How much is the fine?

Yeah, my company is working with one of the largest healthcare providers in WNY and they are putting on a symposium tomorrow about the ruling. We were working with them today and speaking with their CEO he was stating the costs to the customer will be an increase of $200 - $400 a month...

I think about that and it means my Healthcare costs could rise to $500 - $700 a month and honestly it would basically require me to get a second job to make ends meet. After the divorce it might be a different story, but right now, paying everything I am...I would be beyond broke

1.5% of income in 2014, 2.5 percent of income by 2016 (and with a minimum $95/year, $2,085 maximum/year)

Edit: And $2k per employee/year for companies who don't provide insurance.

Whether or not this is true all it will take is a few stories like this and Romney could win in a landslide. Remember perception is reality and the American voting public has never been super bright. If I'm Romney I just run a bunch of ads talking about $500 a month increase in health costs and I am pretty sure a list of facts won't save that one from going viral. Not sure this is the victory the Democrats really wanted.

I think that is where the tact of paying the fine instead of coverage will work to reduce costs. If the insurance companies threaten to massively raise their premiums, that makes the decision to pay the fines that much easier. If you are making $50K per year, and the insurance company is now saying you are going to be paying $8K per year, you tell your insurance company to go fuck themselves, and pay the $2K fine.

Since insurance companies like profits, and you have to have paying customers to get revenue, they will have to be competitive with the cost of the fine of not buying insurance.

How will this work if you're out of work? A few years ago when I was laid off, I had to pay $1300 a month to maintain health insurance. I know in the great recession they halved this or something. Does this change COBRA at all?

They probably wouldn't say anything that wasn't true to try and get people fired up.

Pretty sure the translation for that is, "We think we can get away with fleecing every one of you for about $3 grand a year by shrugging and saying, 'Pssh. Obamacare, right?' before people begin to take a really hard look at these 2014 Lexuses we're planning on buying."

Your edit part is the section that I'm going to need to deal with if my business continues to grow. Currently, we're under the minimum, but that may change soon. May have to play some games in regards to which employees work for which companies as well. Haven't sat down to figure that all out yet, but it's never too soon to start.

Tangentially tied to inflation. The number currently stands at 400% of the poverty line.

That's probably true but it's reality and a factor that I hope is accurately accounted for in the projections. A lot of plans would work out great if everyone acts morally and predictably.

Honestly, I don't think they're is a heck of a lot we can do unless we really look deep into all of the parts that go into our health and the health care system.

Are these things going to go flat-line or decrease?
*New drugs and treatment options, and the R&D dollars behind them.
*New state-of-the-art technological devices and equipment.
*Malpractice insurance costs.
*Medical school (and undergraduate) costs.
*Building cost and maintenance.
*Will people's lifestyles (a big one in my view) change?
*Won't the aging population see a dramatic increase in the utilization of health care-and the expensive portions of that?

Canada, UK and France all have experience creaks on their increase in spending in regards to their health care systems, and I'm sure a lot of the others are right behind them. I just find it foolish to think that this health care bill will fix any of these things, and why I opposed the bill from the start-it didn't really address what goes into the the creation, maintenance, and delivery of health care and how we live our lives from a health-related standpoint.

It is a $2K per employee charge if you decline to offer any insurance to full time employees when you have more than 50 employees. Doesn't say that you have to pay for it. Also as part of that, the insurance exchanges are to be set up, and tax credits given to business that do cover part of their employees insurance.

From what I understand, it's true. Keep in mind that New York already has one of the most-regulated health insurance industries (MG, which company are you talking about? - I have a good friend who has spent a lot of time on one of these teams). The effect of this legislation in 2014 on most states will be far greater.

It's an interesting paradigm, that's for certain. People in the middle class ($40-$100k/year) going without health insurance so people who earn less can have health insurance.

