JMS

Well since all insurance is collectivism, and subsidized by all who contribute, can't that argument be used against anybody who leaves work after an 8, 10, 12, 18 hour workday? Where would you make the break? Where would you say a worker has done his bit, and can go home sleep, eat, pet his dog and not be violating his burden to not recline on the back of his fellow insurane recipiants.

100% of american would need to work 2% fewer hours to have the overall work hours go down by 2%... but The average US work week is more than 40.8 hours per week. The fact is Americans work longer hours than workers in most other developed countries... Including Japan, where they've actually coined a word for "death by overwork".. Typical American middle income family work week grew by 11 hours over the last 30 years, and it's still going up. No, I am stating facts... If you leave your job, any job... you have an option of continuing to recieve insurance by paying what your company pays for you to get insurance.... but your insurance company doesn't charge the same amount of money for an indivudual they do for a company... The Federal Government who passed the COBRA legislation pays the difference.... The federal government subsidizes your COBRA insurance if you leave your job... Regardless of that minutia... the facts are in 1985, when the government passed COBRA, the government was passing legislation to enable and help pay for insurance for folks were leaving their jobs..

Again the facts of the world we live in inform us that Americans on average work more than 40 hours a week... This has been true for decades. This will be true in 2017 when our workforce on average chooses to work 2% fewer hours per week too. Thus this is absolutely a question of consumer choice in choosing to work overtime, or choosing not too. I would thus argue that my example of the guy working 80 hours a week was infinitely more representative as scewed as it were than what the other side is suggesting, That our economy is going to be down 2 million jobs; or that 2 million folks will choose not to work by 2017 because of Obamacare as the CBO report directly refutes that. The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 (aka Cobra ) absolutely is someething the US Government pays for... The federal government subsidizes folks insurance when they leave their jobs ( volentarily or involentarily ).. as they transition from one job to another..

You do understand that government paid over $1 trillion a year in health care before the ACA, right? It's not like this inefficient system is an example of private sector capabilities. It's layered with massive regulations, cost shifting and avoidance of exposure to the real cost of care. The flaw in your logic is the government has always paid for poor folks healthcare... That didn't change under OBamacare.... The folks who got insurance under OBamacare were teh working poor... The folks working, often more than one job to make ends meet. The 50 million Americans who didn't have insurance under Obamacare weren't the systemically unemployed.. Those people are already covered by medicare. The folks who are working their asses off are the folks who Obamcare extended coverage too.

The CBO report didn't say Obamacare would reduce jobs or even that fewer Americans would be employed in 2017 because of Obamacare. The CBO report rather said that because Obamacare is going to ensure many Americans can get insurance at a reasonable rate, some Americans will choose to work fewer hours... So that father of 4 working two jobs to make ends meet may choose to work only a 60 hour work week rather than a 70-80 hour work week. The CBO report specifically said more americans would be employed and that Obamacare is a net positive for both consumers and the federal government. Nothing in this CBO report contradicts previous CBO reports on Obamacare... According to the CBO's report these hours will amount to the equivelent of 2 million full time workers.... Or about 2% of the hours worked by the entire US workforce...... So in my example... that guy working an 80 hour work week to make ends meet may choose to work only 78.4 hours by 2017.... 2% fewer hours... So in that context do you still believe the Government shouldn't have programs to ensure costs of benifits such as healthcare are provided to the consumer at a reasonable rate... Or do you just believe that the government programs for healthcare should be to styfle competition Like our anti trust exemption for the health insurance industry which allows them to collude on price and eliminate competition.( McCarran–Ferguson Act in place since 1944)? You don't see the government having a role to play in Health insurance market on the side of consumer... Just act as a giant syphone and pass along to the health industry hundreds of billions of dollars with no hard requiremnts such as the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003; cost $400 Billion... Hell even Ronald Reagan disagrees with you... He's the one who signed COBRA, which allowed individuals to continue to recieve healthcare even after they stopped working for their company. And as for the General topic that the Government shouldn't be ensuring people don't have to work themselves to death in order to put food on the table... Anybody who makes a statement like that is just beyond the relms of reality... The US has had a 40 hour work week for nearly 100 years.. Most of our economy is still governed by this legislature. The fact that there is a large and growing number of people in our economy which have to go out and get a second or third job is a new thing... That our government actually implements a little legislation which takes some of the heat off these folks is an excellent thing... and then that these people would use such a program to actually reward themselves with 2 hours off a week extra is by any measure a very conservative positive accomplishemnt.... Complaining about this is really defying logic.

