Yeah pf that is true but those cuts were never intended to be permanent. They were going to go away once the economyrecovered . Anyway, getting in a flight to Chicago. Hope you have a good day brother.
Passing this along................
- Thread starter RAYMOND
- Start date
yep, right off the top he raised my taxes 2% I could use that money, in the last 5 years the company I work for the book value/worth of the company is half what it was because business owners are scared to expand and our workforce is probably cut 1/3 in that time too, so things are not all rosy as the liberals say they are
FDC:
Go smoke a dick.
Obama and the Democrats have nothing to do with the stock market highs.....you are stupid if you think so...but we already knew that.
Deficit cut in half? Really - drinking the old Kool-aid, huh? And the 8 Trillion added in 5 years, that is Bush's fault, huh? Oh - OK
:facepalm:
Bush kept us in or engaged us in more wars, too, I bet?
How is it that the healthcare.gov website was initially slated to cost $93 million and ended up costs $650 million? Is that how the Democrats cut the deficit?
And yes, my taxes HAVE gone up....and my premiums will increase by 83%.
Did you happen to read any of that article that I linked? Probably not as it was not written in crayon with rhyming words.
"not in a recession anymore"....interesting. I guess that all depends on which data you look at and which definition you want to use.
And just to be clear, I am not a Republican.
People saying stupid shit just really pisses me off.
Go smoke a dick.
Obama and the Democrats have nothing to do with the stock market highs.....you are stupid if you think so...but we already knew that.
Deficit cut in half? Really - drinking the old Kool-aid, huh? And the 8 Trillion added in 5 years, that is Bush's fault, huh? Oh - OK
:facepalm:
Bush kept us in or engaged us in more wars, too, I bet?
How is it that the healthcare.gov website was initially slated to cost $93 million and ended up costs $650 million? Is that how the Democrats cut the deficit?
And yes, my taxes HAVE gone up....and my premiums will increase by 83%.
Did you happen to read any of that article that I linked? Probably not as it was not written in crayon with rhyming words.
"not in a recession anymore"....interesting. I guess that all depends on which data you look at and which definition you want to use.
And just to be clear, I am not a Republican.
People saying stupid shit just really pisses me off.
Do you have any idea what the difference I'm the national debt and the deficit is? Apparently not. No I didn't read your link, hell, I only read post of your post. Thanks for sharing and showing your ass though dumbass. Sorry your such an angry little troll but again I was asking Ray what was getting worse for him. I don't give a fuck about you. Also, if your stupid enough to state that the Presidents policies have nothing to do with the economy than your dumber than anyone I have ever met and I've seen dead people. Yours may be the most ill informed dumbass post ever posted here. Go read up on the deficit jackass before you make a bigger fool of yourself.
It's a blog. Is not like it's true. Is a fucking blog. You can say whatever you want in a blog that doesn't make it true.
There may be plenty of blame to go around for the nine-day government shutdown, but the Republican brand is taking the harder hit in public opinion.
Just 28 percent of Americans have a favorable impression of the Republican Party, down 10 percentage points from last month, according to a Gallup poll. The polling firm called it a "record low," noting that "this is the lowest favorable rating measured for either party since Gallup began asking this question in 1992."
While the Democratic Party isn?t popular either, it fared better, with 43 percent of Americans approving of the party -- down a comparatively small 4 points from September.
.....................................................................
:SIB
Just 28 percent of Americans have a favorable impression of the Republican Party, down 10 percentage points from last month, according to a Gallup poll. The polling firm called it a "record low," noting that "this is the lowest favorable rating measured for either party since Gallup began asking this question in 1992."
While the Democratic Party isn?t popular either, it fared better, with 43 percent of Americans approving of the party -- down a comparatively small 4 points from September.
.....................................................................
:SIB
went there free health care its not free , everyone rate go up!! you work to insurance the people who do not work !! spent the wealth around:0074 remember joe the plumber:142smilie
Yes, i do recall "Joe the plumber". He's the dude that McCain and his staff hung their hat on to grab the White House. I mean, when you are surrounded with the brilliance of Sarah Palin and Joe the plumber what could go wrong for McCain ? :facepalm:
The GOP could well have of won the thing but ran perhaps the poorest, most self defeating presidential campaign in history. It almost seemed to me that Ray and Skully were personally involved with some of the decision making process along the way.
