Damn Healthcare kills me every year

As an aside: the Guy's and St Thomas' Trust is one of 100+ German health insurance companies as well: just for British soldiers and their families, though.

My pre-Obamacare plan had a $250 out-of-pocket maximum. And it was a traditional plan with no "networks" -- I could get treated by any doctor I wished to see.

My first year of Obamacare the out-of-pocket maximum was $5,000 and I had to confine myself to a network to get full coverage.

Subsequent years the out-of-pocket maximum has been $3,000. Still have to deal with networks.

On the other hand, rescissions are a thing of the past, and that is HUGE. I'm very happy about that.

Overall I'm happy with things.

Dream on!

\\

Look at the WSJ for Sat. 1/16/16. There's big and good article on the subject of Financial Aid.

We have "visiting docs" here too. They also carry a laptop , when visiting the patient ( usually elderly) in his/her home. This is the most expensive form of medical care ( in my opinion) and in most cases the Visiting Nurses ( Chicago and NYC ) are as competent ( or more competent) as the physicians.

Well, here, most procedures can only be (officially) done by the doctors, including writing prescriptions, here. And since they are the normal doctors of the patients as well ... cheaper than staying in a hospital.

So, your health insurance went from $11,000 to $17,000 per year due to Obamacare and the resultant limited choice of quality affordable plans .

Not according to this month's market ....everything down.

Thanks I will take a look.

But the good news is my taxes are lower because I have lower taxable income.

Yes. I share that good fortune with you.

The amount you are losing per year is not far from what I am living on per year.

Sometimes I simply must roll my eyes.

I'd imagine your cost of living is significantly different than the Boston area and you are not supporting two children.

For instance my mortgage is 2,700 a month for a 3 bedroom 1 and half bath. And that is an hour drive outside the city .. you cannot compare our cost of living with yours.

Yes, I can. I am 74 and live on little and routinely try not to lose my small house, mortgage paid for, for taxes and insurance on my tiny amount of money. You can hardly imaging all the stuff I can't pay for, like shoes. I am close to the street. I make most of my own food. My biggest expense is the telephone company letting me glom on to a2k.

Your whining makes me roll my eyes.

My employer pays 100 % of our premiums, thank goodness. I have a PPO plan with a $500 deductible and the premium is not cheap. I do think though that Obamacare is not working too well for most people. On average, people pay over $500/month with a $5000 deductible which is completely nuts, especially when you have children.

By the way, Miller, Medicare is not free. Every retiree gets Medicare premiums deducted from their Social Security and if they don't have supplemental insurance, they do have certain cost associated with their healthcare. Not only that, many many medications that are good but expensive, aren't paid by Medicare. Either you pay yourself or you take a different and cheaper medication yet less effective.

Here's a good place to start:

http://obamacarefacts.com/questions/high-deductible-plan-too-expensive/

That said, the question is why your subsidies under Obamacare don't compensate. If it's because you make so much that you don't qualify for subsidies or are at the high end of the sliding scale (four times the poverty line) then your plight is not an argument against Obamacare in the general case. Could you clarify this point of income and subsidy levels?

" "There are drastically different rates for the subsidized and the unsubsidized," Coleman said."

http://www.cnbc.com/2015/11/02/obamacare-prices-increase-for-those-who-dont-get-subsidies.html

Also, may I ask why you assume a causal connection between Obamacare and the drop in your income? If an employer based plan requires you to pay a care deductible up front, that's one thing. But you indicated that your pay has decreased every year since Obamacare, whereas the high deductible plan was something dating to last year.

I thought a deductible was only a payment made out of pocket before the insurance paid the rest, in the case of a filed claim. So why are you paying your employer in the absence of a claim?

Calamity Jane wrote: "On average, people pay over $500/month with a $5000 deductible which is completely nuts, especially when you have children."

By contrast:

" "While every market is different, and the reasons for rate changes vary, what's important for consumers to understand is that about 8 out of 10 returning consumers will be able to buy a plan with premiums less than $100 a month after tax credits; and about 7 out of 10 will have a plan available for less than $75 a month.""

http://www.cnbc.com/2015/11/02/obamacare-prices-increase-for-those-who-dont-get-subsidies.html

I am talking about reality here, puzzled, not what you picked up in an article.
Have you met a single person who pays $100 or under per month? The deductible is on average $3000/year, even for poverty stricken individuals who don't make more than $11,500/year.

SEveral people have written here, none of us pays $ 100 or less.

Not only that, but there is a co-pay and deductible in nearly every medical procedure. I'm very happy with the system, but you're right about expensive prescriptions either realized or potential.

I don't see the slightest sourcing for your assertions about average healthcare costs net of subsidies. I gave you mine.

And again, a deductible is something that someone who gets sick and files an insurance claim has to pay out before insurance kicks in and pays the balance; so how can you talk about an annual deductible cost as though it was the cost of insurance?

Furthermore, there are many insurance plans that do not include high deductibles. The premiums cost more but that is what the subsidies offset. Assuming that you aren't making too much to qualify. If you don't qualify because of high income, then a high deductible plan is probably not such a burden, insofar as it entails lower premiums and a one time cost that caps your medical outlays.

" There isn't much consolation to give to an employee on a high deductible plan. The truth is those with low-and-middle incomes get a better deal from the Marketplace than they do from employers (in general, this depends upon region and employer contribution)."

http://obamacarefacts.com/questions/high-deductible-plan-too-expensive/

Once upon a time private sector employees had these quaint organizations called "unions" that used the power of collective bargaining to obtain generous healthcare and defined pension plans. That was before Republicans took a hatchet to them starting with Reagan. Now corporations are flush with cash as their share of national income increases, while employees are not so flush as their share declines. This is one of the implications of the phrase "concentration of income" which Republicans find so irrelevant.

Another is weak consumer demand and consequently low economic growth in an economy that no longer supplements insufficient incomes by means of cheap and easy consumer credit and a housing bubble in which ever rising property values fund capital gains through resales and cash cows through reverse mortgages, home equity loans and lines of credit, cash out refinance and similar golden geese.

The funny thing about all this is that the extra cost Republicans complain about vis a vis those too well-off not to qualify for subsidies, is less than or equal to the extra cost they would have to pay to make up the shortfall in the difference between medical costs and subsidies in the case of the medical savings plan alternatives to Obamacare proposed by "repeal and replace" Republicans. Welcome to paradise!