I don't think this will hurt Obama's chances of re-election. Intrade shows Obama with a small gain today (correcting... both Romney and Obama are down about half a point). Unless there's a jump in unemployment, I think he's going to win. This is still far too esoteric a discussion for most voters. When they see their insurance bills early in 2014, that's when most will react. It was very clever on his part to delay most of the implementation until 2014.

What's the risk/downside if more people and companies than expected pay the penalty, (wait, I'm sorry, "tax")?

Insurance companies revenues go down.

Health insurance plans and premiums are regulated by each state, so they would have to convince the state regulators of the rate hikes. I've never been on the "evil health care companies" train. They're margins are rather weak.

The problem, in my view, is two things:
1) If no can be denied (which is a good thought in theory), then why not wait until you need it? A $2,000 maximum fine is nothing in comparison to what it would cost to cover an expensive treatment (such as cancer or a surgery). Doesn't this allow people to just game the system?

2) How will Medicare play into all of this? They already underpay the costs of delivery, so won't the health insurance mandate and all of that goes into just add more stress on top of the Medicare concerns?

3) What about the economic impact? The rule is if you have 50 or more employees, you have to provide a certain level of insurance, right? Or be fined (the company, not the employees)? Won't this impact how entrepreneurs and companies make future decisions? Seems like you would be penalized for growing and creating jobs, and that outsourcing and relocation could be accelerated even more.

We can always bail them out.

I do think that there's a huge attractive opportunity right now for someone to come along and just Southwest Airlines the hell out of the health insurance industry. Anyone who can figure out what vendors to work with to put a flat fee, widely accepted program out there below, say, $200 per month will just kill the competition.

Health care is not that simple.

I guess we'll learn what the origin/basis of high health care costs really is - is it just caused by insurance companies getting away with whatever they can in a broken system, or is it something else inherent and uncured in the system that companies can't get around with doing something drastic.

I think we should start the FOFC Health Care Collective. aka: FOFCHCC.

1. At the top of every form a customer has to fill out, there will be a picture of a scantily clad woman.

2. Each form that has check boxes will always have a trout option

3. When describing your medical history (known as the Face the Board Form) and you need to continue on another page, you will be given a DOLA form

4. If this is a recurring medical issue, it must be filed in the Dynasty section of record keeping

5. You won't be allowed to fudge your medical records

6. Our doctors must always wear a name tag that says "Hi! I'm Pumpy" and carry a bowling ball bag with them that has all of their doctor tools in it.

7. DT and Jon will be the heads of our Death Panel and all decisions must be unanimous

8. Billy Joel music will be banned at all FOFCHCC facilities

9. No matter a persons past medical history, people will not lose posts

10. If Sports Digs already has it, we'll give you a referral.

There has to be a way to make this work.

As long as any treatment of my sexual nerves is covered, count me in

:eek: :eek: :eek:

I hope you didn't get them from Pumpy?

Absolutely covered. Your records would just be stamped with NSFW.

I don't want to say impossible, but for now, every state has different regulations. In air travel, the product is very simply defined and customers have no rights (we're squeezed into seats the size of Kate Moss's butt and we have less leg-room than even Randy Newman would find acceptable).

The new law is designed to keep employers from dumping employees into the marketplace, so these regulated insurance exchanges are going to be quite tricky. I just don't know how you'd prepare a business model for an industry that's about to change radically.

In theory, yes, there's money to be made here. But the law provides so much protection for the insurance giants that I don't see where.

I realize we're not looking at a comprehensive "all you ever pay is the premium" system with this, but I suspect that healthcare really does get simpler the less you have to worry about 'what's covered' and 'what's preexisting' and, the critical part, 'how much can we get away with charging'. Healthcare costs in most of the developed world are under $4,000 per capita, including catastrophic and emergency medical. With 15% of the US getting added into the system, each of whom in a few years will be getting dinged for $2K in penalties without benefit anyway if they don't select a provider, I just don't see the rationale for claiming that this particular legislation is going to add 30% to the costs of seeing the doctor - the increases we will see are forecasted regardless of who's paying.