And things have only became worse. Despite SOME, but certainly not a predominance of decent ideology the party continues to be in battle with just about everybody including itself.
Just what happened to the Republican Party? Reagan is rolling in his grave.
I am amazed with the inept performance of both parties but what amazes me even more is that a third party has not been able to gain any traction despite the poor performance of our Gov.
Apathy reigns supreme now but it won't last forever.
Blow it all up and start over. :wall:
Just a ramble........
He allowed the 2% payroll tax relief in the first place. It was implemented and expired in his term
BP... I am correct on the profit margins. I saw someone's comment about 2011 when 3 carriers listed were getting margins in the 7%+ area... of course, that article made no mention of the fact that much of that profit would be given back to the policyholders in terms of rebates, as mandated by the ACA.. so their resultant profit margin for 2011 would still have been 3-4% after the give back. Remember, insurance companies have to meet a 85% loss ratio in the large group market, 80% in the individual and small group markets. With admin expenses (yes, employees salaries who need to live too), companies can easily have 11-13% in admin costs, leaving very little for profit. Funny, nobody mentioned that.
Can you imagine if all companies could only spend 20% on salaries, rent, marketing and profit? Prices would sure come down on most things we buy, that is for sure!
3-4% seems very low to me. Far lower than hospitals, doctors and Pharma make on a yearly basis. Of course, Obama could not bastardize those folks - or he wouldn't have gotten their bill pushed through - even though they needed to use a very rarely used trick called Reconciliation to get it done. You would have thought the Dems would have gotten the message when a Republican, Scott Brown got elected to stop the ACA. How many centuries had it been since a Republican got elected in MA?
Regarding insurance companies "screwing" people, I do understand that insurance gets a bad rep - in some cases deserved. But to clear up a bunch of misconceptions out there:
1. People have made the comment in this thread that insurance companies would "drop you when you get sick". That is propaganda, and blatently not true. As a result of the HIPAA law from 1996, insurance companies (Individual Market) could not do that.. coverage was guaranteed renewable. So that is a wives tale.
2. What companies could do is, all policies had a 12 month period in which companies could rescind a policy if it was found that the insured lied on their application. This happens a lot - people lie about their weight (which is one of the biggest driver of health care costs - think diabetes and HBP). They lie about conditions they had. They would find out that they are sick, see a doctor and pay cash, so it wouldn't go in their doctor records. And then they'd buy coverage and claim that they were completely healthy. So companies had the right to recind coverage when those things occurred. The trouble was, SOME companies, not all, took this way too far and would recind policies on folks within the first year for vary nefarious reasons - such as someone would get cancer and then they'd go back and see the person lied about their weight on the application. That practice obviously needed to be stopped, and helped give the industry a bad name. But this notion of someone having their policy for 2-3 years, and then getting cancer and having the insurance company cancel them is bunk - HIPAA protected customers from that every happening.
Pre-existing condition issues are tough. Many, if not most, pre-existing conditions are due to decisions made by the insured. It is estimated that 70% of health care costs are driven by insured's own behavior - such as drinking, weight gain, lack of exercise, etc. Obviously some things aren't - such as cancer in a non-smoker, etc.
But it is important to remember that the definition of insurance is "a risk transfer, via a premium payment, for unforeseen medical conditions that could occur in the future". The key term there is "Unforeseen". If someone is already sick, it is hard to define the appropriate premium rate - and it is unfair to others that purchased insurance responsibly BEFORE they got sick. Not unlike purchasing auto insurance BEFORE you total your car in an accident.
This whole notion of having the insurance system pay for people's routine costs: routine doctor visits, routine prescription drugs (think birth control or HBP meds), etc... it is madness and adds a lot of cost to they system. No, preventative care does not save money in the long run - it adds signficant costs to the system. We spend more on the preventative tests than we save in future costs due to the conditions that could develop. Obama had been making this claim during 2010-11 as he was trying to get the bill passed, and finally stopped when someone corrected him. It may be good public policy (and I think it is), but it does not save money.
But the point of that is, those costs, since they are routine and predictable, should be paid by the consumer, and not paid by insurance. It would be like asking your auto insurance provider to pay for oil changes. When you buy a car, you know you'll need 3-4 oil changes a year. Same with your personal health. Insurance should ONLY be there for unforeseen, future unpredicted health care claims. A high deductible, HSA type plan is exactly the right kind of plan. Insurance is meant to protect people from financial ruin - not pay day to day expenses.
