Get Ready for Huge Obamacare Premium Hikes in 2017

I think this guy's making the right call. Not sure why 0bamacare wasn't tossed out with the bathwater when the Republicans took the House and Senate. Anyway, universal healthcare costs anywhere in any country are quite high. We, here in America, are not seeing wage increases that could possibly cover the real costs that are 0bamacare. With so many people not working I'm going to be on the lookout for little financial implosions.

If Tavenner is right, Obamacare will jump dramatically—last year’s premium for the popular silver-level plan surged 11 percent on average. Although Tavenner didn’t mention deductibles, in 2016, some states saw jumps of 76 percent, while the average deductible for a 27-year-old male on a silver plan was 8 percent.

Emphasis mine.

Link

I have always had the opinion that Obamacare is one big phony lie. It was deemed 'constitutional' by the SCOTUS as a TAX.....so now nobody can afford the plans, and are forced to pay the 'penalty' instead, which is done during tax season and enforced by the IRS.

We've been sold a rotten bill of goods. It has nothing to do with health care, and everything to do with massive tax increases against the middle class. It was never meant to help people, it was meant to allow the government to tax us into poverty.

wasn't Obama just bragging about how much money in taxes they were bringing in not to long ago? bastards, the whole lot of them. You people who wanted this still think its a good idea?

a reply to: FissionSurplus

Remember these words?

And basically, call it the stupidity of the American voter or whatever, but basically that was really really critical for the thing to pass

I just don't understand how 0bamacare got by the SCOTUS. They're all smarter than that. I mean ... people say "I'm innocent," all the time and still go to jail anyway. I thought a Judge was supposed to apply common sense.

Good to see a post from you, FissionSurplus. Was wondering if you had pulled a disappearing act from the boards.

originally posted by: Snarl
Anyway, universal healthcare costs anywhere in any country are quite high.

In Australia, universal healthcare is paid for by the GST tax... but by law, only non-essential items can have a 'goods and services tax' on them.

So essentially, universal healthcare is being paid for by people buying things they can already afford... seems ridiculous to me that US citizens tolerated 'Obamacare', but refuse to tolerate full blown universal healthcare under a similar system.

Seems like its just the phrase 'universal healthcare' Americans reject, rather than the actual concept.

But I guess we're all prone to being blatantly petty and superficial at times... I suppose!

a reply to: Snarl

The judge is supposed to apply the letter of the law. Even IF Obamacare is a tax, it still shouldn't be constitutional as they found parts of it unconstitutional and the idiots who wrote it did not put in a severability clause meaning that if part of it went down, all of it should have, issues of tax or unlawful mandate aside.

But even on the issue of tax, is was not written or passed as a tax. It would not have passed as a tax, but John Roberts suddenly created a new interpretation of plain language that suddenly made it a tax in order to save it. The way things fell out over it in the SCOTUS suggest to some that there was some kind of pressure applied to Roberts that got him to change his actual ruling at the last minute, a conspiracy if you will.

a reply to: Subaeruginosa

As an American, we are either having a tax on what we buy OR an income tax. We will not do both. There are too many ways the government can impose shenanigans in both systems. Looking at what you actually pay now, and most Americans are taxed at 50% although they don't really know it.

a reply to: Subaeruginosa

Other places I've been I didn't see blatant abuse of the healthcare system. People in America go to the doctor as an excuse to get out of a day's labor. On top of that, you've got an ER filled with people who can't get in to see a regular doctor, because they've no intention of paying a penny (whether to the doc or to the system).

It was a really bad plan (Obamacare) and I'm afraid we're probably stuck with it (as is) for another three to five years.

I would hope the people get off their butts and protest this, but apparently we're more inclined to suck it up and deal with it, like a bunch of good little debt-slaves.

Personally, I'm sick of all the crap.

a reply to: Snarl

Since Feb.2014 I have had $1207/month taken out of My disabled police retirement. When I was on 7 Rx BigPHarma™ poisons I had a $20.00 co-pay, now that I only take 2 I get big coinage removed. To combat Uncle Suga and His $$$ grabbing laws/ideas/schemes I bought a waterfront house and started renting out My country club home for $1200/month. Now if "They" drag any more of $$$ I literally broke My back for, I'll sell ALL My crap and head to Uruguay and have Uncle Suga pee up a rope. And I mean ALL of it. stocks; bonds; gold; silver; the whole ball of wax.

It would really be great if congress would come up with some tweaks to lower costs. (They could if they wanted to) or a Universl/free plan similar to some systems in other countries, with the option to buy whatever insurance you wanted but if you didn't have it, you'd be covered if you couldn't afford insurance. (Again, congress could come up with some stuff if they really wanted to, they don't)

The problem all along has been our congress.

