Comments about ‘Letter: Obama's Affordable Care Act adds burdens to average Americans’

re:MikeRichards
"A reasonable system would require that those who are not insured pay for all of their medical costs or go without medical services"

There you have it. The true system based on Republican ideals, and operating in Third World countries.

re:UtahBusinessman
Have you done any reading about the history of health insurance in the U.S.?
Univ of Denver: "The History of Health Insurance in the U.S. and Colorado" provides a very interesting overview. Healthcare started to become unaffordable long before FDR.

Health insurance companies would love to sell more "catastrophic" type policies to people, especially the junk-type policy that people discover in the midst of a health crisis covers very little and has lots of exclusions. Wendell Potter, a former CIGNA executive resigned and became whistle blower when he saw his insurance company offering more and more of these "junk" policies.
Today's corporate businesses are always going to seek the short-term profit/gain for shareholders over long-term benefits for employees and customers.

@J Thompson
Our grandparents and the generation before them also had a life expectancy into the 50's. They also dug a pit to use as a bathroom and, at least my grandparents didn't have electricity. They also rode horses, walked and mostly just stayed at home because a car was a luxury, Heck they even had a party line for phone calls. Society has advanced since then, the way to deal with things is not go back to the way our grandparents did it.

Mr. Truthseeker,

You claim that Republicans somehow want to harm other Americans. Who pays the highest percentage of their income to charity, Republicans or Democrats. Hint, it isn't Democrats. Who wants to force you to be charitable; Hint, it isn't Republicans.

The use of force to make us charitable will never work. When people are forced, they push back. They always have and they always will. On the other hand, there is nothing that forbids you from opening your wallet and paying for the healthcare costs of anyone. There are not rules to forbid you to help.

If you truly care about others, no one will ever have to force you to do anything. In the meantime, keep your greedy hands out of my purse. Stealing is still a crime in America, whether it is you or whether it is the government doing the stealing.

@ Noodlekaboodle,

Recheck your figures about dying in their 50s. (You can do it by checking your genealogy.) My grandparents lived to their late eighties as did my great-grandparents and my great-great-grandparents.

You've bought the government line without fact-checking.

The ACA will be a huge burden on America.

It comes down to this, most americans are bad at math. They pay, over 2 years, $2400 for a smart phone and service, rather than buying the phone up front and getting the same service for a total of $1100.

The same can be said for all mandates. There are over 2200 mandates on insurance, which drive 20% to 50% of the cost of a policy, yet we think that we can add new mandates to insurance and make it cheaper.

Better yet, you have people who use their Dr. a lot, then wonder why their group insurance rate goes up.

Doctors pay anywhere from $50,000 to $300,000 in malpractice premiums, yet when you propose doing something that would cut the cost of the premiums, they say it wouldn't lower the cost.

If you want to make things cheaper, cut the number of mandates and enact tort reform. Those are the 2 biggest factors in the cost of insurance.

@truthseeker

"Healthcare started to become unaffordable long before FDR."

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Wow--where was this? In the 1940's and 50's my parents made a very modest living as farmers in South Dakota--they both had major surgeries (Dad 2, Mom 1), and they simply wrote out a check for the bills every time. They never had health insurance until years later when they enrolled in Medicare. As a new accountant (making about $10,000 a year) in the late 60's and early 70's, I paid the full amount (no insurance) for the births of 4 children with no problem--the first was in the San Francisco area, the other three in Utah.

If you will check the records, you will find that the average cost of a 24-hour stay in a SLC hospital in 1970 was about $100. And that was long AFTER FDR.

I will check the reference you gave--maybe I will find some surprises.

L white. Republicans give more to charity but most of that is to thier churches. Megachurches mostly that are in no way required to help anyone with that money. I have several megachurches nearby and don't see any souplines or advertizements for what they are doing to help the poor. They advertize everything else they do so i think that says something.

Republicans also count contributions to political organizations as charitable.

Charitable and charity are not the same thing.

Utah Businessman - Assuming you are correct in your assertion that a night stay in a SLC hospital was $100 in 1970, this really means very little. The technology used in monitoring a patient has changed since 1970, as has the medication used, the training required to be a nurse or doctor, and the cost of that training. Plus, the cost of a night in the hospital is not a flat rate, but rather is dependent upon the services rendered during that stay.

