Tag Congressional Budget Office

ObamaScare’s House of Horrors

Allen Frederick Leave a comment

Just when you thought it was safe, after having been lulled to sleep, the nightmares are about to begin.

Universal's House of Horrors

Something wicked this way comes hiding deep inside the belly of the beast we know as ObamaScare. Whether or not the website problems get fixed there is no escape from this horror show coming to your house.  This nightmare will have you missing sleep for many days to come.

By now almost everyone has heard the horror stories since the roll-out of ObamaScares sign-up began. Well fasten your seat-belts because the horror show has just started and there are many more scarey stories to come. If you have not been sufficiently scared off by the initial phase of the ObamaScare road show, brace yourself for even greater horrors to come.

First up huge deductibles:When consumers finally do get onto the Healthcare.gov website, they are in for a new kind of sticker shock. Avik Roy of the Manhattan Institute has exposed the high cost of Obamacare premiums — the next price shock will be the whopping cost of the deductibles.A Chicago Tribune analysis showed that 21 of the 22 lowest-priced plans offered for Cook County residents on the Illinois exchange have annual deductibles of more than $4,000 for an individual and $8,000 for family coverage.(Deductibles are the money consumers must spend on health care before most insurance benefits kick in.)

The huge deductibles along with the hefty premiums turns what once was a health insurance plan into a self-insurance plan. When you add up the premiums you must pay, and then add in the huge deductible, plus the additional out-of-pocket expense to pay the co-pay in any given year it maybe cheaper to simply pay for your health expenses as they occur and put the premiums you would have paid into a HSA (health savings account) for future expenses. But since Obamascare is now a MANDATE and you MUST buy a policy you are being forced to part with your money to essentially get absolutely nothing in return.Why are these premiums so high, this policy design is a direct result of the law’s instructions about the percentage of average health costs that insurance must cover (60 percent for Bronze, up to 90 percent for Platinum plans).

ObamaScare #2 Will people pay?

The Congressional Budget Office expects 7 million people to enroll in health insurance through the exchanges by 2014, and it needs about 2.7 million of them to be “young healthies” who will enroll, and pay premiums that are higher than their age or health status would warrant because of the law’s regulations. Enough Americans may enroll, but will they keep up with their premiums month after month?

The first month of the new health law’s rollout reveals an unexpected pattern in several states: a crush of people applying for an expansion of Medicaid and a trickle of sign-ups for private insurance.

This early imbalance — in some places, nine out of 10 enrollees are in Medicaid — has taken some experts by surprise. I guess they really where not experts after-all if they could not have foreseen that the FREE MEDICAID plans would see an influx of sign-ups while the EXPENSIVE private-care plans would not. I personally believe that this was the plan all along, to make it as easy for people to sign-up for the FREE PLAN and as difficult and unaffordable as possible for everyone else because the end game is to get everyone under a Federally run and administered health-care plan.

Low enrollment in private insurance, meanwhile, could increase premiums as it would likely indicate that only sick people, who really need coverage, were signing up. And the experts could not foresee this? Really those of us who are not experts knew this was going to happen.

ObamaScare #3 Attracting the sickest:

Sicker Americans, with high health costs, are the ones most determined to get through the Healthcare.gov website to enroll. If they dominate enrollment, premiums will have to rise in 2015, discouraging even more young healthies from applying in the future. The industry calls this a “death spiral.”

Again couldn’t the experts predict this? I believe they did know all this and it did not matter because once again this whole nightmare is not about providing the best possibly program for the most American citizens, the current private-sector programs would not have been tampered with, what it is about is gaining control of an individuals health-care.

 http://www.nationalreview.com/article/361946/top-ten-obamacare-disasters-come-grace-marie-turner

Need proof?
Thousands get health insurance cancellation notices

Oct. 18, 2013 at 2:55 PM ET Health plans are sending hundreds of thousands of cancellation letters to people who buy their own coverage, …
Health plans are sending hundreds of thousands of cancellation letters to people who buy their own coverage, frustrating some consumers who want to keep what they have and forcing others to buy more costly policies.

The main reason insurers offer is that the policies fall short of what the Affordable Care Act requires starting Jan. 1. The new policies supposedly will offer consumers better coverage, in some cases, for comparable cost — especially after the inclusion of federal subsidies for those who qualify.  Now that is a big caveat, if you do not qualify for a federal  subsidy (read taxpayer support) then your premiums will most likely be much higher.

