Posted on 12/23/2013 8:49:54 AM PST by kristinn
At midnight Monday, the official deadline arrives for Americans to sign up through the new federal health insurance exchange for health plans that begin Jan. 1. But, without any public announcement, Obama administration officials have changed the rules so that people will have an extra day to enroll, according to two individuals with knowledge of the switch.
Over the weekend, government officials and outside IT contractors working on the online marketplace’s computer system made a software change that automatically gives people a Jan. 1 start date for their new coverage as long as they enroll by 11:59 p.m. on Christmas Eve.
The switch is the most recent rule change — some by government officials, and at least one by the insurance industry — as a milestone approaches for what has been a tumultuous three-month start of the long-awaited opportunity for Americans to buy new health plans under a 2010 law intended to reshape the nation’s health-care system.
For the first two months of the sign-up, a federal Web site, HealthCare.gov, had so many software and hardware defects that many consumers who wanted to select new insurance were frustrated by computer error messages. And administration officials held off on a planned campaign to urge people to take advantage of the opportunity for new insurance.
At the start of this month, Obama administration officials announced that the Web site was largely working smoothly, and began to urge consumers to sign up for coverage before the Dec. 23 deadline. The full open-enrollment period extends through the end of March, but the first deadline is for people who want coverage to start on New Year’s Day — the date it first becomes available.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Epic fail.
Obama = Scrooge. Sheesh. Yanking your economic freedom on Christmas! The godless communist bastard!
Well by golly, that fixes everything.
Obama and Kwanzaa. Two Frauds. Both “brainchildren” of Thugs.
major difference...Kwanzaa can be ignored....
Obama ..not so much.
Obama wont be back to Washington till Jan 5 a Sunday..
Jan 6 is the first Monday in the new year and the first day the gov will be back to work after their new year paid break etc
nothing will be done until at least then..
did ya really expect the gov to work on New Years Day ???
:)
Then what remains is [a] reduce the cost of medical care so that it is self-sustaining or [b] have more private insurance coverage, if affordable, to cover inflation and new developments, or [c] rely on family or charity.
I'd keep the present system until a new one is created for comparison. I regard it like fire insurance where all homeowners pay but only the one whose house burns down, collects.
Among other things he could be called ..... but that we're too polite to put on FR!
- OhomoCare
I said this weeks ago. They will waive all penalties before the end of the year and blame the remaining insurance providers.
The insurance companies will regret dancing with the devil because he’ll leave them hanging and blame everything on them and congress won’t be bailing them out because the population has no appetite to pay for more bailouts.
Kwanza schwanza -He should have a bone through his nose.
Extra day so Obama has enough time to sign up. lol
Young healthy person here. Can’t afford a $300/month premium and $6,300 deductible before insurance would cover part of any other costs.
A day? Sounds to me like a big nothing burger. I doubt people will be hanging around on Christmas eve trying to get onto identitytheft.gov
“ISN’T THIS THE 15TH ILLEGAL / CAPRICIOUS CHANGE TO THE LAW PASSED BY CONGRESS ?”
It could be the 4,367,865th and congress and the judiciary would still do nothing. They’re potted plants.
Who wouldn’t want to spend Christmas Eve at the internet version of the DMV?
Simply the solution is to decrease benefits or increase revenue or some combination thereof. Right now, the most popular approach seems to be to means test the benefits and increase the costs by taxing the wealthy more. Medicare is a welfare program and a redistribution of wealth program. It will become more so if it is to survive. In the meantime, our children and grand children will be saddled by the debt that has already been incurred to support these programs.
I'd keep the present system until a new one is created for comparison. I regard it like fire insurance where all homeowners pay but only the one whose house burns down, collects.
LOL. I am sure you would since you are getting out three times what you paid into the system. The problem is that the country cannot afford the costs. From the 2013 Trustee Report
"The Trustees project that the Medicare Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund will be the next to face depletion after the DI Trust Fund. The projected date of HI Trust Fund depletion is 2026, two years later than projected in last year’s report, at which time dedicated revenues would be sufficient to pay 87 percent of HI cost. The Trustees project that the share of HI cost that can be financed with HI dedicated revenues will decline slowly to 71 percent in 2047, and then rise slowly until it reaches 73 percent in 2087. As it has since 2008, the HI Trust Fund will pay out more in hospital benefits and other expenditures than it receives in income in all years until reserve depletion."
"The drawdown of Social Security and HI Trust Fund reserves and the general revenue transfers into SMI will result in mounting pressure on the Federal budget. In fact, pressure is already evident. For the seventh consecutive year, the Social Security Act requires that the Trustees issue a “Medicare funding warning” because projected non-dedicated sources of revenues primarily general revenues are expected to continue to account for more than 45 percent of Medicare’s outlays in 2013, a threshold breached for the first time in fiscal year 2010.
FYI: The most urgent problem is the depletion of the DI Trust fund in just three years. From the Trustee Report:
Social Security’s Disability Insurance (DI) program satisfies neither the Trustees’ long-range test of close actuarial balance nor their short-range test of financial adequacy and faces the most immediate financing shortfall of any of the separate trust funds. DI Trust Fund reserves expressed as a percent of annual cost (the trust fund ratio) declined to 85 percent at the beginning of 2013, and the Trustees project trust fund depletion in 2016, the same year projected in the last Trustees Report. DI cost has exceeded non-interest income since 2005, and the trust fund ratio has declined since peaking in 2003. While legislation is needed to address all of Social Security’s financial imbalances, the need has become most urgent with respect to the program’s DI component. Lawmakers need to act soon to avoid reduced payments to DI beneficiaries three years from now.
Thanks for #18.
The bailout money is already appropriated. Obama has the money to pay for the risk corridors.
Which makes me think that something else is going on.
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