out all the claims while only collecting a small portion of what is required. Believe me, the Medicaid recipients, underwritten by the participating insurance companies, they’re the same people who would go to the ER & doc’s every time they felt like it. HRC’s loss was a huge blow to the plan set in motion by Hussein. She failed once when Slick Willy was Pres but this time the groundvwork was already laid for her. Look around, those who are moaning the loudest are those who want free ins & those who are in favor of globalization. Her loss had far greater implications than most even realize.
My wife is an Executive with a CPA firm and her deducible for her alone is $4000.00 and with me on her insurance would be an $8000.00 deducible. This is not including what the company has to pay to keep the deducible down to this level. Lies, all lies and the Dems want a single payer systems that will cause all to paid more in taxes and cost 32 trillion over a decade. In Virginia there is still over 400,000 people without insurance even with the ACA. Someone is lying and I know whom. If you are dumb enough to vote Dems into office, then you should have your taxes raised to pay for there B.S. Lying Suckers………
I am a mature adult who is covered both by Medicare and a private insurance company. I paid all the bills charged my wife and I, and the Insurance paid the rest, but last year when I paid my taxes I had to pay a thousand dollars to Obama Care! We had no payments made for us by Obama Care, though we had quite a lot of payments. Apparently our wise Obama thinks a thousand dollars is petty cash? Well George Soros didn’t build me a mansion, I don’t have the government care of ex-presidents, so Had to pay that thousand dollars as well as regular payments for treatments and office visits! For all the youngsters out there whom believe that the government will pay your bills for you in a socialist government, it’s a LIE. Socialist Government NEVERj, Ever Pays anything. The suckers who are forced into it pay! And most of the payments go into the deep pockets of those whom instituted that form of government!