So now you are not only paying for your own plan, plus those who are already on Medicaid, now you are going to be asked to help pay for your neighbors plans as well. Face it folks we are being seen as a REVENUE source and not as individual human beings with lives. We are being subjected to this tyranny.The law requires policies sold in the individual market to cover 10 “essential” benefits, such as prescription drugs, mental health treatment and maternity care, whether you need them or not.  That’s right guys your policies will now have to cover your maternity care. What you say you do not need maternity care? Too bad you will have to buy it anyway.

In addition less expensive alternative plans are being outlawed.

ObamaScare #4 Less Expensive Plans Vanish

As previously stated since these “catastrophic” health plans do not contain the “required” basic coverages they are not permitted to be sold. And despite Obama’s continued claims that if you like your policy you can keep your policy, you can not.

ObamaScare #5 Families lose out:

Obamacare’s subsidies will mean that the federal tax code’s existing marriage penalty will get much bigger for certain Americans, especially older, middle-income couples. Families will have to reckon with the fact that remaining married could cost them $10,000 a year or more because single people with lower incomes qualify for bigger subsidies.

Massive Marriage Penalties in Obamacare Health Insurance Exchanges

On the Obamacare health insurance exchanges, being married can cost you a lot. Get divorced (or avoid getting married, if you live togeth…

Hans Bader

ObamaScare #6 More Jobs to be lost:

The Obama administration delayed for a year reporting requirements for the mandate that companies provide health insurance for their employees. But with those provisions coming into effect in 2015, employers will continue to restructure their businesses to stay under 50 employees and push workers under 30 hours a week to avoid the hefty fines that will be used to enforce this regulation.

Andrew Puzder, chief executive of CKE Restaurants, wrote in The Wall Street Journal that “the evidence that Obamacare is having a negative impact on hiring is unequivocal, abundant and consistent with common sense.” Job creation will continue to suffer.

ObamaScare #7 Identity Theft and Fraud will explode

Tens of thousands of “navigators,” “assisters,” and other agents are being hired, generally by nonprofit organizations, to help people apply. They will be gathering personal information, such as one’s Social Security number, address, income, employer’s name and address, children’s names and birthdates, and health habits, to find out if you qualify for Obamacare subsidies. Others are going door-to-door to get people enrolled, and there is no easy way of determining if the person at your door is legitimate. While these aides do receive some training, they’re not professionally licensed and don’t go through the background checks required of insurance agents and brokers. Even temporary census workers had to meet tougher standards.

The Obama Administration itself is warning that con artists will take advantage of confusion over the law to steal people’s identities.Beyond the potential for one-on-one fraud, security may be inadequate in the giant government “data hub.” This warehouse of detailed personal information of everyone in the exchanges will be available to people in many different government agencies. The security of that database still has not been independently tested and verified.The risks of potential identity theft are very real, and 13 attorneys general have expressed deep concerns about the security of the exchanges’ information. When this starts happening, it will generate a new wave of negative coverage of the law.

Lawmakers seek answers on Obamacare Data Hub security

Ask HHS for information on access controls, monitoring tools, and the measures used to protect against cyberattacks Computerworld – Two R…

ObamaScare #8 Repaying Federal Subsidies

It’s going to be very important to accurately indicate annual income on one’s insurance application. Those who understate income, either because their situation changes or they reported inaccurate information, and therefore get a larger subsidy than they are entitled to will be required to repay the excess, possibly amounting to thousands of dollars. And since the IRS is in charge of enforcing compliance you can see how this is going to end badly for the individual

ObamaScare #9 Losing your Doctor

To keep rates from going even higher, insurance companies have limited the doctors and hospitals patients can visit.

Many insurers have opted to limit their selection of doctors in some exchange plans to keep premiums and other costs down. And they are also excluding large academic medical centers, which are often pricier because they tackle sicker patients and more complex cases.

“The sticker price will be lower if the number of options are lower,” said Joe Mondy, a spokesman with Cigna (CI, Fortune 500), which is participating in five state exchanges. “The issue is how many options can you do without?”

For example, WellPoint (WLP, Fortune 500), a Blue Cross Blue Shield insurer that offers policies in 14 states, is narrowing its networks in many markets after research showed consumers care more about the price than the provider.

In areas with a heavy concentration of doctors, WellPoint might offer Obamacare plans with only half the number of doctors available in its off-exchange plans, said Colin Drozdowski, vice president of provider engagement and contracting. But where there’s less choice, the network might be only 10% to 20% smaller.

Insurers are also restricting participants access to doctors through HMO plans that don’t offer out-of-network benefits. So patients have to stick to a certain set of physicians and hospitals or foot the full bill themselves.

ObamaScare #9 Doctor choice in Obamacare? Not so much

Many insurers have opted to limit their selection of doctors in some exchange plans to keep premiums and other costs down. And they are a…

And ObamaScare #10 Customer Service Nightmares

If they  could not get the website to work can you imagine the nightmare awaiting you if you actually have a health related problem and need to contact someone ASAP?