Yes the government should never try to see that the working man doesn't have an incentive to work 60-70-80 hours a work..... It's comunism I tell you it's comunism...... I mean the government never should have coined a 8 hour work day... I mean it was critical part of Roosevelet's new deal.. and it's been part of many american's work ethic for now going on 80 years.. but how dare the government try to spread that grace to poor folks who are used to working dawn to dusk...

Holy Guacamole... This is like the 4th time the GOP has blatantly lied about a CBO report.... Nothing has changed... Obamacare is still a net postive to our budget and economy to the tune of trillions of dollars... The Economy isn't going to create fewer jobs... All that's changed is folks who traditionally have to work two jobs to get by in our economy are going to opt to work a few hours less a week.. Workers will choose to work about 1-2% fewer hours by 2027 than was orginally projected by the CBO... The economy isn't going to create fewer jobs because of Obamacare.. It's going to create more net jobs because of Obamacare... Obamacare isn't going to cost us more... it's not even going to cost us anything.. It's still going to save us a bucket full of cash... It's going to save private citizens money, It's going to save the federal budet money... But OH MY GOD.... poor folks have a little cushon because they are being offered affordable healthcare... a few of them are going to opt work a few fewer hours a week... LIKE THAT's a BAD THING? You know how you might fix that? You might raise the minimum wage!!... give them a little incentive to work. more... Right out of the report.... http://www.cbsnews.com/news/what-the-cbo-report-on-obamacare-actually-says-about-jobs/

Only Obamacare doesn't have a cost. The entire plan is a net positive. The Congressional Budget Office is the gold standard for measuring the cost of government programs and they say Obamcare will save us hundreds of billions over the short term and Trillions over the long term. And that hasn't changed since they initially determined that. Even the Republicans Acknowledge this when they took control of congress in 2011. The GOP wrote new rules for Congress requiring that all new spending bills would have to be offset with spending cuts. Only the Republicans wrote one exception. If they repealed ObamaCare they would not require themselves to come up with the hundreds of billions it would cost... http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/05/us/politics/05rules.html Paul Ryan's budget cuts.... spent money to repeal Obamacare.. Paul Ryan's third Budget 2013... Relies on Obamacare savings..

As a nation we spend more than 3 trillion dollars a year on healthcare.... what kind of tax did they clip you for given the exchanges probable cost less than .000001% of our national healthcare cost... which would be about 30 million I'm guessing... ok let's be generous.. .00001%... 300 million. (1) you always had an option of raising your deductible and passing more expense to the employee. That's not something which is specific to Obamacare. (2) Obamacare actually is better if that is your policy because it ensures at least the plan will cover your employees after they get sick... It won't bankrupt folks who have insurance anymore by capping coverage or denying coverage for some illnesses.

So that's what the conservative argument boils down too today.... Holding down costs for the whole doesn't matter... It's how the law effects the outliers, that's the only thing which counts? It's not a "cap" on profits. It's a cap on overhead, which includes profits. And I don't know what you are reffering too when you talk about subsidies.. Subsidies are paid by the federal government not the insurance companies... Unless you are saying the subsidies will make OBAMA care cost more... which is still wrong... We know Obamacare saves money. It saves hundreds of billions over the short term and trillions over the long term. How can you save money when millions of Americans get subsities for their coverage? Simple... before Obamacare we had 50 million folks uninsured.. when they got sick it impacted everybody.. Obamacare reduces that number by 30 million Americans. The government is basically laying off the risk of those 30 million into existing private and public insurance plans. It costs the premium, but it saves the big hit when they get sick... Just like you pay your insurance so you won't be bankrupted when you get sick... same premise.

40% rate increase is bogus.. you can't claim one guy see's a 40% rate increase and therefore Obamacare which is assisting in holding costs down for everybody is bad.... The reason why folks with low end insurance policies are seeing their rates go up is because part of Obamacare legislates minimum coverage for insurance... You can no longer buy insurance winch is unlikely to cover you when or if you need it. The government had to do this because the #1 cause of bankruptcies in this country were medical costs and that was for people with insurance. policies which capp'ed your coverage to 100k or 1 million were thrown out and in addition a plans ability to use legalize to deny folks coverage was curtailed. This meant some plans were discontinued and other plans made available to these folks had greater costs... About 5% of the public found themselves in that boat.. ( from my recollection).. But the very premise doesn't make sense... Pre Obamacare Insurance companies had much more leway to gauge insuree's ... Under Obamacare overhead is capped at 80% of outlays. So an insurance company can't have more than 20% overhead ( profit, dividends, advertising, salaries, bonuses, paper clips ) in total. So their costs today are directly tied to there outlays... If outlays are therefore growing at a near historic low rate... then premiums must be too... That's just math. I disagree.. That you can no longer buy insurance which is meaningless is a good thing.. not a bad thing... even if 5% of the country who where paying for insurance which didn't cover them now have to pay more for insurance which does...

