Obamacare Jacks Up Her Insurance

Sue Klinkhamer has a problem. It’s called Obamacare. And the irony of her situation is not lost on her. In a recent email addressed to her former boss, Illinois Congressman Bill Foster, and other Democratic colleagues, she wrote:

“I spent two years defending Obamacare. I had constituents scream at me, spit at me and call me names that I can’t put in print. The congressman was not re-elected in 2010 mainly because of the anti-Obamacare anger. When the congressman was not re-elected, I also (along with the rest of our staff) lost my job. I was upset that because of the health care issue, I didn’t have a job anymore but still defended Obamacare because it would make health care available to everyone at, what I assumed, would be an affordable price. I have now learned that I was wrong. Very wrong.”

For Klinkhamer, 60, President Obama’s oft-repeated words ring in her ears: “If you like your health plan, you will keep it.” Well, possibly not.

When Klinkhamer lost her congressional job, she had to buy an individual policy on the open market. Three years ago, it was $225 a month with a $2,500 deductible. Each year it went up a little to, as of Sept. 1, $291 with a $3,500 deductible. Then, a few weeks ago, she got a letter. “Blue Cross,” she said, “stated my current coverage would expire on Dec. 31, and here are my options: I can have a plan with similar benefits for $647.12 [or] I can have a plan with similar [but higher] pricing for $322.32 but with a $6,500 deductible.” She went on, “Blue Cross also tells me that if I don’t pick one of the options, they will just assume I want the one for $647. ... Someone please tell me why my premium in January will be $356 more than in December?” The sticker shock Klinkhamer is experiencing is something millions of individual policyholders are reeling from having gotten similar letters from their private insurers.

As UCLA Public Policy expert Dr. Gerald F. Kominski told CBS News this week, “Half of the 14 million people who buy insurance on their own are not going to keep the policies they previously had.” Part of the reason those policies will be more expensive, he explained, is that Obamacare is requiring insurers to offer “a better product with better protection.”

Congressman Foster, Klinkhamer’s former boss who has since been returned to Congress, told me by phone Friday, “A very large number of people are very grateful” for Obamacare. No doubt about that. But right now Sue Klinkhamer, no novice to government or public policy, isn’t among them.

“I am a Democrat and I believe in health care for all,” she said. “And I was excited that previously uninsured people could now get insurance on the open market. But this is not affordable to me.” Klinkhamer suggests renaming the Affordable Care Act. “Just call it,” she said dryly, “the Available Care Act.”

This article is my everything. Gonna be devastated if I find out she's a plant from the insurance industry.

White House OKd spying on allies, U.S. intelligence officials say

Obama may not have been specifically briefed on NSA operations targeting a foreign leader's cellphone or email communications, one of the officials said. "But certainly the National Security Council and senior people across the intelligence community knew exactly what was going on, and to suggest otherwise is ridiculous."

If U.S. spying on key foreign leaders was news to the White House, current and former officials said, then White House officials have not been reading their briefing books.

Some U.S. intelligence officials said they were being blamed by the White House for conducting surveillance that was authorized under the law and utilized at the White House.

"People are furious," said a senior intelligence official who would not be identified discussing classified information. "This is officially the White House cutting off the intelligence community."

Any decision to spy on friendly foreign leaders is made with input from the State Department, which considers the political risk, the official said. Any useful intelligence is then given to the president's counter-terrorism advisor, Lisa Monaco, among other White House officials.

NSA going to war with the White House. Wow

Monkeyboy wrote:Newsflash: We spy on our allies and they spy on us.

Keeping a phone tap one of the leaders of your allies for up to ten years isn't spying. It's indiscriminate surveillance. And saying it's just spying is a poor excuse in light of the volume of indiscriminate trawling. 60 million phone records of spanish people is not spying. It's indiscriminate surveillance. GCHQ and the NSA's trawling of any electronic communication that used the transatlantic fibre optic cable is not spying, it's indiscriminate surveillance.