[4:09:56 pm]: Thanks for contacting Health Insurance Marketplace Live Chat. Please wait while we connect you to someone who can help.[4:09:59 pm]: Please be patient while we’re helping other people.
…..
[4:29:20 pm]: Please be patient while we’re helping other people.
[4:29:50 pm]: Please be patient while we’re helping other people.
[4:30:27 pm]: Welcome! You’re now connected to Health Insurance Marketplace Live Chat.Thanks for contacting us. My name is PGSTX0534. To protect your privacy, please don’t provide any personal information, like Social Security Number, or any other sensitive medical or personal information. (after you spent hours inputting all that information into the exchange website)

[4:30:51 pm]: PGSTX0534
Hello, how may I help you today?

[4:31:12 pm]: Alice

My information is not recording correctly in the summary of my application[4:32:21 pm]: PGSTX0534

Thanks for your interest in the Health Insurance Marketplace. We have a lot of visitors trying to use our website right now. That is causing some glitches for some people trying to create accounts or log in. Keep trying, and thanks for your patience. We’ll continue working to improve the site so you can get covered

[4:32:40 pm]: Alice what does that mean?

[4:32:52 pm]: Alice
It says my application is “in Progress”

[4:33:12 pm]: Alice
Does that mean it is not completed and I can continue to try to edit it?

[4:34:14 pm]: PGSTX0534
Thank you. One moment please while I look that up.

[4:36:19 pm]: PGSTX0534
The only way we can see your application is you will have to call The Health Insurance Marketplace Call Center at 1-800-318-2596. We are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to assist you.

[4:36:47 pm]: Alice
What does the Chat Service do then?

Alice it does nothing it only makes you feel better  that you actually talked to someone. They are not concerned about you and your well being.

President Obama said that buying insurance through the exchanges would be like shopping at Amazon.com. We all know how “truthful” Obama is by now right? Instead of simply clicking a few buttons online, many people will spend hours following up with phone calls, emails, and faxes. As recently as two weeks ago, government software couldn’t reliably tell people the correct price for their insurance or their subsidies. Again all of this is by design, because the end result is the government wants as many people enrolled in a Federal Insurance plan like Medicaid so as to make it almost impossible for any future congress to end the program. This nightmare is going to have more sequels  then Freddy Kruger.

Here’s How Well Obamacare’s Customer-Service Live Chat Works

The site failed to record her information correctly and she could not alter the incorrect information it’d recorded, so “Alice” went …

Thanks for visiting the ObamaScare House of Horrors. Our aim is to SCARE you to death so that we do not have to pay for your medical care. Thanks for your contribution to our campaign.

And this has been a “View From the Nest”.

But those who are waiting for the Lord will have new strength; they will get wings like eagles: running, they will not be tired, and walking, they will have no weariness. Isaiah 40:31 (BBE)


Along for the journey

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The statements, comments, or opinions expressed are solely that of the author and do not represent the views or opinions of the host of this site or any affiliates thereof. Any questions or comments should be directed to myself and not to the host or hosts of this site.

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Why Medicare Costs So Much: 4 Things Politicians Do Not Want you to Know

Allen Frederick 1 Comment

 

Unofficial seal of the United States Congress

Image via Wikipedia

Since the creation of Medicare in 1965, the program’s basic structure has caused spending to grow rapidly decade after decade. Even aside from the role of general inflation and demographic factors in rising health costs, there are at least four additional cost drivers built into Medicare’s current design.

 

  • First and foremost, Medicare allows enrollees and health care providers to spend other people’s money. That all but eliminates any incentive for either party to economize and invites waste, fraud, and abuse. Researchers at the Dartmouth Atlas Project and elsewhere estimate that about 30 percent of Medicare spending does nothing to make patients healthier or happier.18 That estimate does not include Medicare spending that provides some value, but whose benefits are smaller than the costs. This research suggests that Medicare wastes well over $100 billion per year. A study by health economists Amy Finkelstein and Robin McKnight found that “in its first 10 years, [Medicare] had no discernible impact on elderly mortality.”19 Crudely put, the $300 billion (in today’s dollars) that Medicare spent between 1966 and 1975 may not have saved a single life.20
  • Second, Medicare spending grows because the government keeps expanding the list of goods and services that Medicare subsidizes. Congress created the huge Part D prescription drug program in 2003, which has added hundreds of billions of dollars to the federal debt because legislators provided no funding source. Other expansions occur, without any congressional action or approval, when Medicare officials deem new procedures eligible for subsidies. In 2004, the Bush administration unilaterally announced that Medicare would begin subsidizing obesity treatments.
  • Third, Medicare overpays for many items because it often sets prices higher than a free market would. In the 1990s, for example, ambulatory surgical centers (ASCs) increased their productivity. A competitive market would have quickly translated those gains into lower prices for consumers. Yet Medicare took 16 years to lower the prices it paid ASCs. Those artificially high prices encouraged excessive use of ASC services with taxpayers footing the bill.21 Medicare sets prices too high in many other areas of medicine, including cardiovascular care.22
  • Fourth, Medicare’s fee-for-service structure—based on price and exchange controls—encourages providers to deliver too many services because that is what the structure rewards. That fact does not imply any greediness on the part of providers. Medicine entails considerable uncertainty, and Medicare encourages providers to respond to that uncertainty by delivering more services.