Regardless, right now we don't see any meaningful competition in the health marketplace - the lengthy and torturous process to shop for the best healthcare deal is the biggest obstacle to lower pricing, in my opinion. Maybe the price point isn't $200 - maybe it's $300, maybe $400 - but someone out there has a real opportunity, especially with the pre-existing clauses removed, to agree to forego huge margins, sweep most of the differentiation under the hood, and offer a blanket price to anyone. I think that kind of message has a huge opportunity to resonate with the public.

The problem with health care costs - other than simply being too fucking high I mean - is that it seems to be a hydra that requires near simultaneous handling of all heads to have a reasonable shot at defeating it.

My experiences lead me to doubt we have the ability and the resources to do that. Those same experiences convince me that we lack the collective will to do so even if we had every other necessary tool.

Fuck me - I think we agree on something else.

BCBS of WNY aka HealthNow....We will be providing the video stream to all the news outlets that are running the symposium on their websites.

I will tell you this much as well, my insurance at close to 400 a month sucks ass and I hate the hoops I have to jump through just to go to a specialist.

Alrighty...note to self: Amend item number 7 for the FOFCHCC.

Didn't say we agreed on death-panel decisions :) . There are a (limited) number of things that we agree on after all.

Given the rather depressing conclusion I had drawn there, it may actually be an even bigger bummer that we're in basic agreement about it. I mean, it's pretty much a declaration of "we're screwed" ... and we probably both agree that isn't exactly the optimal outcome for anybody either.

In New York, profits are already regulated - and under Obamacare, this will be the case nationally.

You're right that a blanket price is closer to reality when restrictions on pre-existing conditions come into play.

Cynically, the business opportunity comes into play when capturing relatively healthy people. But how do you do that? Most healthy people are employed and the money is going to be in negotiating with large employers. For them, little will change under the new law.

What remains is the Battlestar Galactica of customers. You make money by picking out the best of the independent ships. But the legislation will prevent you from discriminating against anyone. So if you offer a great product, the first to sign on will be the ones who have serious pre-existing conditions. Healthy uninsured people will hold out as long as they can.

This is a big part of the reason why the insurance giants thrive under the current system and will continue to thrive.

The total amount spent won't change much, up or down, with the new legislation. It increases because health care costs are increasing. To address that, we need real health care reform, not a cynical piece of legislation designed for political appeal and corporate interests. I think the biggest gains under this legislation will be with the hospitals. However, there will be pressure to regulate payments to hospitals once this takes effect, so I'm not sure this will be a long-term gain.

This is an incredibly complex law, even though it doesn't address the core of the problem at all.

Tangental to the topic of the day perhaps but I've been amused by this observation attributed to P.J. O'Rourke, about the need for two new political parties: one for those with his mixture of views, another for those who hold the opposite mixture.

Not sure why exactly, but that has amused me today.

I hope there's not some kind of quota. :D

My non-rant, for those who are curious. About 1,300 words but only around 900 of them are my own. I borrowed the rest ... borrowed mind you, neither taxed nor fined :)

And in other news … | Jon's Three Cents

They do tingle when he's near

Ok, someone start looking for that singularity that just opened up....Both DT and I agree with Jon......


I need smelling salts....

Help....everything is going dark....

Well don't call a doctor, the free health care ain't kicked in yet ;)

Were the Paquiaou-Bradley judges subbing for the supreme court today

Busy day. Just checked the net.

Thank you Chief Justice Roberts. If Obamacare survives the next several years, I think this is the legacy you will be remembered for.

GOP will play this to the hilt in the elections and Healthcare will be getting alot of publicity rest of the year. I like the exposure, key issue for me the last election and this coming one.

If the GOP can come up with something meaningfull (vs McCain's $2,500 tax rebate) which will also help the unfortunate, uninsured (and kids of), I'll seriously consider voting GOP as I like Romney.