@J Thompson
"People will not pay the price that doctors would charge without insurance any more than they would pay $20.00 for a gallon of milk. "

If it's emergency room care they dont' really have a choice now do they? Well okay I guess they could die or just live in pain or something like that.

"Our grandparents didn't have health insurance nor did anyone living before them"

They also had a much lower life expectancy back then too.

@Truthseeker
It's all irrelevent since there is no enforcement mechanism to carry out the payment of that mandate fee/tax since the bill, in order to placate liberals who hated the conservative mandate policy, made it so that no criminal charges could be brought against people who didn't pay the fine/fee/tax nor could the IRS do things like withold earnings or any sort of enforcement mechanisms they normally have available for tax evasion enforcement.

@MoliterManus
"Utah Businessman - Assuming you are correct in your assertion that a night stay in a SLC hospital was $100 in 1970, this really means very little.The technology used in monitoring a patient has changed since 1970, as has the medication used, the training required to be a nurse or doctor, and the cost of that training. Plus, the cost of a night in the hospital is not a flat rate, but rather is dependent upon the services rendered during that stay."

What if I were to say that my dad's nights stay in a German hospital was around $100 (after converting from Euros) in 2011 (for comparisons' sake this was not intensive care but an overnight for observation type thing)?

re:UtahBusinessman
You seem to have come to certain conclusions and answers. So what is the solution? Do away with employer-provided health insurance? Provide only catastrophic coverage? what?

RAND conducted a study, the Health Insurance Experiment (HIE) in the 1970s and 1980s. It randomized families to health insurance plans that varied their cost sharing from none (“free care”) to a catastrophic plan that approximated a large family deductible with a stop-loss limit of $1,000 (in late-1970s dollars, more than $6000 in today's dollars).

Participants in the large-deductible (95 percent coinsurance) plan used 25–30 percent fewer services than those in the free-care plan.
For most people enrolled in the RAND experiment, who were typical of Americans covered by employment-based insurance, the variation in use across the plans appeared to have minimal to no effects on health status. By contrast, for those who were both poor and sick—people who might be found among those covered by Medicaid or lacking insurance—the reduction in use was harmful, on average.

Further discussion and conclusion can be found:
(HealthAffairs "Consumer-Directed Health Plans and the RAND Health Insurance Experiment")

@ L White
Well, my grandpa was born in 1919 and my grandma was born in 1925. Grandpa died in '72 and my grandma died in '01. But if you look up the average life expectancy for people born in the 1910' and 1920's it is about 52 for men and 55 for women. Our grandparents just didn't have access to the medical technology and information we have today. So no I didn't just "buy the government line" I just have older grandparents than you do. My point is still valid, the way forward is NOT to go back to the 30's and 40's.

@MoliterManus

"Assuming you are correct in your assertion that a night stay in a SLC hospital was $100 in 1970, this really means very little. The technology used in monitoring a patient has changed since 1970, as has the medication used, the training required to be a nurse or doctor, and the cost of that training."

.....................

My wife had three surgeries in IHC hospitals between 2004 and 2008--the daily rate came out to right at $10,000 each time. I don't know how you do arithmetic, but the difference between $100 and $10,000 is a HECK OF A LOT to me. I knew nurses in 1970 and I know nurses now, and I can guarantee that their present pay is between 5 and 10 times what it was then--not 100 times.

Re technology--researching on the internet, I confirmed what my memory told me--a "decent" computer cost $5,000 in 1970--how much do you pay today for one that is INFINITELY more powerful--about 1/10 of $5,000. Yes, I recognize that some new things are much more expensive, but $10,000 compared to $100--come on!

Really the opposite is true.

The Affordable Care Act LIFTS a burden from ordinary Americans and it's amazing there are still people out there who have been fooled into believing differently.

Noodlekaboodle,

I asked my hubby how to explain the difference between what you think you wrote and what you actually wrote. He said that "life expectancy" has nothing to do with length of life.

Life expectancy means that those born in 1910 might have a life expectancy of 48 years, but in 1920, those who survived the high infant mortality rate and who now ten years old, would be expected to live for another 55 to sixty years. Those who where born in 1910 and lived to be 25, having survived the high mortality rate of infancy and youth, would be expected to live for another 45 to 55 years.

