Um, Michelle Malkin’s health insurance will not be renewed due to Obamacare.
Destruction of the private insurance market is what Obamacare is all about. We’ve been saying that since the earliest days of the earliest drafts in the summer of 2009.
It’s not about expanding coverage to people who need it.
It’s about leaving nothing left except government care. And no, you can’t keep your doctor or your present insurance.
Just got letter from Anthem canceling our family's health insurance plan. #ifyoulikeyourplanyouCANTkeepit pic.twitter.com/8jDwD6jKCO
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) September 21, 2013
Anthem told us if we had enrolled in our plan before 3/23/10, we'd have been able to keep it. 3/23/10 is the day Obamacare went into effect.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) September 21, 2013
The Anthem letter informs us open enrollment begins Oct. 1. Look what they're advertising: Obamacare exchanges! pic.twitter.com/WuJ83uX7yC
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) September 21, 2013
Obamacare is destroying the private individual market for health insurance. By design, not accident.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) September 21, 2013
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Gosh. I wish there had been some kind of clue. Some sort of tell. Some indication, however slight, to warn America of their true intentions way back before the Obamacare Bill was not even read but voted on and passed anyway.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Poniup04LcU“
Aw shucks. Oh well.
I’m losing my plan in January (Regence). I can still get another plan through them but it would be an HSA and be around 100$ more expensive a month. It also does not have any lab or doctor visit benefits like my current plan does so everything is out of pocket. I cannot afford this so I will be going without health insurance next year. I hope the government is shut down over this and shows to the American people how much the democrats want people to suffer for this POS bill and its POS president.
I am wondering if there isn’t a silver lining in all of this, i.e. Doctors and patients taking back healthcare and eliminating the middleman all together.
Are there provisions in obamacare that prevent doctors from a direct pay scheme? If so, then it truly is insidious. Otherwise, it might be a beneficial unintended consequence to get health insurers out from between patients and doctors. (Provided that we STILL get rid of Obama”care”!)
You are out of your mind.
The Government is taking over healthcare and the doctors and patients are going to be steamrolled Flat!
Gibbs was an optimist. He was betting on Part-Time workers losing healthcare. No one realized that Retirees and Dependants were going to get dropped as well. There will be well over 50,000,000 uninsured Americans before this trainwreck grinds to a halt.
Didn’t anyone tell you that when life gives you lemons, to make lemonaide?
Don’t be such a sourpuss, it’s only our constitutional freedoms on the line, right? /sarc
Even so, one can still look for some benefit in this train wreck. And that is we need to build a new train. Since we’ll have to “reform” the medical “reform”, why not look to the future, instead of grousing about what has happened?
I agree with you, Paul, that the move to old-fashioned direct pay models is one possible silver lining to the wreck that is Obamacare. And in my opinion, so is the decoupling of health insurance from employment. Your boss should pay you for the work you do. He or she shouldn’t really be responsible for the healthcare needs of you, your spouse, and all of your “kidult” (up to age 26) offspring. That’s actually a pretty weird concept anyway, if you think about it.
Agree that employers — including the government — should not be obliged to provide benefits for individuals who are not working for them, especially when those individuals are able to provide for themselves. Spousal and dependent benefits are subsidized by employees who are receiving benefits only for themselves.
I guess I am just not optimistic that destroying our healthcare system is going to result in a better one rising from the ashes. The best hospitals – like the Cleveland Clinic – are already laying off.
I guess my silver lining is that 10 years from now – my SmartPhone will be primary care Physician.
Direct-pay practices are becoming more and more popular – the trend has been covered recently in the WSJ, Forbes, and other news outlets. The relationship is just between you and your doctor and his/her staff (NPs, PAs, etc): the middleman (be it the government or big insurance) is completely cut out of the picture. As one doctor I know puts it, “We’re Taking Healthcare Back From The Idiots Who Are Now In Charge”.
This is just one example of a doctor who’s recently switched to the “direct primary care” model – I’m not personally endorsing him, just sharing his explanation of what it is he’s trying to accomplish by going this route:
http://doctorlamberts.org/better-care/
This is interesting, but why the monthly payments for primary care? This isn’t old-fashioned. Old-fashioned was: call up the doctor, make an appointment when needed, and pay for the services you actually use.
I don’t think it’s necessarily good when the service provider’s profits are tied to the same service provider’s control over whether to “eliminate unnecessary services”. There then is incentive to cut corners.
