Medicare for All is Coming

[scott]

Seen on a footnote of a slide for a training presentation today:

*Commission structures will be similar under HR676

While I still have my magazine businesses and technology consulting practice, I'm also an Insurance Agent for Medicare Advantage plans. I've been approached to join an agency that will be selling private healthcare insurance policies to individuals and that requires certification in ACA rules and practices as well as certifications in each of the plans offered by all of the insurance companies. Due to the very poor rollout of Healthcare.gov, insurance companies are being granted access to the systems in place that can calculate and apply federal subsidies to those policies. Today I perused the materials and some of them had video slideshows, most had the same stuff for the general section of rules.

So far, this is conjecture but I asked the regional VP for Agency Relations at Humana why that footnote was there and he said because one way or another a form of Medicare Advantage is going to be the standard. This is why they are not recruiting traditional health insurance agents, they are targeting Medicare Advantage agents.

[Gingersnap]

Well, that's cheery news.

[daveman]

The goal all along: Single payer.

Surely there's no one who thought ACA was the desired end state.

[Novaheart]

The goal all along: Single payer.

Surely there's no one who thought ACA was the desired end state.

Even Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin called that one. They basically said that the ACA was such a patchwork, that the only solution before it was over would be to go to Single Payer/Medicare For All.

As I have said before: you will all be on Medicare one day if you are lucky enough to live long enough. Doesn't it make sense for you to be in the system you pay into all of your life rather than to hand Aetna thousands of dollars a year and then go into Medicare? Trust me, you will survive. My mom is on Medicare with a Blue Cross on top and while her medical bills still run $300 a month for meds, it beats the hell out of whatever it is they think a dram of Boxilene Dihdratize is worth.

[Gramps]

Even Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin called that one. They basically said that the ACA was such a patchwork, that the only solution before it was over would be to go to Single Payer/Medicare For All.

As I have said before: you will all be on Medicare one day if you are lucky enough to live long enough. Doesn't it make sense for you to be in the system you pay into all of your life rather than to hand Aetna thousands of dollars a year and then go into Medicare? Trust me, you will survive. My mom is on Medicare with a Blue Cross on top and while her medical bills still run $300 a month for meds, it beats the hell out of whatever it is they think a dram of Boxilene Dihdratize is worth.

I will soon be 66.
I draw SS and am Medicare enrolled, and VA entitled.

Since I choose to continue to work, Medicare deducts x amount from my SS monthly payment, and I pay SS taxes and Medicare taxes out of my paycheck.
SS punishes me quarterly because of my meager income.
I pay SS taxes, Medicare Taxes, Income taxes, Medicare deductions from my SS monthly, and, a quarterly dick in the ass bc I earn over x amount.

In other words, The Fucking Government loves me.
Because of me, several dead beats can sit around from cradle to grave and be sustained and have to do nothing other than occasionally show up in one of the various gubment offices.

[Billy Jingo]

I will soon be 66.
I draw SS and am Medicare enrolled, and VA entitled.

Since I choose to continue to work, Medicare deducts x amount from my SS monthly payment, and I pay SS taxes and Medicare taxes out of my paycheck.
SS punishes me quarterly because of my meager income.
I pay SS taxes, Medicare Taxes, Income taxes, Medicare deductions from my SS monthly, and, a quarterly dick in the ass bc I earn over x amount.

In other words, The Fucking Government loves me.
Because of me, several dead beats can sit around from cradle to grave and be sustained and have to do nothing other than occasionally show up in one of the various gubment offices.

Tell you what. I'll pick up the tab for those guys and you can take care of the "legitimate" poor.

Deal?

[Gramps]

Tell you what. I'll pick up the tab for those guys and you can take care of the "legitimate" poor.

Deal?

I have been 'legitimate poor' probably for more years than you ever were.
We got 'commodities' ... that was it....
Cheese, powdered milk, corn meal.