I apologize if I misunderstood your point... From your post number 1921 So I took that as you saying Obama care was causing us to spend more on healthcare...

As a more left wing reactionary poster, I find Larry annoying too when he calls me out for my biases and perceived inaccuracies... Your premise here is just wrong... which is what Larry is reacting too. While there are some insurance rates which have risen under Obamacare... the facts are healthcare costs since Obamacare passed are at record low increases overall. 3.7% in 2012.. So claiming healthcare costs are up by 40% is just crazy talk. The new report from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) found healthcare spending rose by 3.7 percent in 2012, the second year on record and the only years in decades healthcare costs have grown lower than the rate of GDP growth.. So claiming out of control costs associated with Obamacare is just factually inaccurate.. A more valid tact would be to say Obamacare didn't create the savings. Only that doesn't appear to be the case either.. A still more accurate complaint might be ok we reduced costs 0.1% as a ratio to GDP.. whoop de doooo... by even the most conservative estimates half of our healthcare costs are due to inefficiencies and waste built into our system... saving 0.1% as a percentage of GDP is still only modestly better than treading water. At that rate it will take us nearly 50 years to close the gap with the rest of the industrialized world in healthcare costs.

I'm going to go with the new Sherlock Holmes from the BBC.. The latest season will be coming out on PBS for those who don't have a computer or ipad and a VPN client such as Tunnel Bear. The third season just finished up on the BBC last Sunday... Starring Benedict Cumberbatch's as Holmes and Martin Freeman as Dr Watson.... Seasons are only three shows long.. So all told there are only 9 shows... They are excellent.... I just watched season three last Sunday.

TWA if you get insurance from the expansiion of Medicaid, or if you get private insurance with subsidies from the government then you might be right. However, you are then also a pretty poor person who probable pays no income tax and most likely Heathcare Savings Accounts wouldn't help you much anyway as the distiction between pretax and post tax dollars is less meaningful for folks who don't pay much taxes.. However if you have private insurance which you fully pay for... your insurance is still ACA plan, subject to it's mandates; and then certainly you could use the HSA. As I said, I've got one. It's only worth it to me though because I knew I would incure thousands of dollars of healthcare costs from my daughter which weren't covered by my plan and I knew that in advance. As for How much will somebody have to pay.. That's question cannot be answered because poor folks who get subsidies just like folks who don't have a choice and can pick from different plans... You would have to know which plan the guy picked to answer your question.

Absolutely right. There is free preventative care checkups in Obamacare. There are no more annual or lifetime ceilings to benifits. There are a plethora of other things which must be covered in everybody's plan. The idea folks plans prior to Obamacare were more comprehensive or more fully featured is arguing the exception rather than the rule. That might be true for less than 2% of Americans. Likewise the argument insurance is going to bankrupt poor folks before they can benifit from it is nonsensical. The one critism of Obamacare which I would like to explore is the tax on cadilac plans which is set to go into effect in 2018. From what I'm reading the tax is on the companies... is that right? The right wing whackadoodles who have been misleading at every turn on this law are saying this is about limiting services to the wealthy... which makes no sense to me. But if they are truely taxing companies 40% of the cost of the employee plans over say some sort of threashhold... ( plans over say 4500 get the 40% tax on the portion over the threashold )... How could the net effect be anything other than to pursuade companies from using these cadilac plans? I'm still researching this..

If you are a small buisiness then I would think you would embrace Obamacare. (1) You can get insurance and can't get priced out of that insurance if somebody get's sick. (2) Pre-existing conditions are gone. (3) They addressed bankrupcies which most effected small business owners and employees due to being under insured.. If your argument is the status quoe system was working for you, then that's fine.... The old system was systemically broken and didn't work for most. The new system under Obamacare is a modest step towards having a functioning healthcare system. We are far away from the end to healthcare reform in this country.