The appropriate check-and-balance for unnecessary or overpriced services is the marketplace. There is nothing wrong per se with insurance (spreading the risk). It’s a perfectly valid idea that should be used — with high deductibles — to cover ONLY (truly) catastrophic events, and should in the first place, comprise non-profit groups of people pooling their risk.
Because direct primary care payments are typically paid over time, rather than in return for specific services, the economic incentives are such that the long-term health of the patient is the most lucrative situation for the doctor. As such, preventative care gains greater emphasis under DPC. Your monthly payment also covers email and phone consultations, which a lot of people find handy.
There are also “pay per visit” cash practices too, of course – just do a search and you’ll see that there are all sorts of different models:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=direct+pay+healthcare
But it goes without saying that you’d still want catastrophic insurance for any big-ticket non-routine things that may come up (cancer, getting hit by a bus, etc), just as you have home insurance for if your house burns down (but not for paying for routine cleaning and maintenance) and car insurance for if your car gets into an accident (but not for oil changes and annual tire rotations).
That’s the rub with Obamacare for me. There are NO catastrophic plans available. The bronze coverage that I have seen was around 500$ (prelim.) a month for my wife and I (we’re both 27). This is not affordable for us.
My employer (small business liberal) is no longer offering us any assistance with premiums for our individual health plans since they will be “free.” My brain-dead boss will not hear anything otherwise and is also going to be cutting hours back as well as icing to my little crap cake.
I would be fine with directly paying doctors for their services but you still need catastrophic care! Obamacare makes even basic bronze health coverage so damn expensive for individuals (that you can’t opt out because of John Roberts). If the republicans do not hold firm against this law, there is ABSOLUTELY NO FREAKING REASON TO SUPPORT THEM EVER. And I mean it. There needs to be MEANINGFUL defund/abort procedures against this, NOT this BULLCRAP Boehner has been pulling for the past three years with the toothless resolutions to defund in the House.
They give me no hope that anything will ever get better until this all collapses.
Why the monthly payments for “primary care”?
This is a profit-making scheme. There is no shortage of potential patients such that “the long-term health” of anyone affects any physician’s practice.
Fee for services…..capitalism rocks!
Obamacare: For every action there is opposite and equal reaction.
Being self-employed, I’ve always had an individual health plan. Beginning fall of 2009 the premiums rose every 5-6 months till I was priced out of a level. In 2011 my standard $1,000 deductible 80/20 plan premium had risen to over $900/mo, a sum I’ll be damned if I’ll pay, especially when I can’t remember the last time I saw a doctor for anything.
I switched to catastrophic, a $2,500 deductible 80/20 plan, new premium about $350/mo. Still premiums rose till hitting over $600/mo in June last year. I bumped to $5,000 deductible 80/20, it dropped to under $500/mo, but rose to near $700 by this spring. Not one claim made during this time, mind you.
Early this month I got a letter notifying me my policy is cancelled effective September 30, 2013. Time to dust off my old Magic Accountant software and defend myself. These ass clowns don’t realize how and why small businesses like mine have no choice but to get that money covered; they have forced me into the role of guerrilla tax warrior.
http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=MQ_tAe87ELo
Some of us saw this coming.
First, it was spontaneous. Second, it was a wedding. Hardly likely a place where a kidnapping would be carried out. And, three, the discipline from the “top” … could mean Israel, again, has an idiot like Bar-Lev at the top. Or worse: Gonen.
Just getting promoted doesn’t prove a thing. Hey, look at the “star wars” General Alexander, who runs the N.S.A. And, has a special program that teaches “deception.” Plus, he lies to congress. No problem. Plus, he doesn’t let our Constitution get in his way. We’ve lost 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, and 6th Amendment Rights, where it’s even hard to find a lawyer in America who cares.
Our 3rd Amendment involves “housing troops.” While over in Israel it is common for soldiers to thumb rides with strangers. Who stop and pick up the gun toting soldiers. It’s all a matter of trust.
Arik Sharon, himself, said he had trusted arabs who worked at his farm. And, he loved them. And, in return they loved him.
Arafat’s dead. Hamas, who lives in Gaza, is dealing with the Egyptians making sure they can’t come out and terrorize Egptian policemen. What Egypt does goes unscrutinized. What Israel does gets proctoscoped.
While what you learned at this “dancing at the wedding” event … is that local soldiers have hearts and brains. And, they’re comfortable “working” in an area that’s considered hazardous.
In America this would be white cops working well in black ghettos. BECAUSE they can relate to people as human beings.
This ended up on the wrong thread!
Private insurance destroyed our relationships with out doctors years ago. First, doctors had to hire workers who could handle the forms. And, then, make sure the doctor received payments.