Arguing that this is all 'just spying' when in actual fact you are breaking the rights of foreign citizens by trawling through anything we send or browse is insulting. It's an attempt, at best, to ignore the seriousness of what's been done. At worst, it's an attempt to trivialise and ridicule those who have unearthed these facts. It reeks of the worst kind of entitlement i.e. 'we do it because we can.'

WRT insurance companies cranking up the rates, that has always seemed rather opportunistic to me. I know a small business that was looking at a 150% increase for the same basic policy. Rather then pay up they competed their plan and are seeing a 18% increase. 18% suck, to be absolutely sure, but I have only seen double digit coverage increases in my own insurance for at least 15 years (about when I started to take notice).

I did notice the following few samples:

- Highmark CEO comp $6M

- NC BCBS CEO received a 6 percent raise in salary to $854,692. His salary is up 19 percent in the past two years. His bonus jumped 62 percent to almost $1.6 million. His total compensation was at $2.48 million, up 36 percent. (dude is slacking, but BCBS NC only had a slim 1% profit margin on $5.7B)

- Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Illinois CEO had a total comp of more than $12.9 million in 2011, which was a 61 percent raise from 2010.

I understand that the wage slaves answering the phone calls of angry plan members make little scratch, so the whole of the industry is not a get rich quick scheme, but management comp is pretty egregious. I am rather certain that there will be more stories about the explosion in profits at the insurers.

why has she not applied for a subsidy? nowhere mentioned in that article is her attempting to look at other policies out there, simply her checking from the policie her insurance company offered her. from the looks of it, she should be mad at the insurance company and is misplacing her anger. I didn't hear medciaid, either. if she lost her job, she likely has less income. normally, conservatives would be asking why this lady isn't 'shopping around', but now that it fits their agenda, she's a victim of big bad ACA.

i really fail to see why people losing insurance that didnt cover anything and arent bothering to look for better subsidized insurance should make me feel sorry for them or why i should view it as some big affront to the people at large. why do you even 'like your insurance' if it doesnt cover anything?

Wizlah wrote:

Monkeyboy wrote:Newsflash: We spy on our allies and they spy on us.

Keeping a phone tap one of the leaders of your allies for up to ten years isn't spying. It's indiscriminate surveillance. And saying it's just spying is a poor excuse in light of the volume of indiscriminate trawling. 60 million phone records of spanish people is not spying. It's indiscriminate surveillance. GCHQ and the NSA's trawling of any electronic communication that used the transatlantic fibre optic cable is not spying, it's indiscriminate surveillance.

Arguing that this is all 'just spying' when in actual fact you are breaking the rights of foreign citizens by trawling through anything we send or browse is insulting. It's an attempt, at best, to ignore the seriousness of what's been done. At worst, it's an attempt to trivialise and ridicule those who have unearthed these facts. It reeks of the worst kind of entitlement i.e. 'we do it because we can.'

Right on the mark here, the jingoism and flag waving rallying cry of "We're #1!!" is more and more falling on deaf ears to those who realize our predicament and deteriorating reputation around the world. Not only are we not #1 in several metrics, including healthcare and education(we have dumb kids who seem to be getting dumber), we are increasingly ramping up the arrogance in how we deal with sovereign nations. This has been slowly getting worse for decades, but it exploded under Bush and has been simply continued by Obama with his increased drone war and continued Bush policies of the surveillance state.

This past 13 years of "leadership" has been abysmal.

pacino wrote:why do you even 'like your insurance' if it doesnt cover anything?

1. Maternity and prenatal services are required for EVERY plan to qualify under Obamacare. Just because someone chooses a plan that does not include these things does not mean that they have "bad" insurance. It means that they are using health insurance to cover what they need.

2. Additionally, if a young healthy person is in an unqualified plan, cancellation of their plan and moving them to the marketplace places them into a more risky pool of people. Under Obamacare, insurers have less ability to price plans according to expected cost. So these people are going to pay more because they are forced into pools with people who cost a lot.