The vast majority of people were born in 1910 who survived infancy lived almost as long as we who survived infant mortality expect to live today. Sure, some people will live longer than expected and some will die sooner than expected but mixing life expectancy with length of life are apples and oranges.

Having or not having insurance did not extend life appreciably for those born in 1910 and it will not extend life appreciably for us, no matter what President Obama says.

Like most folks, I pay all kinds of taxes to fund things that do not benefit me directly. I pay for schools, even though I have no children in school. I pay for roads on which I will never drive. I pay for firefighters to fight fires in places I will never visit. I pay for police to chase criminals who have never harmed me. I pay for parks that I will never use. I pay for research into subjects I have never heard of, let alone approved. I pay for a military to fight terrorists who pose no realistic threat to me. I pay for agencies that provide no service to me.
Why? Because I live in a civilized society, where people share each other’s burdens by authorizing the government to do things that the collective will of the people deems important. So it is with the Affordable Care Act. To those who think everyone should pay for their own health care but not someone else’s, please explain why that philosophy doesn’t apply to all those other things I mentioned. I don't see a substantive difference.

Everyone wants affodable health care. The "act" is the thing we object to. Obamacare is the worst piece of legislation in the history of the world. It is 2400 plus pages of legal-speak and no one really understands it. It was crafted behind closed doors without debate and voted on by people who had not read it and had no Republican support. The famous statement by Nancy Pelosi that they would vote on it and then find out what was in it is abominable. Anyone who thinks that government can run a healthcare system efficiently should provide us with some examples.

Opponents to ACA have spent four times more money than proponents in campaigning against it.
Democrats are lousy at messaging compared to Republicans, but then Republicans have a bigger echo chamber.

Re:BRM
In July 2009, a series of bills were approved by (bi-partisan) committees within the House of Representatives. Beginning June 17, 2009, and extending through September 14, 2009, three Democratic and three Republican Senate Finance Committee Members met for a series of 31 meetings to discuss the development of a health care reform bill. Over the course of the next three months, this group, Senators Max Baucus (D-Montana), Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), Kent Conrad (D-North Dakota), Olympia Snowe (R-Maine), Jeff Bingaman (D-New Mexico), and Mike Enzi (R-Wyoming), met for more than 60 hours, and the principles that they discussed became the foundation of the Senate's health care reform bill. The meetings were held in public and broadcast by C-SPAN and can be seen on the C-SPAN web site or at the Committee's own web site.

"Anyone who thinks that government can run a healthcare system efficiently should provide us with some examples." Let's look at the other side of the coin. From 1950 until 1980 health care costs increased at the same rate or lower than the cpi. Starting in 1980 and ending in 2010 (way before Obamacare), health care costs increased 400% and cpi increased 200%. I wonder what happened in 1980..oh year it was the capitilization of American society.

A 2008 study of 37 health care indicators reported that American health care was sub par in all areas,but the worst scores..efficiency. Pretty much came in at half of expected given what we spend.

Yea, let's let the markets do it..they are so efffective..on paper..or in your dreams.

Now who would pay a penalty under the Affordable Care Act? Certainly not me as I already have insurance. And not my sister who can't afford insurance. She will be the beneficiary of the new law.

Oh, yes. It would be my nephew who has a excellent income from a small business, can easily afford insurance, but doesn't want to pay for it. He would rather you pay for it through your insurance.

Now how many people are like my nephew? 1% of the population? That's a far cry from "all Americans"!!

At least get the facts straight before making the argument against the Affordable Care Act. And, while you're at it, tell us what the Republican have in mind as a realistic replacement? And don't tell me that they will "do something better" if Romney gets elected.

The fact is that they have no plan because they like the way things are today. They scare the "little people" into believing healthcare reform will "cost" them, so don't change anything. There is a HUGE lobbying effort to protect certain interests in the healthcare industry. Their agenda doesn't include you or me.

The only reason that those states with Republican governors are refusing to implement the Medicare provisions of the Affordable Care Act is political posturing. It's all part of the "oppose Obama and make him fail" mentalitys encouraged by Rush Limbaugh and the Republican Tea Party establishment. It's all part of their "Just Say No" political mantra.

No wonder nothing gets done in Washington. Now we might ask, if Obama is re-elected and cannot have another term, will these conservative zealots continue their obstruction, or will they decide to do some work. Since they are getting paid by the American taxpayer, should they be responsible to the American taxpayer and not just to a minority ideology?