Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Will people not pay?

The interesting question of the health care reform - will people decline to pay for yearly insurance covering until they get sick?
Since many people have coverage through work now, the cost is subsidized. You take it if it's a good deal and otherwise don't think about it.
We had to think about it in 1995. We left our jobs so my wife could start school at the University of Virginia. I didn't have a job lined up and she was a student, so we paid $800 for a semester of Blue Cross coverage.
I thought briefly of going without coverage - I was in my early 30s and hadn't needed medical coverage. She wanted coverage and so we got coverage.
A few months later, I got a full-time job and the insurance that came with it.
It's easy for Rush Limbaugh to say he won't buy insurance under this plan - he can probably buy Costa Rica and use their hospitals if need be.
For the rest, on one hand you have the newly increased premium plus payments for your services. On the other hand, you have the fine for going without insurance, plus the medical costs you're used to having insurance cover above the co-pay.
How high does the premium have to go to make dropping insurance a good idea? A couple might squeak by, until they decide to start a family. If you have kids or are over 50, insurance might seem to be still a good idea. You never know when your kid is going to break a bone.
And since you've always had insurance, you never had to pay full cost.
We're going to a vast, uncharted territory that's not as bright as Democrats would have you believe.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Yes the health insurance industry is in it to make money. Who here works to not make money? There are laws on the books now about pre-existing conditions. Yes there is a wait time if you have a certain length of time laps. This keeps people from going years with out insurance paying in nothing suddenly expecting to get something. It was their gamble and they failed themselves. Now what this new law does is Fine someone, just say a one time 1,000.00 for not having coverage. You are looking at a loss of only 1,000.00 for an insurance policy that would cost about say 12,000.00 a year. Now the uninsured can get sick, without any clauses come into the health system and get say a 200,000.00 life saving surgery. Than they can drop their coverage and get another fine, total fine, 2,000.00 services rendered 200,000.00. Who is paying the difference? Cut and suppress the health care system for less quality. Higher premiums and more taxes that’s how, they will milk us to death.
Millions of people now qualify for Government run Medicaid and Medicare, many do not want to take the time and register because it is not covenant. So many government systems failing how can any one trust this?

• http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/faqs/faq_consumer_hipaa.html

I believe Bill Clinton signed this into law in 1996, if not who ever did was the reason our health care has gone sky high. Just think now with an un-regulated or no time frame pre-existing what that will cause premiums to do. If not paid for by premium hikes by insurance companies, the government will have to foot the deficit. Guess where that money will come from?
Kenny S
Doswell Va