And yes, the ACA did drive up premiums for a lot of people - and this was done solely by the ACA. If you were young, you got screwed - as premiums are restricted to a 3-1 ratio now - which is not commensurate with the risk at each age. So, young people (who make the lowest incomes typically) pay much more than they should - and older folks who make higher incomes pay much less then they should. Younger males now pay much more than they should than females, due to the restriction on gender rating. Most importantly, if you are healthy and have been taking care of yourself, you will pay much more than your risk level indicates, as you will need to subsidize those who are overweight and do not take care of themselves.
It is ironic - on one hand, Michelle Obama has this "lets move" initiative (which I think is a great idea) and trying to help kids from being obese. On the other hand, the ACA is saying "we don't care if you are healthy and take care of yourself or are fat and sit on the couch - we will charge you the same thing". They certainly should have had a BMI component in the rating structure. I wouldn't be surprised if Pres Obama wanted that, but then his wife told him no, because she'd have to pay a much higher premium rate! :nono:
I'm sure the liberals will blast this message too, as folks that read articles on the web, but have not worked in the industry will clearly feel they know more.... but maybe they stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night....:00hour
I couldn't agree more. People keep saying "Obama won a 2nd term, so everyone loves him and his policies"... that couldn't be further from the truth.
The Republicans ran one of the worst candidates for president than our country has seen in a long time, probably since Michael Dukakis. Nobody but the strongest republicans were going to vote for Romney, although surprisingly, Romney did win the independent vote.
Obama won by default. The country was still reeling and nobody had won with the unemployment numbers that existed at the time. If the Republican's could have found a decent candidate, they would have won. But they didn't, and lost - and so did the country.
I read this and couldn't think of anything political to respond with. However, I did realize my 3-yeard daughter talks with better sentence structure.
Thanks for replying Mags, there are so many aspects to high costs for health care and the number one culprit IMO is people themselves.
People are obese and use excuses as to why, big bones, genetics, low metabolism etc. We take in alcohol and tobacco, live poor life styles, do not get proper rest and pump in fast food at an alarming rate, but it is also non compliance or follow up with your health plan. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink it and a health team can lead a patient to good health but can't force them to eat properly, exercise, rehab, or take their medication.
My beef with insurance companies is a bit personal. They waste my time and they seem to spend a lot of time treating patients rather than their doctor. Had one doctor yell at me on the phone, "those G Damn insurance companies keep telling me how to treat my patients." When a doctor orders a specific med and it never fails that I would get a call from pharmacy saying, "insurance won't cover that med." Then I have to take away from what I am doing to see if MD is here or call/fax office to tell the doc the good
News, then wait for a new order. Meanwhile I could be having a new admit with a new set of orders then later get a phone call from pharmacy telling me that insurance won't cover one I those meds. Just one example.
How many people do hospitals employee to make sure they are compliant, like utilization review and chart checking. Reimbursement is often based on the condition not length of stay. So if a patient has pneumonia the reimbursement is set, what's the goal of hospital? Get the patient out as fast as possible, what if the patient can't go home? Well let's find a short term rehab center to plant your ass, what happens next? Often times you are readmitting that patient. I have worked at a few short term rehab centers, their have been many many many instances of admitting a patient and wundering why the fuck did they discharge this patient? Only to send he/she back to said hospital for advanced treatment. Yeah so I maybe more emotionally involved.
One last examples, how about a quadriplegic who now lives a sedentary lifestyle, developed diabetes and high cholesterol due to lack of exercise, patient now needs anti cholesterol meds and diabetic supplies. Is it covered? Hell no that's an out of pocket expense, those conditions are not related to his main diagnosis. Or how about the wheel chair ridden patient with stage 1 coccyx ulcers, patient is discharging to home, needs rojo cushion, covered?, nope
Condition not severe enough, client goes
Home doesn't reposition self every 2 hours, developes stage 2 ulcer, now needs rojo cushion anyways and medical wound treatment.
People are obese and use excuses as to why, big bones, genetics, low metabolism etc. We take in alcohol and tobacco, live poor life styles, do not get proper rest and pump in fast food at an alarming rate, but it is also non compliance or follow up with your health plan. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink it and a health team can lead a patient to good health but can't force them to eat properly, exercise, rehab, or take their medication.
