As if the baby boomers weren't leaving a big enough mess already. Congrats young libs, hopefully this is the change you wanted: enacted legislation that allows the young & healthy to overly bear the burden of the old & sick as well as allowing well moneyed institutions & corporations who can afford to set up their own health care plans to side skirt the requirements in their entirety. Bravo. You bet we need immigration reform. Send us all your young & healthy.
The two numbers cited were for next year and the year beyond-- and that latter one just about doubled. I wonder if that is due to a fuller implementation of the ACA or just anticipated increased healthcare costs? I was a little shocked that a tax preparation service was being used to identify potential "out of complicance" citizens-- although it was finally ruled a tax, wasn't it?!
You may qualify for discounts to help pay for premiums if your income is from $15,302 to $46,021 for an individual and $31,155 to $93,700 for a family of four.
And those families of two who make a little more than 93,700 are just screwed when their insurance rates go up massively while their income doesn't. Family of two who makes about 95,000 a year and hoping to have their first kid in their 20s is in for a shock.
Are you saying your health insurance is expected to go up $700 next year? The penalty for not having insurance is done in your tax bill. That's how it was from day 1.
I think people expecting rates to skyrocket are in for a much bigger shock. Early evidence (and it is VERY early since much of the implemention still hasn't happened) is that Obamacare is starting to bend the cost curve down.
If you look at random individual circumstances, there were increases like that in 2007 and 2008 as well. Overall, the increases the last 3 years have been the lowest in the 50 years that we've have tracked them (not all due to Obamacare, though).
These aren't random circumstances. I look at well over a hundred renewals. The CEO of Aetna said in a Dec 12th investor meeting that some markets will see their prices go up by over 100%. In Texas, the major carriers won't even write child only policies anymore because of Obamacare. Here's an excerpt of an article from the WSJ. I don't have it digitally anymore to post the full article:
That never would have gotten through. In fact, no meaningful legislation on health care will go through, because any solutions will either require a totally nationalized system or leaving the elderly to dry, and voting for either of those options is a death sentence. Same thing with Social Security. And that is why democracy sucks.
I'm saying "They're saying..." Where does the 2014 $700/month cost of healthcare estimate come from? Our Employer claimed an $18,000 deduction (DD) for our family this year (2012) and that alone is $1500/month. That is what the Employer paid, we have to pay some out of our own pocket, too-- around $500/month.
At the very least, there should have been a "public option." But the insurance companies have cronies in both parties who would not support single payer or the public option. The Nixon/Romney/Obama reforms just don't go far enough. By we should start to see costs bend down as more of the program get online. In the meantime, we should expect th einsurance companies to jack up prices while they can..
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/08/us/health-spending-growth-stays-low-for-third-straight-year.html The rate of increase in health spending, 3.9 percent in 2011, was the same as in 2009 and 2010 — the lowest annual rates recorded in the 52 years the government has been collecting such data. ... “In 2011,” the report said, “spending for private health insurance premiums increased 3.8 percent, as did spending for benefits. Out-of-pocket spending by consumers increased 2.8 percent in 2011, accelerating from 2.1 percent in 2010 but still slower than the average annual growth rate of 4.7 percent” from 2002 to 2008. There are a multitude of factors, including the recession, but the post on the previous page about Medicare spending being flat - which is less affected by a recession - suggests that the cost curve itself is getting bent down, at least in the short term.
The above was 2009-2011. Here's early 2012 data. http://www.altarum.org/health-syste...th-spending-growth-4-percent-price-14year-low ANN ARBOR, Mich. — National health expenditures grew at an estimated annual rate of 4.3 percent in 2012, a bit higher than the 3.9 percent experienced for each of the years 2009-2011. While this estimate is subject to revisions, it portends a fourth consecutive year of record-low growth compared to all previous years in the 50-plus years of official health spending data. Health care prices in December 2012 rose by 1.7 percent compared to December 2011, the lowest year-over-year growth since February 1998. The 12-month moving average at 2.0 percent was the lowest reading since December 1998.
Don't know if I'm stating the obvious but one of you is talking about healthcare spending while the other is talking about premium increases.
Good point. I don't see historical data on premium increases offhand, but I'll see what i can find. But you would think Medicare spending should track with insurance premiums since it's not affected much by recessions cutting down what people are spending on health care.
Rates are up. No one in the insurance industry believes that health care spending has been reduced because of a bend in the cost curve. It is attributed almost entirely to the recession keeping people who used to go to clinics and specialists home. Obama's pledge to reduce family premiums by $2500 at the end of his first term has been a total flop.