I have zero problem with helping 'legitimate poor'.. those circumstances happen..

So, Fuck Off...

BTW... we have a deal.. and you are truly fucked...


Get off your superior morality throne.

K ... Fine?

[scott]

Even Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin called that one. They basically said that the ACA was such a patchwork, that the only solution before it was over would be to go to Single Payer/Medicare For All.

As I have said before: you will all be on Medicare one day if you are lucky enough to live long enough. Doesn't it make sense for you to be in the system you pay into all of your life rather than to hand Aetna thousands of dollars a year and then go into Medicare? Trust me, you will survive. My mom is on Medicare with a Blue Cross on top and while her medical bills still run $300 a month for meds, it beats the hell out of whatever it is they think a dram of Boxilene Dihdratize is worth.

Why isn't she on a zero premium HMO plan?

[scott]

Tell you what. I'll pick up the tab for those guys and you can take care of the "legitimate" poor.

Deal?

How do you plan to pick up the tab?

[daveman]

Even Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin called that one. They basically said that the ACA was such a patchwork, that the only solution before it was over would be to go to Single Payer/Medicare For All.

As I have said before: you will all be on Medicare one day if you are lucky enough to live long enough. Doesn't it make sense for you to be in the system you pay into all of your life rather than to hand Aetna thousands of dollars a year and then go into Medicare? Trust me, you will survive. My mom is on Medicare with a Blue Cross on top and while her medical bills still run $300 a month for meds, it beats the hell out of whatever it is they think a dram of Boxilene Dihdratize is worth.

Still wondering where the Constitition authorizes FedGov to be in the medical insurance business.

No one's ever been able to point that out to me.

[daveman]

How do you plan to pick up the tab?

Other People's Money.

The left is very generous with that.

[Novaheart]

I will soon be 66.
I draw SS and am Medicare enrolled, and VA entitled.

Since I choose to continue to work, Medicare deducts x amount from my SS monthly payment, and I pay SS taxes and Medicare taxes out of my paycheck.
SS punishes me quarterly because of my meager income.
I pay SS taxes, Medicare Taxes, Income taxes, Medicare deductions from my SS monthly, and, a quarterly dick in the ass bc I earn over x amount.

In other words, The Fucking Government loves me.
Because of me, several dead beats can sit around from cradle to grave and be sustained and have to do nothing other than occasionally show up in one of the various gubment offices.

How many kids did you have?

[Novaheart]

Why isn't she on a zero premium HMO plan?

I would imagine that the answer to that is "Because I have always had BCBS." My mother has always been over insured.

[Gingersnap]

Single-payer health care is very excellent for broken arms, pre-natal visits, vaccinations, and other uncomplicated acute situations. What it's not good for is cancer and cardio-vascular disease, diabetes treatment, obesity management, pseudo-psychiatric problems, or complex chronic things like MS, lupus, Parkinson's disease, or dementia.

Sadly, those things are actually the major things that affect people and one of those things will affect almost every person who doesn't die of trauma or infection.

It's worth noting that a lot of the big single-payer countries have all now allowed supplemental private insurance because the state-run medical care is so inadequate for all those major issues. The French have their babies on the national program but they get their cancer treatment privately - if they can afford it. Same with the Swedes or the Swiss.

You end up with a different two-tiered system: the poor pay nothing and get very good care by standards from the 1980s while the middle class pay for both the state care and for their supplemental care. The state systems are so constrained by cost issues that little or nothing is done to advance treatment or to develop new drugs or techniques.

Worse yet, state systems are even more vulnerable to politically correct but ineffective treatments than private medical groups are. This is why European diabetics are counseled to eat most of their calories from carbohydrates and it's why the Brits are statin-crazy even though statins haven't been proven to affect death rates in groups.

[scott]

I would imagine that the answer to that is "Because I have always had BCBS." My mother has always been over insured.

It sounds to me like she's underinsured if her prescriptions cost that much.