Maybe I'm just overly optimistic, but I just don't see all these votes the GoP thinks they have heading into this election.

The Black vote Obama's
The Latino vote right now is almost 3-1 in Obama's favor
The right has pissed off pretty much any woman not married to a right wing male.

So otehr than the old fart white guy vote, who is voting for the GoP?

I've seen nearly as many livid women today as I have men, or maybe more accurately they've been more derisive about the decision (while the men have been more angry). And, now that I think about it (since you mentioned marital status) I think there were actually more of them single than married.

I don't really want to get into a public debate about this stuff since this thinking about and implementing this law is what I do for a living but I'll comment on a few things.

Galaxy is right, the margins for health insurance companies are poor compare to other industries. Even if the insurance companies never profited another cent there wouldn't be much savings because without the insurance cos fighting for those profit dollars - they will just be seized by expanding margins for providers. Now maybe you think that is better - which is fine, but don't fool yourself into thinking there would be savings.

There are no accounting tricks to really be had on the MLR rebates. The pools are strictly regulated and it is quite easy for regulators to see the differences between your statutory accounting and your MLR filings. Certainly there is some gray at the edges, but if you run at a 75% loss ratio and don't pay rebates it won't take long until the fines roll in.

A Southwest type carrier that could compete with the national carriers is impossible. Most importantly you need membership scale to negotiate competitive deals with provider systems, without that you can't compete. You can't get the membership without sales, underwriting, actuaries and service people. If you somehow convinced providers to take global caps over fee for service.... But don't worry that isn't happening.

One thing a lot of you seem to be ignoring is that the ACA came with rate review - so in the individual and small group market if you want more than a 10% increase the state needs to approve. The idea that after 1/1/14 insurance companies can use any rates they like is 100% incorrect.

This law is not great (more bad than good), I still was personally happy to see it stick
- without it having 50 states doing 50 things would be worse for everyone in the long run.

A few interesting theories about how things may have shaken out behind the scenes (Scalia's dissent may have started as the majority, Roberts may have written much of the dissent before he swapped on the tax issue). It's sounds a little like a contrived storyline built around Roberts' unexpected vote, but they raise some good points.

The Volokh Conspiracy » More Hints that Roberts Switched his Vote

I never understood the vitriol regarding the law. A lot of it seemed to already have been a part of laws that group plans have (put in place by evil socialist Ronald Reagan). It really doesn't change a lot for most people and I do think it helps those who do have preexisting conditions or come down with something while insured. My small business has benefited from the credit we get for having people on our plan. It's by no means perfect, but it's also not bad.

There are far bigger issues out there in the health care landscape that need to be addressed. This just seems like a silly thing for people to start a political war over.

I don't get this line of thinking. Health insurance costs are passed on through to the employee even if it doesn't show up in their check. Just like the payroll tax, unemployment insurance, and any benefits you're providing (401K match, etc). There are only a handful of scenarios that I can configure where this would hurt a business, and those would seem relatively rare. And health care premiums are tax deductible to your business, something I don't believe the penalty is.

Hiring is based on demand. If people are lining up down the street for your service, you'll hire people to fill that demand. If health care costs go up for an employee, they'll simply take home less cash in their paycheck. And if you don't offer them health insurance at all, you'll have to make up for it by offering a higher salary and thus eliminating any perceived savings you would have.

It's not a great bill and the brouhaha over it is overated. It doesn't address the biggest problem with health care which are the rising costs. It should not have any impact on your hiring practices though. It simply spreads out the responsibility and shifts where payments come from.

You own a business like I do which is why you shouldn't be touting the "people will get fired" propaganda you hear. You know that has nothing to do with hiring, just like your own personal income tax rate has nothing to do with hiring.

I wish we could figure out a way to detach health insurance from our employment situation, like the Switzerland private health care model.

Im curious why you correctly think that the sick will flood the Individual market but the healthy will hold out, that it would help insurance companies thrive?

