Posted on 02/16/2017 11:14:45 AM PST by SeekAndFind
During his weekly press conference Thursday, House Speaker Paul Ryan announced a bill to repeal Obamacare would be introduced next week. “After the House returns following the Presidents Day, we intend to introduce legislation to repeal and replace Obamacare,” Ryan said. He added, “It has become increasingly clear that this law is collapsing.
“Look at the events that happened this week. On Tuesday another major insurance company announced that it too will leave the marketplace. In its decision, Humana cited a lack of young people signing up, a problem that has dogged Obamacare for years now.
“And then on Wednesday, the CEO of Aetna, another large insurance carrier, said that Obamacare is in a death spiral. His words…Obamacare is not simply stuck in some kind of status quo, it is getting worse by the day and it will keep getting worse unless we act. We need to rescue people from this collapsing law.”
Ryan could have actually added some things to his list of bad news for Obamacare. In a story appropriately titled “A bad week for Obamacare” Politico noted another bit of bad news. Molina insurance, which was frequently cited as an industry success story last year, now seems to be considering dropping out of Obamacare after unexpected losses:
Molina — which had expected a $60 million profit on the exchanges for 2016 — reported a $110 million loss on Wednesday, and will assess ongoing participation at a later date. “There are simply too many unknowns with the marketplace program to commit to our participation beyond 2017,” said CEO Mario Molina.
And though it didn’t happen this week, just two weeks ago Cigna indicated that it was going to review its participation in the Obamacare market for 2018 after projecting it would continue to lose money in 2017. During a conference call, Cigna’s CEO David Cordani called the marketplaces “unsustainable.”
Here’s Ryan’s full weekly press conference. His statement about Obamacare comes at the very beginning of the clip.
Don’t mind a requirement to carry some sort of health insurance, just let me choose what I want to carry without the penalties. I don’t want to pay for abortions, free birth control and people that have cancer that are getting treatment up until the day of death (watched this happen with my brother, when he finally told the health professionals and his wife I’ve had enough, let me die). The money from cancer treatment paid by insurance is a great way to fund research and use people as guinea pigs.
Any replacement the Republicans come up with is going to be labeled "Trumpcare".
Congress is on recess next week, no?
So it is actually the week after that that they are talking about introducing repeal. According to Trump, the tax cuts aren’t coming until after Obamacare is dealt with, which is unfortunate, because that means they won’t have the cuts taking effect until 2018—and so much of the impact will come after the midterms.
If it's required then how will they make people buy it without some kind of penalty?
I don’t want to pay for abortions...
If you're a guy then you aren't covered for abortion.
...free birth control...
You got me there. I get free birth control and I still can't explain why.
...and people that have cancer that are getting treatment up until the day of death (watched this happen with my brother, when he finally told the health professionals and his wife I’ve had enough, let me die).
So how would you deal with that? Some sort of panel that decides when is enough and cuts off treatment? A "death panel", so to speak?
“Repeal is fine. It’s the replace that scares me.”
Exactly what I have said on FR and in conversations at work. It still astounds me that so many people think that we need a federal law to manage healthcare in this country. There is, in my opinion, NOTHING that the feds can do in this area that will be better than simply getting the hell out of the way and letting the market work.
We had a wonderful constitution back when we at least attempted to abide by it. There have been some amendments passed that should be repealed but I think it would still work far better than simply pretending that any old law that some dimwit can think of actually passes the constitutional test.
Isn’t it possible to make a tax REDUCTION retroactive?
Yes, you can, but that takes away the incentive influence on potential investment, work, and growth decisions, so basically takes a lot of the benefit out of it. Such cuts are also unfair, since taxpayers make their decisions based on the expected tax rates.
1. Allow insurance companies to sell across state lines. ( deregulate)
2. Allow tax free medical savings accounts.
3. TORT reform.
4.
You’re right — won’t work to require it without a penalty.
Cancer, at the minimum insurance stop paying for the experimental trials that’s where they are funding their research. If the person elects this, then they can pay.
Can you give me a scenario where that will reduce costs?
2. Allow tax free medical savings accounts.
Already available through many companies for those who offer high deductible healthcare plans. What about those who are self-employed or whose company doesn't offer an MSA? Will the government require companies to offer them? Or will the government get into the Medical Savings Account business?
3. TORT reform.
About half the states have already enacted some form of tort reform and in none of them is there any indication that it has reduced health care insurance premiums.
Few, if any, trials for any experimental treatment are covered by insurance.
The defense to your well-reasoned objections is “it would take three-fifths of the states to ratify any lame-brained amendments,” and that would stop them.
Well, we are pretty lame-brained as a nation at this moment.
Why do you fear state legislatures will commission delegates to finish off our republic?
Do you oppose the exercise of other Natural Rights beyond those in Article V?
A bill that repeals Obamacare and then delays the effective date for a couple of years is not a repeal.
The pre-ex portion will be modified, not removed, in all probability. I had a two-hour long conference call last week on the possible scenarios that could play out with ‘repeal and replace’. It may be that if one has continuous medical coverage of some kind or another, pre-ex would be satisfied. It is the ones that wait until they are dx’d with some dread disease, have an accident, buy medical insurance for a few months when they need it and drop it when they don’t, that will have pre-ex applied to any new medical coverage purchased.
Just reading tea leaves at this point. My $0,02 at this point.
.
- Tax deductible Health Savings Accounts
- Tort reform
- Free market shopping of health insurance across state lines
- Tax deductible health insurance premiums
Not being the brightest limb on the tree, I don’t know to exactly which “other” natural rights you refer, that are “beyond Article V”.
Mostly, I am untrusting of the timing, while The USA is indisputably a secular nation. Our condition at this time in history has wrought a Godless governance, elected by it’s own people.
That is my reason exactly. I believe in miracles. Trump had to be a miracle. Not sure about hoping for two of them.
Fooling around with a perfect document, I can’t brave up enough to support.
Most everyone pushing it are too Type A and big mouthed to trust entirely.
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