I work for a hospital and my premium went up, coverage went down and my max out of pocket almost quadrupled.

Allowing health care to be a huge money making business doesn't help.

I remember prior to the ACA. Insurance premiums went up significantly every year. By the year prior to the ACA, we were paying over a thousand dollars a month for health insurance, and we had no choice but to remain insured due to our need for care. It was crazy!

Does anyone else remember that??? Was I the only one paying more for health insurance than our house??

It seems that Marco Rubio has something to do with the upcoming rate increases, incidentally...

Before last year, insurers had no experience selling such policies, under such conditions, directly to individuals. When they initially set their premiums, they had to make some guesses. They also had to compete for market share. Insurers planning to stay in the new marketplaces for the long haul had incentive to price low, in order to grab customers, even if it meant running losses in the short term.

Now, with hard data on the customers they’re attracting, many insurers are discovering the population is less healthy than they had expected — and more likely to run higher medical bills. At the same time, federal programs designed to cushion insurance company losses are subsiding, partly because the law’s architects intended them to be temporary and partly because Republicans — led by presidential candidate Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) — forced elimination of one key program in the spending deal Congress enacted last year.

So after two years of premiums that seemed surprisingly low, at least by the standards of private health insurance in the U.S., some insurers are raising prices to adjust. That’s the source of the big hikes that have the attention of Trump and other Affordable Care Act critics. And it’s why, according to ACAsignups.net blogger Charles Gaba, premiums would rise between 12 and 13 percent on average if everybody who currently has insurance simply renewed the same plans for next year.

But, as Gaba points out and Politifact noted recently, the averages also mask a lot of variation. Some insurers are raising premiums more modestly and others are actually reducing rates.

I wonder if the R's did this with the hope of causing pain, thinking that it would create more anger against the law so they'd have a better chance winning the election so they could "repeal and ???" the law.

Nah...politicians would never strategize like that...

- AB

Ours just jumped $200 a month.
I can hardly wait for another one.

originally posted by: amazing
It would really be great if congress would come up with some tweaks to lower costs. (They could if they wanted to) or a Universl/free plan similar to some systems in other countries, with the option to buy whatever insurance you wanted but if you didn't have it, you'd be covered if you couldn't afford insurance. (Again, congress could come up with some stuff if they really wanted to, they don't)

The problem all along has been our congress.

AMEN! I agree. The ACA needs a Congress that is flexible enough to take both the good and bad of it, evaluate it and then tweak it into being a more effective and affordable law - OR - ballsy enough to go to full universal health care.


= AB

a reply to: AboveBoard

Yes, it went up, but it went up by a steady amount. Now it goes up by much, much more and you get less coverage, poorer care networks. Also the deductibles have gone through the roof.

We used to burn our deductible out by around September or October every year. After Obamacare ... yeah, right. Forget that!

Keep in mind that 85% of the people on ObamaCare health plans have a significant portion of their health insurance premium paid by the Government (aka "the US taxpayers"). The law caps the premium liability at 9% of income, for those who earn less than 400% of the Federal Poverty Level. For these people, if the premium goes up 30% or 300%, they won't notice much of a difference in the amount of money they pay for their monthly premium. That's one of the really deceiving things about this ObamaScrew law. There's a LOT of smoke and mirrors designed to hide the real damage and pain.

The folks who earn more than 400% of the Federal Poverty Level get no premium assistance at all. They have to pay the huge increases. They're voting for anybody but Hillary. She wants to keep Obamacare as is, because in her words, "it's a good law."

a reply to: Snarl

Obamacare is a perfect example of why I would rather have Congress do nothing. It is in the best interest of the people to keep these two crappy mainstream parties in opposition. Obamacare is what happens when one party takes control of both houses and the Presidency.

a reply to: ketsuko

We have awesome insurance now. We are done with our deductible usually by March, but that's pretty unusual I guess. This year we met our maximum allowable out of pocket in 10 horrible days.

I'm grateful for what I have and know a lot of people that the ACA has really helped. I'm also frustrated at its shortcomings and how it has made other people's lives more challenging. I would advocate for working to fix it to make it more fair for everyone, or to go with universal health care. Just like the VA, however, it would still be less than optimal in some areas and great in others.

One problem is how uneven it is for folks from area to area/state to state/income to income. There are a ton of factors at play for what people end up being able to choose from and how much it costs them.

The subsidies to the insurance companies are ending, and that was helping to cushion everyone's cost. Thanks to Congress, however, that provision was eliminated as part of a budget deal, so we can all thank them for the further pinch on our pocket book than we otherwise would have had. Yay Congress.

- AB