Support for repealing Obamacare plunges to an all time low.

You want a widow exemption or something? What does her being a widow matter? There are millions of single parents in this country.

I'm glad you're on board with a single payer. That always surprises me when you say that.

 

No. It's really just as simple as the cost has gone up since last year when it was supposed to be going down. Isn't that what the ACA was pitched as standing for?

 

As I noted - thanks to the subsidies, insurance for her and her family next year should be substantially cheaper than it would have been last year. If her employer decides to pay less of her insurance to save money themselves, that has nothing to do with ACA.

 

I don't recall what he said specifically but health insurance has gone up every year regardless. We've expanded what's covered so that should increase costs but perhaps reduces it over the long term with preventative care and less emergency room visits and such. I do know there is a refund mechanism now where a company has to refund money if it doesn't meet the expenditure requirements. I actually got a refund last year in the mail.

 

Yes, it seems employers are using it as cover to increase the employee contribution. Slimy move.

 

Note: my comment assumes she (or at least her children) would be eligible for subsidized care. I'm not sure how that works if an employer offers coverage for her but she has to pay for dependents.

 

Premiums are a terrible measure of cost. There are now rules on minimum levels of coverage. Plus employer funded plans really didn't change all that much with the ACA. Most of them met the minimum requirements and a lot of companies unfortunately are using the ACA as a convenient excuse to cut the amount they are contributing.

For example, the Indiana government made a claim that the ACA was going to increase premiums by 80% or something. What they didn't mention was that Indiana had a large set of insurance plans with virtually no premiums that had ridiculous deductibles and they were averaging those premiums to create a contrived figure.

Frankly that's a huge problem with health insurance in the US. We measure health insurance solely on premiums which is silly. The cost of health insurance should measure deductibles, copays, out of pocket maximums, benefit caps, etc.. in addition to premiums. When you factor all of those things, then you get a realistic picture of how costs have shifted.

 

Part of "our" problem was that the board was willing to give us great coverage out of their pocket but didn't have the foresight to realize that that would pass through expensive dependent coverage.

Premium is a significant measure of cost when you are swept up in a group where someone has made a well-meaning choice that costs you as happened to some of our staff wanting/needing dependent coverage. And premiums are the first and only sure expense in the healthcare system.

 

Our employer is paying 100% of the employee cost. The problem is that her dependent cost has gone up about 60% from last year.... on a 15 YO boy and an 8 YO girl.... from about 270 to 420.

They probably didn't consume 150 bucks worth of health care last year-- one month's premium increase.

 

Obama calls on the ultimate salesman, bill clinton, to explain the law