The law only allows age banding at a max of 3:1, while currently most have a max of 6:1. So if you are young... your rates are going to skyrocket because of just that factor, even ignoring guaranteed issue and the new required benefits that aren't in plans.

As for regulating payments that makes sense on the surface (i.e the medicare fallacy), but it comes with unintended consequences. The most obvious and dangerous being that if there isn't money to be made in medicine you'll lose a lot of talented future doctors to other careers. There will already be shortages in primary care because it's less lucrative than specialties. Dentistry already has seen a shift to cosmetic because it's more profitable than general.

I know it started 15 minutes ago, but we are providing the Video Streaming for the event the Blue Cross Blue Shield of WNY is running right now.

This is a symposium of HealthCare professionals, lawyers and names within the WNY and NY area talking about the ruling.

If interested, you can watch it here...

http://www.wgrz.com/life/advertorial...w/default.aspx

Mainly a barrier-to-entry argument. The money in health insurance is with the contracts with large supplies of younger, healthier employees. And, as you said, the change in rates for the young means those customers will be more profitable. Which means much lower rates.

So, how do you set up a new health insurance company without getting those clients? With the added difficulty of not being able to compete across state lines.

Like much legislation, it's tailored to support existing big business. I know it sounds like tin-foil-hat conspiracy crap, but it does seem that both the Democrats and the Republicans are beholden to the large groups that finance their re-election campaigns.

Meanwhile, we desperately need health care reform. As you said, a huge risk lies in the scenario where there's little incentive to become a doctor. There are already shortages in many fields, including general practice. When it comes to big pharma, we have a system where there's huge incentive to develop new drugs that give you erections, but very little incentive in attacking the problem with increasingly antibiotic-resistant infections.

We're lucky to live in such a wealthy, thriving country. We spend an enormous amount on health care. We could do so much better if only our politicians were honest people.

Unfortunately, I can't think of a good solution. I'm pro-freedom, so a complete ban on political advertising is anathema. McCain-Feingold was a nice try at starting to address the problem, but I agree that we can't just suspend the Constitution because of good intentions.

I didn't say anything about people getting fired. I just said I'm going to have to play games with where people are staffed amongst the three LLC's currently in my business. It's called tax avoidance and it's perfectly legal. I'd also note that the level of games that will be played to avoid this tax are going to be a huge part of the coming years (assuming it survives).

Hopefully at some point they will address this (although I think we have different concepts of what "address this" will mean, and I'll just leave it at that).

The new rules are going to drive the rates up for the young and healthy, not lower them.
I think the reality is going to be that the young profitable members are going to have to bail on the product and only purchase when necessary. The tax/penalty isn't high enough to compel people to stay in the market if their rates quadruple.

So without the young subsidizing the old and rate review in effect... The barrier to entry really becomes that the premium cant keep up with the claims as the population spins into a death spiral.

Low penalty + tighter age banding + rate review + mandated benefits + no individual underwriting/rate ups = dead product. One man's opinion - companies will be attempting to turn in their licences in states in the ind market - and states will be forcing companies to pay to play - to have a group licence you'll have to offer an ind product, which companies will make as unattractive as possible to keep membership low and losses to a minimum.

I don't disagree that corps influence legislation to their benefit - but because the penalty is so low, the admin to implement is high, the new taxes will drive groups to move to less profitable self insured plans... It's not the insurance cos who are benefiting in the corporate sector. I don't know enough about Medicaid to know if it helps the industry or not.

There's no addressing about it. There are TONS of loopholes built into these laws to provide options for tax avoidance for businesses. If you aren't playing the game as a business owner, you're throwing money away.

Listen, I've been very consistent in my support of a flat tax rate without any loopholes, deductions, etc. I'd much prefer a system without them because it would make my job a whole lot easier. But that's not my fault nor any of the business owners in this country.

I didn't word it very well, but that's what I was trying to say. When pricing, an existing large insurance company will be able to offer a big business with lots of young profitable members a rate closer to actual cost.