Then, if doctors were sued, the insurance companies said it was easier to “settle” then to defend (IN MANY CASES INNOCENT) doctors.
But at least insurance was a STATE matter. And, we have 50 states. And, 50 states with insurance departments, and state laws.
What’s happening now is obscene. It’s a grab for information the Feds are not entitled to.
And, blame Obama all you want. He came in not knowing how to construct legislation. This is ALL PELOSI’s doing … as the House starts the ball rolling. There’s plenty of PORK in this bill! And, after the House signed it … it went to the Senate … Where Harry Reid saw to it that it got the votes.
Harry Reid “gets” the votes because he knows what every single senator WANTS. And, he delivers this into their pockets.
Blame Obama for signing it. But it is turning into legislation even UNIONS don’t want! Workers who had 40 hour jobs, saw their hours reduced to 29. Meaning they’d have to figure out how to get another job just to come to a paycheck each week where they can pay their bills.
THIS IS A POCKETBOOK ISSUE.
You’ll see republican votes going into the barrel. And, you’ll hear excuses (we couldn’t afford not to do this.)
Politicians are well versed in the art of fooling you.
Obama’s term ends. And, he leaves. Or like ALL the other politicians, he hangs around for the low hanging fruit that comes from lobbyists.
We’re gonna need a real revolution to change things around.
Meanwhile, the GOP fancies itself as a “purer than pure” place. They’re shrill about abortion. They hate gay marriage. And, lots of people won’t touch one of their candidates for beans.
Within both sets of tents there are governors who’d like to give the presidential races a try. Who knows what Andrew Cuomo is up to? I wouldn’t bet a nickel on Hillary. And, most outsides will be amused at Chris Christie takes a shot at being the champ. Will the GOP be forced to pick someone they believe in? Or will they go for Christie because he’s a bully?
It’s a show people will watch.
If I work more than twenty eight hours a week, I have “options” and my husbands health care plan is done with me. Hope I can keep my job, but their “option” stinks. Screwed either way.
You mean your husband’s boss doesn’t have to offer you health insurance then? But why should s/he, anyway? Where is it written that there’s some moral imperative for an employer to look after the health care needs of people who don’t even work for him or her?
If America hadn’t gotten locked into this weird system of so many people expecting their boss to provide for their health care insurance needs, you and your husband would have your own policy, one that you all had picked out for yourselves based on your own priorities and values, and you wouldn’t be in the perverse position of worrying about working “too many” hours per week.
Agreed, but decades of family plans have been established. What do we do now? Would love to write our own policy, if it could be done, it can not.
I don’t deny it’s going to be hard on a lot of people getting from “here” to “there”, and I don’t have any good answers for you 🙁
I’ve always had my own individual policy, and I do feel bad for friends who get stuck in jobs they pretty much hate because they feel they have to stay for the insurance. It really is a horrible situation, and the sooner we transition away from it the better. If we’d moved away from it years ago, we wouldn’t be in the position now where just as we’re trying to climb out of a recession, companies are cutting employees’ hours NOT so much because there’s not enough work for them to do, but because they can’t afford to get stuck with the health insurance bills for them.
Obamacare is a revenue generation scheme, as well as a vote buying scheme. It does not address limited resources. It does not address inflation. It is designed to maintain the status quo, but it will ensure a progressive decline in quality and availability of health care. Also, as it conflates contributory and non-contributory (i.e. welfare) entitlements, it will, presumably by design, serve to sponsor corruption. Think Detroit on steroids.
That said, Obamacare is still in gestation. It can be legally aborted. Dismember it. Vacuum it. Flush it.
Obamacare does contain any health insurance. It’s the biggest scam of the century. Another way to bring the US down and steal your money. No telling what they have included in this phony law. I hear it’s increased from 2700 pages to 11000 pages. Does anyone know why we haven’t seen the additions?
Meant to say Obamcare does not contain healthcare.
Ummm, don’t you all understand that geniuses like Huckabee and McCain say we should just wait for Obamacare to fail? What these political Einsteins fail to comprehend is that Obamacare is designed to fail. By the time Obamacare is officially declared a disaster the insurance industry will be destroyed and guess who will have to step in and take over the role of insurer? I know the suspense is killing you…….GOVERNMENT SINGLE PAYER.
Too late now geniuses.
For 45 years, I have dutifully handed over a portion of my earnings to the government. I’ve raised my children to be both productive and honest with the admonition to never, never attempt to skirt their tax obligations. Now, late in my life, after much soul searching and weighty consideration, I have determined that:
– I will not submit to this government shake-down.
