Pages

Jump to bottom

10 comments

1 freetoken  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 12:12:52am

Yeah… it’s not like Forbes would would actually distort things, would the?

Like, comparing apples to oranges?

2 goddamnedfrank  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 2:53:24am

This is idiotic. The Covered California plans operate on a sliding scale, and are heavily subsidized at lower incomes. Here’s the .pdf for the silver plan. Now go to ehealthinsurance.com com and pretend to be a 25 year old and set the sort to lowest price. You’ll notice that whereas the max deductible under ACA is $2K assuming you’re in the highest income group, with reasonable copays at every service level, the five averaged plans on ehealthinsurance.com really are catastrophic, copays limited to 2 visits with deductibles between $3.5 to $7.5K.

If you look at the low level Bronze plan you’ll see that it offers more than the cheapest plans on ehealthinsurance.com, even without considering the income based government subsidies for the silver plan, something Forbes deliberate refused to factor in. The ACA bronze plan offers 70% coverage of x-rays, and lab testing, 60% coverage of MRI, CT, and other imaging, along with reasonable copays for urgent and specialty care. All of which is missing from the plans Forbes is comparing it to.

None of which goes to the real point, that the ACA plans aren’t going to replace the other healthcare plans available, they aren’t going to drive anybody’s healthcare costs upwards. The old plans will continue to exist and will have to compete on the open market with those available through Covered California. ACA is just making much better coverage available at a very reasonable price.

Apples and oranges indeed. You’ve been suckered Bob.

3 Absalom, Absalom, Obdicut  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 3:13:31am

Why do you keep falling for this stuff, Bob?

4 blueraven  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 7:09:36am

If you read a few of the comments on the article, you will see that the advertised rates on ehealthinsurance site are basically a bait and switch. No one actually gets those lowest rates.

5 Skip Intro  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 7:36:06am
He was comparing apples—the plans that Californians buy today for themselves in a robust individual market

As a person who has been in this “robust individual market” for nearly 20 years, I can say without fear of contradiction that there is nothing robust about it. It’s not like car insurance, where if I don’t like my premium/plan I can just go shop somewhere else. Once you’re in a plan, and you’ve had any medical treatment whatsoever, you’re in it until Medicare. No one else will touch you.

Oh, and don’t even think about leaving the state, because your plan won’t be following you, even if the same company exists in the state you’re moving to.

Shop around for a better plan? Only in the dreams of Forbes writers.

6 calochortus  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 8:33:45am

re: #5 Skip Intro

As a person who has been in this “robust individual market” for nearly 20 years, I can say without fear of contradiction that there is nothing robust about it. It’s not like car insurance, where if I don’t like my premium/plan I can just go shop somewhere else. Once you’re in a plan, and you’ve had any medical treatment whatsoever, you’re in it until Medicare. No one else will touch you.

Oh, and don’t even think about leaving the state, because your plan won’t be following you, even if the same company exists in the state you’re moving to.

Shop around for a better plan? Only in the dreams of Forbes writers.

QFT.
And if you have to buy as an individual, well, they’ve been known to discontinue plans every so often and invite you to reapply for a new one. If you’re healthy, great. If you’re sick, oops, so sorry-preexisting condition!

7 Skip Intro  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 8:41:02am

re: #6 calochortus

QFT.
And if you have to buy as an individual, well, they’ve been known to discontinue plans every so often and invite you to reapply for a new one. If you’re healthy, great. If you’re sick, oops, so sorry-preexisting condition!

I do buy as an individual, and if I decide I’d like to switch to a higher deductible plan with my existing insurer, guess what? I have to reapply all over again, the entire 20+ page application, even though they already have every single medical record of mine for the last 20 years. And God help you if you omit or make a mistake or forget the date, doctor, and hospital where you had your tonsils removed when you were six. That’s fraud, and they can cancel you for that.

8 stabby  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 9:36:52am

My downding will be there till you look up info on the sliding scale and include it.

I have to go to work now so I don’t have time to do it myself.

9 GunstarGreen  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 10:55:44am

This just in, decent insurance costs more than shitty non-insurance pretending to be insurance.

10 RadicalModerate  Mon, Jun 3, 2013 11:56:03am

From the article author’s biography:

Avik Roy

About Me

I am a Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. In 2012, I served as a health care policy advisor to Mitt Romney.
[…]
Professionally, I’m the founder of Roy Healthcare Research, an investment and policy research firm. In this role, I serve as a paid advisor to health care investors and industry stakeholders. Previously, I worked as an analyst and portfolio manager at J.P. Morgan, Bain Capital, and other firms.

I sure can’t see any reason to think this guy might be biased in his views on the Affordable Care Act.

/////


This page has been archived.
Comments are closed.

Jump to top

Create a PageThis is the LGF Pages posting bookmarklet. To use it, drag this button to your browser's bookmark bar, and title it 'LGF Pages' (or whatever you like). Then browse to a site you want to post, select some text on the page to use for a quote, click the bookmarklet, and the Pages posting window will appear with the title, text, and any embedded video or audio files already filled in, ready to go.
Or... you can just click this button to open the Pages posting window right away.
Last updated: 2023-04-04 11:11 am PDT
LGF User's Guide RSS Feeds

Help support Little Green Footballs!

Subscribe now for ad-free access!Register and sign in to a free LGF account before subscribing, and your ad-free access will be automatically enabled.

Donate with
PayPal
Cash.app
Recent PagesClick to refresh
Detroit Local Powers First EV Charging Road in North America The road, about a mile from Local 58's hall, uses rubber-coated copper inductive-charging coils buried under the asphalt that transfer power to a receiver pad attached to a car's underbelly, much like how a phone can be charged wirelessly. ...
Backwoods Sleuth
3 days ago
Views: 186 • Comments: 1 • Rating: 4