For the younger individuals (like me) outside of the system, rates will skyrocket and the products we would ordinarily choose will no longer be available. The tax/penalty is going to be a fact of life, it seems.


Which is pretty much what we have today anyway, only there's no forcing insurance companies to play. My rates have gone up 50% in the last year alone.


There's still good profit in the big insurance companies - especially when you consider that it's a completely artificial and unnecessary mechanism in a state-run health-care world. It's regulated profit, but it's protected and easy.

I think health-care reform requires entirely removing employers from the equation. But I worry that the entire system is unsustainable without that influx of money. Since people view health care as an entitlement, they aren't willing to spend money when they need health care.

I read this and I have to ask, "Do those women have the slightest clue what they're talking about?"

The law does nothing but save rights for women when it comes to medical care. What on earth would they have to get upset about? Single or married for that matter?

Obviously there is a difference in opinion on how the law will effect everything long term, and I admit that only time will really tell the truth of that. Anyone claiming to know for certain one way or the other is simply spouting their party line.

Beyond that however, I really fail to understand the vitriol. Change is hard. people like their status quo, but change is also inevitable. Why piss into teh wind? All it does is get you wet?

This is an issue far bigger than medical care for a great deal of people. And tbh, you should know that without asking.

Ah you are conflating the individual and group markets. Yes, group insurance will stay more stable as the members are subsidized by their employers generally. Group rates may become a bit more unstable with ACA because now large group is also guaranteed issue regardless of participation or emplyer contributions. Generally today large groups require a certain level of employer contributions to get competitive quotes - otherwise you end up with only the sick utilizers enrolled. Starting 1/1/14 - carriers can't refuse group coverage on contibs or participation - which may make the large group market less stable if employer's start to scale back contibutions even further. Without getting into a very technical discussion on how it's priced it will have a different effect on groups 50-150, 150-500 and 500+.

I am not familiar with Michigan's individual market - but if the rates went up 50% over two years I would imagine the claims have gone up a similar amount. Michigan of course is dominated by one carrier who has toyed with the state legislature over the past decade - I have worked on Michigan at times in the large group space and it's one of the least competitive states I've experienced.

Personally I don't think you can solve cost issue with legislation. The only think that will make the system sustainable in the long term is a major shift in the behavior of the people it serves. How America convinces it's citizens to live healthier lives and treat end of life care differently I have no idea. When your system supports expensive treatments long past a terminal diagnosis to merely extend life for a short period at a low quality... How can you even discuss the issue when every conversation turns into a tonedeaf discussion of death panels.

Edit: There are states today that force insurers to offer individual products in order to participate in their group market. That won't become a new issue, just more widespread.

What exactly are you looking to avoid? The penalty/tax for not covering employees? It's a silly thing not to offer since it passes through to your employees. If you don't offer it, you have to make up for it with a higher salary anyways. It's not like health insurance is an added expense to your books.

Romney raises an astonishing $4.6 million in 24 hours. Could this be a case of Obama winning the battle but ultimately losing the war?

Romney campaign donations hit $4.6 million following health care decision

Evidently the Obama campaign didn't do too badly either.

Obama, Romney Duel Over Post-SCOTUS Fundraising | TPM2012

Best quote from that article. Emphasis mine.

Maybe George Clooney, Bill Maher, Sarah Jessica Parker and Steven Spielberg each donated $1 mill? ;)

Obamacare sucks. *Funds campaign of guy who put it in practice first*

LOL

Wait, so the Romney statements were cold-hearted or something, and the Obama ones were about compassion? As opposed to you know, both being about campaigning? I guess we're back to normal!!

Mitt has more large donors than Obama Vic...that's a discussion you're doomed to lose.

Do you not understand the difference or do you just think its irrelevant somehow?

From a Forbes column:

The majority of the citizens of Massachusetts wanted “Romneycare.”

The majority of American citizens did NOT want“Obamacare.”

