Seriously - you don't want BIG GOVERNMENT knowing your SSN - no telling what they would do if they possessed a list of SSN's.
Good point. Seems like it would improve job mobility and more freedom of choice of work. No longer are you tied down to a workplace simply because you need health insurance. A person with a pre-existing condition can now quit a job to start his/her own business. A middle class husband or wife can now quite a job to look after their family because two income wasn't necessary but was only there to obtain company provided health plans. While other folks that do want those job can now get into those jobs. Increasing job mobility and freedom of work in this case I think is a net positive for society, even if some are choosing it for the subsidy.
I just want to know why I need to provide it even if I don't go the healthcare.gov route and walk right into a Humana office.
That's exactly right. And one extremely conservative constituency that stands to benefit most from the ACA (or a single payer/universal program) are people living in rural areas/small towns. There will much less pressure for them to move away from home to big cities where the jobs with health plans exist.
my life went from roses and peaches to pure crap.. thanks obama.. anyways, i agree obama care has not gone smoothly and yes my insurance rates have gone up and so has everyone elses that i know.. We definitely have a messed up healthcare/insurance system. The prices are just outrageous... I'll at least credit Obama for trying to change and make things better.. whether it's actually better or not.. i dont know. but at least he's trying
Again, the federal government uses SS as an ID#, and they have to verify that you have insurance. It doesn't matter if you have group care, go to a Humana office, or go through the exchange. They still have to verify your insurance to determine whether you are subject to penalties.
Seriously? I'm truly sorry to hear that. But maybe it's just your life and Obama had nothing to do with it? Just a thought. And Sam just what did you mean by that?
Coming back late to this thread. True not tying insurance to employment is a good thing and one of the things I've argued before but I think you are painting too rosy a picture that those who don't participate in the labor force will just be able to find new and better jobs or create new businesses. There is as much the possibility that these people end up on Medicare further taxing the system rather than significantly add to the economy. While I agree that more opportunity should be made for mobility in the labor force I don't think just brushing off the possibility that millions will chose to leave the labor force is a good thing. I've only skimmed the last few pages here but the amount of spin I see is dizzying from both sides. I'm not going to trumpet this as an imminent failure but at the same time I'm not going to declare this as a wonderful opportunity. With a lot of things about the ACA this is another thing worth keeping an eye.
These are people *voluntarily* choosing to leave. If they don't have other options that they consider to be better, they probably aren't going to be leaving in the first place. Increased job mobility is virtually always a good thing, at least for employees. It leads to rising wages (companies can't trap people), higher job satisfaction (people are in jobs that they want), ability to pursue individual goals, etc, etc.
By the way, there is study after study going back years - prior to Obamacare - that talks about the benefits of getting rid of job-lock. Can you point to any that suggest the opposite? The idea that this is being driven by partisanship is nonsense - the science is firmly and strongly on one side of the debate.
You don't seem to be understanding this at all - there's no need for them to "find new jobs" (mostly because it's about people working fewer hours...but even if it wasn't) or "create new businesses" - that's not what economics is about. It's a better outcome if people sit at home and watch TV or go for a walk or do absolutley nothing at all. When people are able to realize their preferences better -because health care access is not nonsensically bundled to employment status - that is what economics is about. Somebody who doesn't want to work, doesn't have to - and somebody who does, fills in the gap. That is a better outcome, full stop. I understand you probably are going to have to go down the same road as others who initially misread the report earlier this week (see, e.g., CaseyH, Fmullegun, Mr. Clutch, Justtxyank) and begin inventing speculative theories on why voluntary reduction in labor supply is "worrisome "- but you shouldn't, because it's not really working out well for them. The reason why is because it's not worrisome.
As far as I can tell, job-lock became good sometime after the media did a horrible job of writing headlines on Monday and people took them at face value.
That doesn't really make sense when you figure that these people will still likely be using the health care system not to mention doing other things like eating and paying bills. If they aren't earning money they are either living off savings or else they are taxing the system. Your idea of them sitting at home is fine if they didn't use more resources or resources weren't going to take care of them. And I agree that insurance shouldn't be bundled to employment. I am a small business owner and pay for my own health care so I know better than anyone about that. That said you are presuming that productivity that could be added to the GDP from these people will be made up which isn't for certain. It almost sounds to me like you are making an argument for a welfare state without really considering all of the implications of it. I don't know what other posters have said but I find it rather overly optimistic to just presume that a lot of people leaving the labor force will automatically lead to either more productivity from them being so entrepreneurial or the that those jobs will be automatically filled. I won't rule out that maybe a big benefit will materialize from unleashing the entrepreneurial spirit of people shackled to dead end jobs because of insurance but I think it is rather sanguine just to presume that that will happen.
I don't know if this was addressed to me but I haven't talked about partisanship except to accuse both sides of spin. As I said I agree that job mobility is a good thing but there is a very big presumption that any lost productivity of someone leaving the labor force will be made up automatically. Like I said I don't know for sure if this will be a problem but a lot of these arguments strike me as being overly optimistic. Let me ask you and SamFisher, and anyone else who care to weigh in, have you considered any possibility that 2.5 million people leaving the workforce could be a bad thing? Have you considered anything on the cost side?
I have a problem with that. It seems that when people don't understand an issue, they assume everyone just must be throwing out spin. But sometimes, there is an objective truth. The idea that job-lock is bad has never been controversial before. It has always been seen as a good thing to free up employees from being trapped in jobs - that's what things like HIPAA and COBRA are about. It's only controversial today because of the "everything related to Obamacare must be bad" crowd. If you don't understand the economics here, that's fine - but don't accuse everyone else of just throwing out spin for repeating ideas that have been universally accepted by just above everyone for years. It doesn't particularly matter if the productivity is made up. People aren't required to be productive if they have means to live otherwise - people don't exist to work. But regardless, jobs aren't being lost - people are. Every job that someone quits is being filled by someone else who was previously jobless who wants it more. At worst, that's a net breakeven. Of the people that leave, some will be gainfully employed in other ways (start businesses, part time, etc). Others will contribute to society in different ways (raising kids, etc). Others will be lazy bums. All combined, this is a net positive. You're making the huge mistake of assuming that the only way to contribute to society is to have a full time job. If it's by choice due to greater opportunitity? Not particularly. Can you name some of these additional costs?