Even the "high decuctable plans" under obamacare must cover basic doctor visits, free visits for preventitive care; be devoid of life time limits, and annual limits on benifits. So the "High deductable plans" aren't nearly as spartan as they once were. I have a healthcare savings account, and used it for certain doctor visits for my daughter which were not covered under my previous plan. Those visits are now covered though. Not sure if it's just a different plan thing or an obamacare thing though..

How exactly am I flip flopping? I think I've defended every point to such an extent you've accepted my evidence without question; with the exception of the lawyer's driving our system... your assertion which we disagreed upon.. I don't think I've flip flopped at all.... Although you do have me considering your lawyer position..

Yes poor people were covered by Medicaid in the status quoe system. The 50 million folks who had no insurance were the working class folks who were not poor enough to get Medicaid benifits. Obamacare expands Medicaid to cover some of thse folks, and send many others into the commerical marketplace with subsidies for private insurance.

:doh: any source for that statement? any what so ever? So your thought is that prior to Obamacare when there was less minimum coverage requirements folks were less likely to find high deductible plans attractive. But now under obamacare with benifits ceilings are gone and manditory coverage; folks are crowding into those plans? That makes no sense...

I'm unsure of what your point is. Working class people don't need insurance? Working class people should pay as they go, only the poor and weathy folks benifit from having insurance?. Or is your suggestion that catastrophic insurance is of lesser concern than coverage for ear infections? Or perhaps your point is Obama didn't go far enough and what is covered by insurance plans should be much much more regulated? That when poor folks couldn't get any insurance... they were better off because now they can potentially choose a plan which wouldn't cover ear examinations? It's hard to make your statement fit into any coherant critism of Obamacare.

Insuring the poor is cheaper today under Obamacare than prior to the passing of Obamacare. Medicare today costs 5% less than it did prior to passing Obamacare.... And as already discussed the cost increases in private health insurance have been cut in half. Taken together healthcare cost increases are at their lowest rate since we've been tracking this metric. So that directly refutes your proposition that "rates are rising like crazy". Rates are rising in the last three years since Obamacare passed at less than half the rate they rose in the previous 10 years prior to Obamacare. http://www.usatoday....growth/3650243/

Obamacare doesn't set your deductable dude. I have a 20$ deductable, I was attempting to identify an extreme example of a high deductable to fit your critism. Deductables are dependent upon the plan you pick. Yeah, with Obamacare if you get sick and need your insurance you have a much better chance you will be covered... which is a good thing.. we agree. (1) The 50k dude can't say "screw it"... if he doesn't get insurance there is a penelty which basically amounts to the cost of insurance. So their isn't any financial benifit in him trying to opt out. That's the idea behind a mandate. (2) You can't get "cheaper" healthcare visits by paying out of pocket. Folks who pay out of pocket pay significantly higher prices for services under our system.... That's predates Obamacare... like orders of magnatude more expensive. (3) Costs vary depending upon which plan you sign up for and what subsidies you are eligible for. Some folks who are too wealthy for medicare can get coverage for 50$ a month.... Other folks can pay $500... Some folks who were paying $1000 are finding alternative plans which now cover them for much less. (4) A lot of foks in this country which didn't work for a fortune 500 or the US government couldn't buy insurance. and if they could buy insurance it didn't cover them when they were most in need.. Obamacare fixes that... The argument that only wealthy people benifit from insurance is a croc. The complaint that everybody must get insurence I personally find muted against the benifit that everybody (most folks) will be able to get insurance.

Across the board since the Affordable Care act passed in 2010.... ( last 3 years ) cost increases for private companies have been cut by more than half.... down from 4% growth to 1.6% growth... Medicare costs have actually been reduced.... Heathcare cost increases are today at their lowest rate on record.... http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/11/20/health-care-spending-growth/3650243/ Which really makes no sense. So today a dude get's sick and incures 50k in expenses..... Our system, meaning you and I have to basically incur 50k of costs.... Now you are saying his 1000$ deductable will bankrupt that dude... So the system will have to basically over 1k? and you are gripping? The reality is even poor people benifit from having insurance, and society benifits too. ? catastrophic insurance with free preventative healthcare visits.... This is another silly complaint..... folks are angry that insurance companies now have to cover all sorts of illnesses which may or may not pertain to individuals for the benifit of the population; and then complain it's only catastrophic insurance. You can't have it both ways.... Facts are the mandates don't cover everything in the top plans, but they do mandate your insurance cover the basics, which is more than insurance companies used to cover.