“Romneycare” was developed by a coalition of Labor, Management, Republicans and Democrats, who collaborated on its makeup, its contents, and represented the people of the state of Massachusetts—at that time in history. That is how a representative democracy works. If Romney disagreed with parts of the Massachusetts law, that was overcome by the 85% Democratic legislature’s power.

Obamacare was “crammed down our throats” by Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and the Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, in spite of the fact that almost 2/3 of Americans neither favored the law nor wanted it! And almost that many still do not like it, and still do not want it. Pelosi’s now famous statement, “We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it…away from the fog of the controversy…” is indicative of the disregard for the wishes of American citizens.

{shrug} Worthless sumbitch won't do anything useful about anything, what's the f'n point?

The objections conservatives have with Obamacare are all a part of Romneycare. They are eerily similar even in principle. Particularly the individual mandate.

Except the constitutional objection. And the "1 size fits all" objection. And the distrust of federal bureaucracy objection. And the national debt objection.

I'm sure there's people who hate all mandates, there's people that hate all government-supported healthcare. But it's not everyone, not even close. Not everyone who has any issues with Obamacare is a crazy conservative. (I know the strategy is to paint all opposition as extreme, but it's just not reality.)

This is not even close to true. It wasn't crammed down anybody's throat anymore than any other law (and in fact a great deal less than others). And polls have consistently shown throughout the process that people overwhelmingly WANT the provisions within the bill, they're just buying into the negative-messaging around the bill as a whole put out by political opposition.

And finally...I don't get how Pelosi's statement is indicative of the disregard for the wishes of American citizens. That's just stupid editorializing by Forbes. Was it the smartest thing she's ever said? No. But it doesn't in any way even remotely relate to disregarding anybody's wishes. That just makes NO SENSE.

Quoting a propaganda piece doesn't really point out differences. Both were put in place by democratically elected officials. If the people don't like it, they can vote out those who put it in place and replace them with those who will repeal it. I could care less either way as it doesn't affect me much at all.

Both sides whine too much about politicians putting in place things they don't like. Everyone has the power to vote those people out.

With the exception of the mandate, the individual pieces of the ACA poll well among the general public. It isn't as simple as saying people hate it.

And the ACA could have also been put together by a coalition, but the GOP refused to participate. Instead a majority of House members andd a supermajority of Senate members voted for it. That's how a representative democracy works.

I don't see any polling that supports your assertion:

RealClearPolitics - Election Other - Obama and Democrats' Health Care Plan

Oh the ït's different because it's Federal" bit. Except for the part when this was the plan Republicans had back in the 90's when Clinton was trying to pass his health care plan.

The plans are practically identical, one was put in place by a Democrat and the other by a Republican. That's the difference.

Or doesn't work, as the case may be.

Try a real pollster instead of a partisan one. RCP is regarded by any objective measure as a POS.

So if you take the positive things out and opinion-test only those things, people are in favor of them? I bet we could do that with the Patriot Act too.

It appears that you don't know what you're talking about. The RCP chart is an average of all of the available polls, and has correctly called the past three presidential elections within one percentage point.

You could do it with the Patriot Act. It's not just the positive things either. It's that political issues are more complex than a yes/no vote. Ask people if they want to cut spending and most will say yes. Ask them if they want to cut Social Security, Medicare, Defense, and Veteran Benefits and they say no. Well you can't really cut spending without cutting those.

There was and is a lot of misinformation thrown around about the bill. A lot of people are basing their opinions off of that. Thus why it polls well on the individual parts of the bill but not on the bill as a whole. Just like the Patriot Act and spending debates.

I'm not even sure who you're criticizing. Is it anyone that opposes Obamacare? Anyone that has concerns about it? Anyone that gave Romney money in the last 24 hours? Anyone who believes states constitutionally have more freedom to enact certain types of legislation than the federal government? Or just some other fixed group with boundaries set by you?

My bad - I must have been confusing them with someone else.

Anyways - all this is just from the first page of Google results.