These factors help explain why actual Medicare spending usually surpasses projections. When Congress created Medicare in 1965, officials projected Part A would cost $9 billion by 1990; it ended up costing $67 billion. In 1967, official estimates projected the cost of the entire Medicare program would reach $12 billion in 1990; it cost $110 billion that year. When Congress created Medicare’s home-care subsidies in 1988, official estimates projected it would cost $4 billion in 1993, but it ended up costing $10 billion.23

So when the Congressional Budget Office projects that Medicare spending will grow at an annual rate of 7.0 percent during the next decade, it is important to take that projection with a grain of salt, given that Medicare grew at an average annual rate of 9.3 percent over the past decade.24

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Obama and Democrats Place Economy on ‘Crash Course’

Allen Frederick 1 Comment

Great Depression: man dressed in worn coat lyi...
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This is serious business folks. These ‘fools’ in congress have spent us beyond our ability to recover. It is imperative that ‘fiscal conservatives‘ step in and apply the brakes to this run-away, federal spending, train wreck. It has become increasingly obvious even to the causal observer that federal spending is out of control.

Come on people vote these fools out of office and take our country back from these ruinous democrat policies. The good times are over, it is time to get off the party train and take some fiscal responsibility before it is all over. Which may come sooner than you think.

Amplify’d from www.americanthinker.com
Warning signs are everywhere — most of them carefully phrased and nuanced, but warnings, nevertheless. Greece and, closer to home, California are painful reminders of what could happen. CNBC is reporting that the Dow is repeating patterns that prevailed just before the Great Depression. The U.S. workforce suffered one its sharpest declines ever — a drop of 652,000 — in June. Economists claim that “wages are flirting with deflation.” It’s hard to find good news on the financial front. Now, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) just released its “Long-Term Budget Outlook” to confirm what people already feared: The national debt is devastating for the future of America. According to the CBO, “the federal government has been recording the largest budget deficits, as a share of the economy, since the end of World War II.” As a result, the CBO paints a very bleak picture of our nation’s future prospects. Further, as the world’s remaining superpower, this country’s terrible financial condition affects all other nations — a fact that makes the CBO report even more alarming.
Sadly, Shaw’s dismal picture is not sobering enough. Douglas W. Elmendorf, director of the CBO, noted that the nation’s debt to GDP surged from 40 percent to 62 percent in just two years.
To compound the alarm, the CBO admits to understating the severity of the problem because its report does not include the negative impact that “substantial amounts of additional federal debt” would have on other aspects of the nation’s economy.

Read more at www.americanthinker.com
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/7tb4
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Federal Debt Unsustainable according to CBO Chief

Allen Frederick 1 Comment

Government spending and largess has swamped America in an unsustainable debt crisis. And what do the politicos come up with as a solution? You guessed it RAISE TAXES. Hey how about this idea… CUT THE SIZE OF GOVERNMENT and REDUCE SPENDING. GET OUT OF THE HEALTH CARE BUSINESS. How about quit sticking your big fat nose under every FREE ENTERPRISE tent in America.

LAY OFF the ENTIRE federal government. I THINK WE THE PEOPLE will find a way to survive without you guys. The political class is KILLING AMERICA.

clipped from www.politico.com

President Obama's budget.

The problem ‘cannot be solved through minor tinkering,’ the head of the Congressional Budget Office said Thursday morning.

AP

The nation’s fiscal path is “unsustainable,” and the problem “cannot be solved through minor tinkering,” the head of the Congressional Budget Office said Thursday morning.

Elmendorf noted a recent CBO report that pegged an increase in the public debt from $7.5 trillion at the end of 2009 to $20.3 trillion at the end of 2020 if President Barack Obama’s fiscal 2011 budget were to be implemented as written. As a percentage of gross domestic product, the debt would rise from 53 percent to 90 percent, CBO forecasted. The last time the percentage was that high was right after World War II.

