abaldwin360:

Most people who buy their own health insurance would get a much more generous policy under the Affordable Care Act, according to a new study published in Health Affairs.

Most individual policies today fall short of the ACA’s most basic standards, the study said. That means many consumers will get more benefits and will likely face lower out-of-pocket costs — but premiums could rise as a result.

People who buy health insurance on their own typically pay higher premiums and higher out-of-pocket costs than people who get their coverage through an employer. Individual policies also tend to offer less coverage and, until the ACA is fully implemented in 2014, can exclude coverage for pre-existing conditions.

According to the Health Affairs study, even the most basic plan under the ACA’s new standards would be significantly more generous than what most people get today on the individual market.

read more

divineirony:

abaldwin360:

On the second anniversary of the signing of Affordable Care Act, the bitterness of the health-care fight remains a core fissure in American politics, and the nature of the fissure is clear. The two parties are fighting over whether access to regular medical care ought to be a right or an earned privilege.

To me, and essentially everybody on the liberal side, the answer to that question is obvious. I’m comfortable with the market creating vastly unequal rewards of many kinds. But to make health insurance an earned privilege is to condemn people to physical suffering or even death because they failed to secure a job that gives them health insurance, or they don’t earn enough, or they happened to contract an expensive illness, or a member of their family did. (If you think I am overstating, you ought to read my friend Jonathan Cohn’s book, Sick, which, in addition to explaining the dysfunctionality of the health care system, offers a gut-wrenching portrait of many Americans who saw their lives destroyed by lack of access to decent medical care.) The principle strikes me as nothing short of barbaric.

read more

“…The House Republican budget, which has become the lodestar of conservative public policy, is instructive. It repeals the Affordable Care Act and leaves nothing in its place to cover the uninsured…”

abaldwin360:

If you have health insurance, you already do. That’s how insurance works.

Try again.

Anon: Tell me if i am missing something: It is ok, if not encouraged, to lobby against abortion and gay marriage, but once Obama proposes employers providing birth control to those who want it, it’s a gross violation of the first amendment? (And one more thing: if you are employed by the Catholic church, most likely you are Catholic (assumption) so wouldnt you be against bc too? Then if you dont want it, your employer doesnt have to provide it, right?)

Exactly.  What you are missing, of course, is the total lack of logic, extreme hypocrisy, grotesque ignorance, and assumed Christian privilege necessary to arrive at these conclusions.

~ Steve

…and they told me that my Pristiq is no longer on my insurance company’s “formulary”.  Therefore the insurance will no longer pay for it.  Therefore, I would have to pay $180 a month if I wish to continue to use it, as opposed to the already expensive $30 copay I was paying before.  There is simply no way I can afford $180 a month.

Pristiq is a proven medication for people with depression or ADD, and also has VERY intense withdrawal symptoms.  I decided to pay $48 for a week’s worth of medicine so that I have a chance to talk to my doctor about either fighting the insurance company, putting me on a new medication, or coming up with a strategy to ween me off this one.  I have been more productive, happier, and better all around since I’ve been on this medication.

Yes, I know I am fortunate to have health insurance coverage, and how many people have no insurance coverage at all, but this just brings home to me how very fucked our current insurance system is.

~ Steve