Obamacare Tag

Complaints about lack of access to insurance for preexisting conditions may be overstated...

He'll do it his way...

More evidence that the Obamacare health insurance offerings are a cruel joke on the public. We already have covered how there will be few doctors willing to see the millions more Medicaid patients -- in many cases people who previously had private insurance. We've also covered how insurance companies have no choice but to hike deductibles and narrow in-network provider networks in order to keep premiums artificially low. It's all caused by Obamacare's one-size fits all philosophy, loading up so-called acceptable plans with so many things most people don't want or need that it raises the cost of insurance to unsustainable levels. The reimbursement rates are so low for hospitals that even major research hospitals like Stonybrook Medical Center on Long Island are refusing to participate in any of the state health exchange plans unless reimbursement rates are renegotiated. There is a cruel and heartless bureaucratic pox on the healthcare system, and we're just in the infancy of seeing the symptoms. The latest, from CBS News, in how in Washington State the major children's hospital in Seattle is excluded from all but two of the Obamacare plans (via Marathon Pundit): This is just the start. The first response inevitably will be a system of forced labor where doctors and other providers will be compelled by force of law to offer services through government plans under threat of license revocation or other punitive measures. And then, when the system is so screwed up it is beyond repair, single payer. Obamacare is just the gateway drug to single payer. If you don't believe me, just listen to Martha Robertson, a Democratic Congressional Campaign Jumpstart candidate in NY-23:

State your race and ethnicity, or no doctor for you....

Premiums are just half the story, the deductibles are the killer....

Many have addressed the issue of uncertainty created by the implementation of Obamacare and noted the impact that may have on a variety of areas, including for the health insurance industry. On Thursday, Moody's Investors Service downgraded its outlook for health insurers, citing such uncertainty. From Moody’s: Moody's...

A handful of stories from across the web on Obama's NSA reform speech, Hollywood hypocrisy, Obamacare and more. Something the President's NSA speech today didn't address. From the Wall Street Journal: After Obama's NSA Speech, Tech Companies Wait and See After saying he plans to make a movie...

We've finally gotten some data on who has actually signed up for Obamacare on the exchanges. At first glance, it would look bad for the insurance companies. There are way fewer young people (only 24% are between the ages of 18 and 34) than the original stated goal. But it doesn't matter for the first year or two because the government has guaranteed to insurance companies that they'll be protected against loss. So the fact that enrollees may be older than expected---and therefore much more likely to make claims and reduce insurance companies' profit margins---is okay because government will take up the slack. And by "government" we mean, of course, the taxpayer. And by "taxpayer" we mean the wealthy taxpayer, although the middle class taxpayer also will pay more in many circumstances. Here's a list of the taxes that are supposed to fund Obamacare. Will they be adequate to cover the fact that nearly 80% of the exchanges' enrollees are getting subsidies so far? It depends on whether this was approximately the number anticipated, and also on whether the tax revenues actually collected will be as great as had been projected. The Byzantine nature of Obamacare is reflected in the fact that one of the largest items in the list of Obamacare funding tax sources is the following:

$60.1 Billion [projected amount of revenue]: Tax on Health Insurers: Annual tax on the industry imposed relative to health insurance premiums collected that year. Phases in gradually until 2018. Fully-imposed on firms with $50 million in profits.

So Obamacare giveth to the insurance companies and then it taketh away. And then it giveth back again, in a sort of shell game.

An official from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services who helped oversee the rollout of healthcare.gov is retiring, according to the NY Times.

The No. 2 official at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, who supervised the troubled rollout of President Obama’s health care law, is retiring, administration officials said Monday. The official, Michelle Snyder, is the agency’s chief operating officer, in charge of day-to-day activities and the allocation of resources, including budget and personnel. Technology experts who built the website for the federal insurance exchange, HealthCare.gov, reported to her. Ms. Snyder is the second administration official to depart since problems with the website frustrated millions of people trying to buy insurance and caused acute political embarrassment to Mr. Obama. The chief information officer at the Medicare agency, Tony Trenkle, stepped down in November to take a job in the private sector. Marilyn B. Tavenner, the administrator of the Medicare agency, said Ms. Snyder was retiring this week “after 41 years of outstanding public service.”

Snyder’s name came up in congressional hearings in October.