Obamacare: Told You So (Continued)

Bill Maher says "Liberals" are Stupid.

 

You see, Pres Obama had to lie to get the "Affordable" "Care" Act passed because Americans are too stupid to make decisions on their own about their health care.  But that means that the people who needed Pres Obama to lie to them are the ones who supported Obamacare based on Pres Obama's promises, because If they'd understood that they couldn't keep their insurance if they liked it, they wouldn't have supported the bill.

Who supported Obamacare based on Pres Obama's promises?  "Liberals" did.

Who opposed it from the beginning?  Conservatives did.

Who warned "Liberals" the "if you like your plan, you can keep your plan" promise was a lie?  Conservatives did.

Who warned "Liberals" that the coverage Obamacare mandates would make health insurance more, not less, expensive?  Conservatives did.

Taking the preceding into consideration then, Maher's "stupider" Americans are the "Liberals" who swallowed Pres Obama's oft-repeated lie hook, line and sinker.



Let's meet two of them, shall we?

San Francisco architect Lee Hammack says he and his wife, JoEllen Brothers, are

“cradle Democrats.” They have donated to the liberal group Organizing for America and worked the phone banks a year ago for President Obama’s re-election.

Can't get more "Liberal" than that.

Since 1995, Hammack and Brothers have received their health coverage from Kaiser Permanente, where Brothers worked until 2009 as a dietitian and diabetes educator. “We’ve both been in very good health all of our lives – exercise, don’t smoke, drink lightly, healthy weight, no health issues, and so on,” Hammack told me.

 She even worked for an insurance company.  Can't claim ignorance, then.

 The couple — Lee, 60, and JoEllen, 59 — have been paying $550 a month for their health coverage — a plan that offers solid coverage, not one of the skimpy plans Obama has criticized. But recently, Kaiser informed them the plan would be canceled at the end of the year because it did not meet the requirements of the Affordable Care Act. The couple would need to find another one. The cost would be around double what they pay now, but the benefits would be worse.

Must've been a "cut rate plan" from one of those "bad apple insurers", right?

I tried to find flaws in what Hammack told me. I couldn’t find any.

• The couple’s existing Kaiser plan was a good one.

• Their new options were indeed more expensive, and the benefits didn’t seem any better.

• They do not qualify for premium subsidies because they make more than four times the federal poverty level, though Hammack says not by much.

How is this possible?

I asked Hammack to send me details of his current plan. It carried a $4,000 deductible per person, a $40 copay for doctor visits, a $150 emergency room visit fee and 30 percent coinsurance for hospital stays after the deductible. The out-of-pocket maximum was $5,600. 

What about the new plan?

The letters said the couple would be enrolled in new Kaiser plans that would cost nearly $1,300 a month for the two of them (more than $15,000 a year). 

And for that higher amount, what would they get? A higher deductible ($4,500), a higher out-of-pocket maximum ($6,350), higher hospital costs (40 percent of the cost) and possibly higher costs for doctor visits and drugs. 

When they shopped around and looked for a different plan on California's new health insurance marketplace, Covered California, the cheapest one was $975, with hefty deductibles and copays. 

So, their new plan with KP is $1,300 - $550 = $750, or 2.36 times more expensive per month.  The cheapest plan they found was $975 - $550 = $425, or 1.77 times more expensive per month.  And for all that added expense, they get worse coverage.  Obamacare is awesome!

What is going on here? Kaiser isn’t a “bad apple” insurer and this plan wasn’t “cut rate.” It seems like this is a lose-lose for the Hammacks (and a friend featured in a report last month by the public radio station KQED.)

It's called economics, genius.

Kaiser has canceled about 160,000 policies in California, and about one third of people were in plans like Hammack’s, Stenrud said. About 30,000 to 35,000 were in his specific plan. 

“There’s an aspect of market disruption here that I think was not clear to people,” Stenrud acknowledged. “In many respects it has been theory rather than practice for the first three years of the law; folks are seeing the breadth of change that we’re talking about here.”

It was clear to those of us who warned about it.  But wait - here's where it gets really good.

That’s little comfort to Hammack. He’s written to California’s senators and his representative, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., asking for help.

Are you freaking kidding me?!  They want help from "we have to pass the plan so you can find out what's in it" Pelosi?



We told you so!  We've been telling you since 2009, but you wouldn't listen!  I guess you know what's in it now, "Liberals"!  But wait, it gets better!

“We believe that the Act is good for health care, the economy, & the future of our nation. However, ACA options for middle income individuals ages 59 & 60 are unaffordable. We’re learning that many others are similarly affected. In that spirit we ask that you fix this, for all of our sakes,” he and Brothers wrote.

There's that word again!  I thought this was supposed to be the "Affordable" "Care" Act!  But wait, there's more!

So what is Hammack going to do? If his income were to fall below four times the federal poverty level, or about $62,000 for a family of two, he would qualify for subsidies that could lower his premium cost to as low as zero. If he makes even one dollar more, he gets nothing. 

That’s what he’s leaning toward — lowering his salary or shifting more money toward a retirement account and applying for a subsidy.

Didn't Hammack say that "We believe that the Act is good for health care, the economy, & the future of our nation"?  How is it "good for... the economy & the future of our nation" for middle class people to make less money so they can receive more money from the government?  Where does the government get that money?

By the way, we told you this would happen!  We told you that people respond to economic incentives, and that the incentives Obamacare offers are all wrong! 

But wait - here's the best part!

“We’re not changing our views because of this situation, but it hurt to hear Obama saying, just the other day, that if our plan has been dropped it’s because it wasn’t any good, and our costs would go up only slightly,” he said.

Even a flat worm will react to pain by changing its behavior.  So, I guess that means Bill Maher is right.  I can't believe I just wrote that!