These two things can directly cause premiums to go up, and they are caused by the Affordable Care Act. Neither of these things means that people are dumb for liking their previous insurance plan.

I will just say people do not know what they need covered. If they did, we'd already be fine and wouldn't need any fixes. Insurance companies have never priced plans according to expected cost. Also, I pay auto insurance despite not getting into accidents on a regular basis. I make those companies money, helping others who don't make them money.

and if anyone actually wanted to fix anything, maybe they should actually be congress, working.

I'm fairly certain that I won't need maternity coverage

yes, fine. that is not the only thing covered, and werthless picked it for obvious reasons.

pacino wrote:yes, fine. that is not the only thing covered, and werthless picked it for obvious reasons.

I picked it because it obviously doesn't apply to everyone! It perfectly illustrates the point, that Obamacare forces people to pay for stuff they don't need.

There are a number of ACA requirements ("features") that increase costs for people that don't need those services: Maternity, mental health, pediatric care, ability to keep young adults on your plan through age 26, limits on pricing risk, etc. These forced inclusions all have the potential to increase costs for people who don't need those services. This is because the cost of these services is spread between those that want these services, and now, those that don't want them. And just because someone has a plan without these things does not mean it is a bad plan that they are too dumb to want.

pacino wrote:Insurance companies have never priced plans according to expected cost.

How do they price it?

how does someone know they don't need certain services??? that's just non-sensical, if this is about creating access to potential medical and health needs.

Bucky wrote:I'm fairly certain that I won't need maternity coverage

If you were a loyal American, I'm sure you'd be happy to pay for those that do need it.

pacino wrote:how does someone know they don't need certain services??? that's just non-sensical, if this is about creating access to potential medical and health needs.

People have limited funds. This law requires a person to spend money on things they do not want to spend money on, and you obviously don't have problem with that. If you had to pay an extra $X,000 per year, you'd be annoyed.

Taxes are the traditional way to redistribute income, as high income people essentially subsidize services that all people benefit from. Obamacare is an additional way that this redistribution is occurring, but many people did not realize this aspect of the law when it was being debated. Many people who supported the law did not realize that they would be forced to pay higher premiums -- in some cases, much higher premiums -- than they would have otherwise, simply because their plan did not include enough bells and whistles. Some people prefer to insure with high deductible plans that cover the basic, and insure against catastrophe. That's a decision that they were making, and that insurance companies were previously willing to supply this product.

This is not a situation where a government is banning large sodas, and making you buy 2 small sodas if you want to get around the law. To give you something to argue against (since it's hard to argue against the need for men to purchase maternity services), I will say that this law would be similar to a situation where Bloomberg required that tofu squares must be included in every restuarant meal. The price of a meal would go up, and even though tofu is healthy, people would be annoyed at being forced to pay for something that they maybe didn't want. If you have a pre-existing love of tofu, however, the law would be great!

Werthless wrote:

pacino wrote:why do you even 'like your insurance' if it doesnt cover anything?

1. Maternity and prenatal services are required for EVERY plan to qualify under Obamacare. Just because someone chooses a plan that does not include these things does not mean that they have "bad" insurance. It means that they are using health insurance to cover what they need.

2. Additionally, if a young healthy person is in an unqualified plan, cancellation of their plan and moving them to the marketplace places them into a more risky pool of people. Under Obamacare, insurers have less ability to price plans according to expected cost. So these people are going to pay more because they are forced into pools with people who cost a lot.

These two things can directly cause premiums to go up, and they are caused by the Affordable Care Act. Neither of these things means that people are dumb for liking their previous insurance plan.

Points 1 & 2 seem to contain some common sense, yet are misinformed.

Most of the time in many if not most states, maternity coverage is a mandated benefit. Mandated by state legislatures. Has been for a generation or more. Why would legislators insist that insurers provide that coverage provision in all policies? Insurance is about spreading risk. Sometimes those it is spread to don't like it. They do not understand the premise of insurance.

Happily, dropping that provision does little to impact rates. Why? Because of the implications of the Single Most Important Chart in All of US Health Care which I've posted in another thread around here somewhere.