– I will not be providing medical insurance information to the IRS with my 2013 income tax filing next year because I do not now possess, nor do I intend to obtain health care insurance; not from an “approved” private plan, nor from an ObamaCare exchange. For nearly 2 decades, I have been a cash only patient on the rare occasions I have needed dental or medical intervention of any sort. Never have any practitioners who provided services to me been stiffed nor have I ever received any public assistance to cover fees.
– I will not pay the IRS one dime more than my customary tax burden. Not one thin dime will I hand over to the government as a penalty/ tax for not purchasing a policy to subsidize tattoo removals, recreational sex, breast pumps or drug and alcohol addiction treatments for other people. I have no personal need for any of these services or devices. I take no routine medications and guard my cash flow carefully so that I can maintain a reasonably low risk, good quality of life. For the foreseeable future, I plan to continue to take responsibility for my own wellbeing.
I’ve seen posts around the internet expressing the same resistance and know that surely many are just talk. I am, however, firmly committed to my choice and ready to face the consequences. I want to know if anyone else here at LI is of like mind.
Purportedly, there are no criminal penalties which can be levied against anyone who chooses to openly flout and defy the individual mandate in this way. Comments from other LI readers are solicited.
I am with you in this regard 100%. It’s called “Civil Disobedience” against an unjust, Unconstitutional law.
For those who argue the SCOTUS is the final arbiter of what is constitutional, let me remind you:
SCOTUS was formed by the compact, therefore it cannot determine in the final analysis, what constitutes the compact. Only the parties to the compact, i.e. the respective States and the People, can be the arbiter of what constitutes the compact.
We, the people, and the States, have agreed to abide by SCOTUS decisions in the past, but this does not always have to be the case. Thomas Jefferson and George Mason were pretty clear on this subject.
Not certain at all, how the logic of the Obamacare discussion is supposed to proceed. Obama is delaying implementation of it for certain, select, classes, or groups or people, including Congress and its staffers; not too certain whether Federal Civil Servants will also receive a delay exemption. Yet, the argument against the GOP’s efforts to defund Obamacare are that that action will result in a shutdown of the federal government!
If Obama may elect to defer certain classes of people from the effects of the Affordable Care Act, isn’t he taking extra-legal steps, which will bend the law into a personal pretzel based on Obama’s selected preferences?
Isn’t Obama openly defying the Constitution’s prohibition against granting of personal rights, even if not nobility per se, exemptions that others may not of themselves presume as their right?
Regardless, the GOP should state their actions as removing funding from an questionably constitutional statute, forcing the administration to avoid engaging in further unconstitutional behaviors, the granting of nobility in the guise of special privileges and exemptions from law.
The other 2,700 pages of ‘Obamacare’ (aka the Nazi Enabling Act, Part II) is also going ‘according to plan.’
This nightmare has to end: but first the stranglehold by corrupt, cowards heading the GOP has to end. That means you, Boehner, McConnell, Prebus, Cantor, and the rest of you bastards.
We already had to trade in our inexpensive major medical policy and HSA for a full service plan – $1200 a year to now $1200 a month. With all 4 kids in college, I’m really enjoying the maternity benefits. One oddity of our old plan was that it included a free vision exam each year (the agent told me that at some point they had determined that the customers who purchased that policy were more likely to be in auto accidents – and that eye exams seemed to correspond with lower likelihood for accidents, so it was a cheap risk management tool with a low fixed cost and very popular benefit for them to offer.) Glasses, contacts and such were not included, just the exam.
So, I just got back from the optometrist – not only does my new and more expensive policy not cover eye exams (the only thing I’ve used my insurance for in the last 10 years) – my optometrist was dropped from our plan anyway. I still paid the $75 fee out of pocket rather than change to “in plan” optometrist who has a very high rate of complaints for getting prescriptions wrong.
The other problem that I’m learning about slowly and surely with our new plan…. is that unlike our old plan, this one doesn’t travel well. Our old plan was so widely accepted across the state that I had to try to find somewhere that it wasn’t honored. The most recent map I received marks out large areas where we regularly travel and could conceivable run into adverse situations.
Late to the party, but….
This weekend, we saw an … amusing … commercial saying the Affordable Care Act programs provide choices and options to the people of our state at competitive rates.
Huh.
I turned to my wife and said, “The law creates a single-payer MONOPOLY of a healthcare system, but we’re to believe it creates options and keeps costs ‘competitive’?”
Must be that new doublespeak. We future-unpersons can’t quite grok the new Newspeak words.