“If at the end of the day we need to raise taxes, we should raise taxes,” Volcker said.

On Wednesday, Bernanke said in a speech in Dallas that the government must cut entitlements or raise taxes.
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Would you Believe? Liar In Chief Strikes Again

Allen Frederick 3 Comments

This comes from an AP story which up to now has mostly been in the tank for Obama. However even a stopped clock is right twice a day so here is one of those times even AP got it right.

AP FACT CHECK from the OBAMA speech on July 22, 2009 in an article titled:

FACT CHECK: Obama’s health care claims adrift?

By CALVIN WOODWARD and JIM KUHNHENN, Associated Press Writers Calvin Woodward And Jim Kuhnhenn, Associated Press Writers – Thu Jul 23, 3:06 am ET

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama’s assertion Wednesday that government will stay out of health care decisions in an overhauled system is hard to square with the proposals coming out of Congress and with his own rhetoric.

Even now, nearly half the costs of health care in the U.S. are paid for by government at all levels. Federal authority would only grow under any proposal in play.

A look at some of Obama’s claims in his prime-time news conference:

__

OBAMA: “We already have rough agreement” on some aspects of what a health care overhaul should involve, and one is: “It will keep government out of health care decisions, giving you the option to keep your insurance if you’re happy with it.”

THE FACTS: In House legislation, a commission appointed by the government would determine what is and isn’t covered by insurance plans offered in a new purchasing pool, including a plan sponsored by the government. The bill also holds out the possibility that, over time, those standards could be imposed on all private insurance plans, not just the ones in the pool.

Indeed, Obama went on to lay out other principles of reform that plainly show the government making key decisions in health care. He said insurance companies would be barred from dropping coverage when someone gets too sick, limits would be set on out-of-pocket expenses, and preventive care such as checkups and mammograms would be covered.

It’s true that people would not be forced to give up a private plan and go with a public one. The question is whether all of those private plans would still be in place if the government entered the marketplace in a bigger way.

He addressed some of the nuances under questioning. “Can I guarantee that there are going to be no changes in the health care delivery system?” he said. “No. The whole point of this is to try to encourage changes that work for the American people and make them healthier.”

He acknowledged then that the “government already is making some of these decisions.”

___

OBAMA: “I have also pledged that health insurance reform will not add to our deficit over the next decade, and I mean it.”

THE FACTS: The president has said repeatedly that he wants “deficit-neutral” health care legislation, meaning that every dollar increase in cost is met with a dollar of new revenue or a dollar of savings. But some things are more neutral than others. White House Budget Director Peter Orszag told reporters this week that the promise does not apply to proposed spending of about $245 billion over the next decade to increase fees for doctors serving Medicare patients. Democrats and the Obama administration argue that the extra payment, designed to prevent a scheduled cut of about 21 percent in doctor fees, already was part of the administration’s policy, with or without a health care overhaul.

Beyond that, budget experts have warned about various accounting gimmicks that can mask true burdens on the deficit. The bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget lists a variety of them, including back-loading the heaviest costs at the end of the 10-year period and beyond.

___

OBAMA: “You haven’t seen me out there blaming the Republicans.”

THE FACTS: Obama did so in his opening statement, saying, “I’ve heard that one Republican strategist told his party that even though they may want to compromise, it’s better politics to ‘go for the kill.’ Another Republican senator said that defeating health reform is about ‘breaking’ me.”

___

OBAMA: “I don’t know, not having been there and not seeing all the facts, what role race played in that. But I think it’s fair to say, number one, any of us would be pretty angry; number two, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home, and, number three, what I think we know separate and apart from this incident is that there’s a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately.”

THE FACTS: The facts are in dispute between black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. and the white police sergeant who arrested him at his Cambridge, Mass., home when officers went there to investigate a reported break-in. But this much is clear: Gates wasn’t arrested for being in his own home, as Obama implies, but for allegedly being belligerent when the sergeant demanded his identification. The president did mention that the professor was charged with disorderly conduct. Charges were dropped.

___

OBAMA: “If we had done nothing, if you had the same old budget as opposed to the changes we made in our budget, you’d have a $9.3 trillion deficit over the next 10 years. Because of the changes we’ve made, it’s going to be $7.1 trillion.”

THE FACTS: Obama’s numbers are based on figures compiled by his own budget office. But they rely on assumptions about economic growth that some economists find too optimistic. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, in its own analysis of the president’s budget numbers, concluded that the cumulative deficit over the next decade would be $9.1 trillion.

___

Associated Press writer Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar contributed to this report.

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