Posted on 10/13/2013 9:53:17 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
This is a story out of California that’s been making the rounds this weekend and definitely needs to be filed under, “Who could have possibly seen this coming?” Some of the people who managed the feat of getting through the dysfunctional web site and actually getting quotes on health care policies under Obamacare have already been finding out that “low priced” can mean something entirely different than they may have thought. This is particularly true of older citizens on fixed incomes. But if your income is low enough, you can just scratch off a lot of the cost of those premiums with a taxpayer funded subsidy, right? Sure… but what if your income is too high? Well, duh… you should make less money!
People whose 2014 income will be a little too high to get subsidized health insurance from Covered California next year should start thinking now about ways to lower it to increase their odds of getting the valuable tax subsidy.
“If they can adjust (their income), they should,” says Karen Pollitz, a senior fellow with the Kaiser Family Foundation. “It’s not cheating, it’s allowed.”
Under the Affordable Care Act, if your 2014 income is between 138 and 400 percent of poverty level for your household size, you can purchase health insurance on a state-run exchange (such as Covered California) and receive a federal tax subsidy to offset all or part of your premium.
This, er… “helpful” article offers one retired couple as an example of this phenomenon. In order to fall under the 400% of poverty level ceiling, they need to have a family income of less than $62,040.00, but they they’ll need to trim their income to qualify as they estimate they’ll take in around $64,000.00. So rather than rewarding them for planning ahead to do as well as they can in their retirement years, the system will push them to make less.
And why do they need to do this in the first place? Are they two of those “irresponsible people” we keep hearing about? No. They’ve had a bare bones Kaiser plan which costs them around $7,200 per year. But it doesn’t “qualify” under Obamacare because it doesn’t offer certain mandatory types of coverage… specifically maternity care, healthy child visits and coverage for dependents up to age 26. But these people are in their sixties and none of those things apply to them.
Welcome to the future, folks. And it’s already here.
Want to make the Affordable Care Act actually affordable again? Two quick changes: remove mandatory maternity coverage, and reinstate the proper differential rates for men and women. And whamo, you slice through the cost of coverage.
Because those are the two demons in PelosiCare - mandatory coverage for maternity which was optional coverage in the past, and different rates for men and women (since, you know, the are actually physically different.)
Instead, it is liberal dream world - men and women are entirely equal, maternity coverage for everyone (how many 40 year olds really need maternity coverage anyway? How about 70 year olds?)
So there’s no way in the world that rates will ever drop. It will just increase by incredible amounts each year (and likely will increase BEFORE coverage even begins on January 1st...) All because of the kitchen sink mentality of what liberals imagine coverage should be.
I’ve had a round of discussions about this thing over the weekend with various Actual Americans, and the consensus seems to be that Official Washington will delay the Individual Mandate, as they have the Employer Mandate, for a year ... IF a face-saving way to do that can be devised.
If that happens, expect a stripped-down Obamacare a year hence, with lower premiums and directed more toward the poor, not those who can afford, and already have, insurance.
And, presumably, a website that actually works.
Don’t forget a unicorn in every garage and a tofu turkey in every pot.
Oh yeah, them, too! I did say IF! :)
And a railroad spike up every ...
... That’s what haunts me!
I checked what my Obamacare rates would be here in California, and for the cheapest plan I’d pay $880 a month. This is about 2.5 times what I was paying for a similar plan about 8 months ago.
2nd, I do think the much-publicized debacle with the website gives them a ready excuse for delay and re-think. This thing is not ready for prime-time, obviously, and if it can be blamed on those dang programmers in Canada, rather than the Administration, I would surmise they might go that route. If they’re smart. Which is of course debatable.
Check it out for yourself with the Kaiser Family Foundation ObamaCare calculator. KFF ObamaCare Calculator (KFF supports an ObamaCare. It's certainly not a rightwing critic.)
The calculator is already filled in with an income of $62040 at the link. Add one marginal dollar of income, and the marginal income tax goes up by $7446.
If your family uses ObamaCare insurance in 2014 and your adjusted gross income is in the vicinity of $62,000, you'd better pay close attention to this fact.
Its allowed, but what you are doing is forcing some other taxpayer to pay for it.
COOL.
In CA a 60 Y/O couple making 71,500 can take 11,500 IRA deduction to reduce income to $60,000 which makes them eligible for a $7,645 subsidy. With an income of $71,500 the subsidy would be $0. Don’t forget about $3,000 tax adjustment to gross income as well.
I don't think the that the insurance companies will enter into that type of suicide pact. The dream died when the Supreme Court said the states could opt out of enhanced Medic-Aid.
To be honest, I really have no idea what’s going to happen with this thing. If we had a “normal” American government, the second the existing law was changed on a whim by the President (to delay the employer mandate and give exemptions to some groups), the legislative branch would have stood up and said, “Can’t do that, suckah!” But that of course didn’t happen. Apparently we’re living in a time when the President, in between golf matches, can just arbitrarily alter existing law whenever he feels like it.
I have to say I am a little bit encouraged that traditional Democrat allies like the unions have started screaming bloody murder since the details of Obamacare have been released. Another reason I think the individual mandate will be delayed a year, as the corporate mandate has. But then again, as I say, who can possibly predict what will happen when Washington has gone this crazy?
Pile up 900 channels your average customer will never watch in order to sell a high-priced product to folks who only want to watch 30.
The feds fought for years to keep inter-state regulations in place to prevent you and I from buying insurance from other states.
They fought tooth and nail, at the behest of insurance companies, to only allow you to buy what was offered in YOUR state. States regulated what must be covered.
In Illinois, the only policies allowed were those that covered chiropractic, aroma-therapy, acupuncture, holistic medicine, mammograms, child-birth, etc.
A single male who did not want any of those things, could not shop around for any other policy.
You HAD to have (and still do) those things in your policy, because the state regulates what must be in the policy, and we were not allowed to shop around to other states, which don’t have such requirements. Or even buy insurance from other countries.
This whole thing would have been great if they just opened up the regulations in all 50 (or 57 in Obama’s cases) states, to allow folks to buy insurance from whomever they wanted.
We all know it is a shell game, just follow the money.
I’m betting almost all D’s in congress are gonna get some piece of the pie and a very good percent of R’s as well.
Money talks, BS walks, we know the story.
Not going to happen, that’d destroy its primary function as a wealth redistribution scheme.
Indeed, for some reason, this President has Line Item Veto power.
It is illegal.
The house and senate should be up in arms about it.
Reagan wanted it, and even the Republicans said “no, this is a bad idea, because when the other side wins an election, they will take advantage of it”. He agreed, and backed off.
Clinton wanted it, and the house and senate went nuts.
Now all the sudden the Muslim in Chief gets it?
It is illegal. Congress should pass the bill that they created. They CANNOT fund a bill that was not passed!
The house should just say “ok, asshat, we’ll fund the BILL THAT THE SENATE PASSED”
Let the cards fall where they may. No extensions, they will extend this till after the 16 elections you can bet on it. If a dem wins, they’ll extend it again, if a R wins, it will fall squarely on our faces.
Obamacare could be a "stalking horse" for single payer government insurance like Medicare or full blown government run healthcare like Hillarycare. Obamacare is too badly thought out to endure as an end product.
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