Try this from your favorite magazine (Forbes):
Ignore the Obamacare Polls - Forbes making the point that "Obamacare exists in the minds of most people not as what it is: a government program with various impacts on the availability of health care, insurance markets, and the economy. Instead, it is a hazy abstraction. It’s a proxy for Obama himself, and his presidency "

There's also this discussion of a CBS/NYT poll from earlier this year:


Or this discussion of a Kaiser Family Foundation survey

Ya, I was thinking about those spending/tax polls and I think that's just human nature that can be explained in a psychology 101 class. It doesn't expose an inherent correctness about one particular political philosophy over another. When I hear people use polls that have that kind of phenomenon to justify that their side is right, I hear, "see, they're in favor of it, they're just not smart enough to know it", and I find that pretty annoying/insulting. Sure, some aren't smart enough, but there's dumb liberals too. There's also really smart people on both sides.

I was criticizing people who rushed out to support a candidate who was a big supporter of the policy a couple years ago. Figure he'd be the last guy you'd want to support if you were against Obamacare.

I'm not justifying it's right, ultimately people who go to the polls will decide. Just that issues are far more complex than "cut spending". If you actually cut spending without raising taxes, you'd be voted out of office immediately for cutting SS/Medicare benefits and our defense budget.

The Patriot Act is a good comparison because it's something that likely has support on the individual parts of it, but not as much when put together. When you muddle it together you can throw in garbage and people get fed shit like "OMG THEY ARE LISTENING TO ME TALK TO MY WIFE ABOUT THE SEX WE HAD LAST NIGHT". Just like Obamacare somehow had death camps latched on to it.

"Specific provisions of the law enjoy widespread popularity. Tax credits to small businesses, the requirement for easy-to-understand plan summaries, the ability to appeal health plan decisions and the prohibition on cost-sharing for preventive services have the support of 69 percent to 80 percent of Americans."

Ya, this kind of stuff. If you ask someone, "are you in favor of the requirement of easy-to-understand plan summaries or are you against them?", I'm guessing most people are going to say yes. Not sure that's a huge validation of popular opinions. Same with "tax credits for small businesses." or "the ability to appeal health plan decisions" Or in those famous tax/spending polls, it's like asking someone, "do you want to cut funding for hospitals?" Without context, no is the easy answer there. But bills and economies don't exist in those vacuums. Sometimes funding might need to be cut for something, but the the impetus for that isn't usually the cut alone. It's not "we hate hospitals". It's, "shit, where can we save some money here - how much harm will occur if we have to cut this, and maybe fund something else instead."

It's people wanting something for nothing, which isn't going to happen.

Well that and people buying into the BS political-theater/death-panel shit like RainMaker was pointing out.

And the unfavorable numbers may also be more complicated.



Looking at a single favorable/unfavorable line doesn't come close to giving a complete picture on public opinion.

I think it's kind of amusing that at least 20% of Americans are apparently against "easy-to-understand plan summaries." I'm sure those are just people who voted they're against everything when they figured out that's what the poll was about. And maybe that group is the only people you guys are really talking about. I just think it's a little disingenuous to rely on that group to make your points, when there's a much larger group of moderates who are more important to this stuff.

:confused:

Fair confused face, I think I was thinking about another old pet peeve that really hasn't been here recently but just tied in a little into the "people are really for Obamacare they're just brainwashed to think they're not" thing. So nevermind.

The 27% of the people who answered keep the ACA and remove mandate.... I don't even know what to think about them.

One random thing that most people don't know. Barring further legislation the dollars paid by your employer to cover dependents until age 26 or higher depending on the state - will become taxible income if those kids aren't dependents on your tax return.

They just don't understand why the mandate is necessary.

My take is....

If the mandate makes or breaks the whole thing, that shows the weakness of the act. If one peg is taken out and the whole thing collapses, then there is something fundamentally wrong with the structure of this law.

At least that's my guess on why they polled that way.