My beef with insurance companies is a bit personal. They waste my time and they seem to spend a lot of time treating patients rather than their doctor. Had one doctor yell at me on the phone, "those G Damn insurance companies keep telling me how to treat my patients." When a doctor orders a specific med and it never fails that I would get a call from pharmacy saying, "insurance won't cover that med." Then I have to take away from what I am doing to see if MD is here or call/fax office to tell the doc the good
News, then wait for a new order. Meanwhile I could be having a new admit with a new set of orders then later get a phone call from pharmacy telling me that insurance won't cover one I those meds. Just one example.
How many people do hospitals employee to make sure they are compliant, like utilization review and chart checking. Reimbursement is often based on the condition not length of stay. So if a patient has pneumonia the reimbursement is set, what's the goal of hospital? Get the patient out as fast as possible, what if the patient can't go home? Well let's find a short term rehab center to plant your ass, what happens next? Often times you are readmitting that patient. I have worked at a few short term rehab centers, their have been many many many instances of admitting a patient and wundering why the fuck did they discharge this patient? Only to send he/she back to said hospital for advanced treatment. Yeah so I maybe more emotionally involved.
One last examples, how about a quadriplegic who now lives a sedentary lifestyle, developed diabetes and high cholesterol due to lack of exercise, patient now needs anti cholesterol meds and diabetic supplies. Is it covered? Hell no that's an out of pocket expense, those conditions are not related to his main diagnosis. Or how about the wheel chair ridden patient with stage 1 coccyx ulcers, patient is discharging to home, needs rojo cushion, covered?, nope
Condition not severe enough, client goes
Home doesn't reposition self every 2 hours, developes stage 2 ulcer, now needs rojo cushion anyways and medical wound treatment.
Of course they turned that profit back into the company . Sure they did because that's how they make billions is just that itty bitty little 3% it isn't liberals saying you're wrong its me. You're misrepresenting the facts. Also, all articles are on the internet where the fuck else would they be? I thought you didn't work in the insurance industry but now you do again? To be honest mags I don't care what they report their profit margin to be because its all bullshit anyway. I can rwad how much their return on equity is. I can see what they spend on lobbyists. You're misrepres enting the truth.
I do understand your frustration. Insurance companies do try to limit care in some instances. But it's not like it goes into the companies' pocket - remember the MLR, forcing them to spend 80-85% on claims? When they do "limit" care, or pay by condition, that money ultimately goes back into consumer's pockets - via lower premium payments.
If you are concerned with payment by condition to hospitals, rather than by service, well, get ready to bend over. That is a big part of the ACA. That was one of the few portions meant to drive down health care costs in the bill (the majority of it increases health care costs). So, the bill will incent doctors/hospitals/docs to do the minimum necessary for a patient, as they will ultimately paid by diagnosis, rather than what they do. So, if you feel this is an issue, it will get worse, not better due to the ACA.
Also, in regards to Rx drugs, keep in mind, many doctors will prescribe the drug from the company that best "takes care" of him. There are a number of things that Rx reps due to incent doctors to prescribe certain Rx drugs - even if they are not the best course of treatment. Insurance companies are the only "cop" watching this - and do their best to ensure that the cheapest, and usually the best, drug is prescribed.
Yes, insurance companies do their best to control costs - which is a difficult task to do. But it does not go back in their pockets - it goes back to the consumer now in lower premiums. You decide if that is a good thing or bad thing.
And yes, I could tell that you had some type of personal issue/experience that was driving your comments, as they were pretty heated in your view of insurance companies. But I get it, health care is very personal. Which is exactly why having the government more involved in defining what coverage you have, how docs will be paid down the road, and creating inappropriate subsidies between groups of people was a very bad idea.
Any time you introduce subsidies into a system (healthcare or other) you create inappropriate incentives for people. The whole key to insurance (not just healthcare, any kind) is to match the risk to the cost. The ACA no longer allows that to happen, which drives up the cost for everyone, especially the healthy people.
FDC - your opinion, obviously. And I've learned over the years from seeing your posts against anyone that disagrees with you, that they are always wrong and are an ass for not having the same opinion as you (see the SSD stuff above). Happens all the time, so I'm not surprised that you are seeing this the same way.
I get it - you are always right, I (and other posters) are always wrong, and we are all asses for having a different opinion that you. That's your mantra - and have seen it time to time again with other posters.
So, I won't bother discussing with you, given your position.