The distribution of health costs follows an extreme Poisson, or power law, or Pareto-type distribution - pick your favorite term for an extremely skewed non-"normal distribution". 1% of people account for about 11% of US health costs; just 5% account for half of all of our costs. Their typical average annual price of treatment exceeds $35,000; the average price of the care the LOWEST 60% or so of the population get is around $300. A year. Most of us, most years, don't get squat from health coverage we and/or our employers may pay hundreds or thousands of dollars a year for. The benefits paid by health insurance are mostly paid out to people with health conditions most of us most of the time do not and will not have to contend with soon, if ever. And that's a good thing.

Adding or dropping maternity coverage would not move rates catastrophically, because each $1 million premie that plans cover is countered by the preventive benefits of paying for effective, systematic prenatal care and plannable normal deliveries for thousands of covered women.

Conversely, devising plans that only cover events people are already imminently likely to qualify for benefits for is not going to spread the cost sufficiently enough to make for affordable premiums. You aren't going to write, or sell, policies covering prostate treatment solely to old fat men. Why? Because if you price them only on the population likely to need that treatment soon, your price will be too high for you to sell enough of them to stay in business.

just because someone has a plan without these things does not mean it is a bad plan that they are too dumb to want.

yes; yes it does, for some of the reasons provided previously.

On other erzatz health insurance coverage scare items, Jerz's new favorite Dem ex-congressperson should realize her $2,250 deductible was absurdly low for someone in her economic circumstances. There's less than 1 in 15 chance that in any given year she'd incur expenses that would result in payment of benefits under a plan with a $2.25k deductible. So why would she pay ~$5k more annually for a renewal policy with that deductible? She's much better off economically rolling into the policy with the $6.5k deductible, at about the same premium. Any competent insurance agent/broker could tell her that.

Hmm, wonder if the big insurers pulling out of the exchanges prior to the October 1 rollout (there is only ONE insurer in the New Hampshire exchange, 2 in Vermont) is impacting the premium rates...

drsmooth wrote:On other erzatz health insurance coverage scare items, Jerz's new favorite Dem ex-congress staffer/person should realize her $2,000 deductible was absurdly low for someone in her economic circumstances. There's less than 1 in 15 chance that in any given year she'd incur expenses that would result in payment of benefits under a plan with a $2k deductible. So why would she pay ~$5k more annually for a renewal policy with that deductible? She's much better off economically rolling into the policy with the $6k deductible. Any competent insurance agent/broker could tell her that.

Without knowing what wasn't covered under her existing policy, from what I can tell she was much better off with the policy they just canceled

cshort wrote:Without knowing what wasn't covered under her existing policy, from what I can tell she was much better off with the policy they just canceled

what can you tell from what Jerz provided upthread?

drsmooth wrote:Adding or dropping maternity coverage would not move rates catastrophically, because each $1 million premie that plans cover is countered by the preventive benefits of paying for effective, systematic prenatal care and plannable normal deliveries for thousands of covered women.

Conversely, devising plans that only cover events people are already imminently likely to qualify for benefits for is not going to spread the cost sufficiently enough to make for affordable premiums. You aren't going to write, or sell, policies covering prostate treatment solely to old fat men. Why? Because if you price them only on the population likely to need that treatment soon, your price will be too high for you to sell enough of them to stay in business.

Thanks for your post. Even though I disagree with your view of how insurance *should* be, I can see your position.

drsmooth wrote:

cshort wrote:Without knowing what wasn't covered under her existing policy, from what I can tell she was much better off with the policy they just canceled

what can you tell from what Jerz provided upthread?

This is where it's difficult for anyone to do a good comparison. Did she have prescription drug coverage? If so, what were the co-pays? Were they for generics or branded drugs? Did she use out of network coverage? Dental? What would these be under the ACA? Right now, all we're seeing is high level premiums and co-pays, not much beyond that.

According to her, her existing policy was cheaper and had a lower deductible than a comparable policy under ACA.