Just saw this ACA newspiece

[Conundrum]

A article I just read on USA Today.

https://usat.ly/2M7irjG

I hope the thread does not get locked on political grounds.

As a individual with a preexisting condition approaching FIRE these types of stories cause me great concern. While I have appx $1900/mo in my retirement budget for healthcare it’s irrelevant if you can’t get healthcare. (Age 51)

I am, of course, getting ahead of myself. However, what happens if you can’t get healthcare? Does it become a Medicaid situation? Or is it simply “go back to work” to get the insurance.

 

[pb4uski]

I guess that to me the principal of the DOJ declining to defend laws that it "doesn't like" is more disturbing and an erosion of the rule of law. Having practiced in Asia during part of my career I came to have a great appreciation for the rule of law in the US.

 

[easysurfer]

Nothing surprises me anymore .

That's all I can say without saying what I really feel .

I've learned the with ACA and health care, best approach is to wait and see to avoid whiplash as no one really knows how things will end up in the back and forth. My approach is go with the law of the land, until things change.

 

[MRG]

Look back pre-ACA for examples.

 

[athena53]

I've learned the with ACA and health care, best approach is to wait and see to avoid whiplash as no one really knows how things will end up in the back and forth. My approach is go with the law of the land, until things change.

I agree with that! I remember when Trump signed an Executive Order that was something like, "Do a study of the ACA and come up with a solution that's cheaper and better". From the FB posts I saw, you would have thought that all the ACA policies had been cancelled by the stroke of a pen. They later recommended some changes (one of which truly scared me as it would have alleviated some of the higher rates younger people were paying to subsidize the costs of older insureds, in the hopes of getting more younger people to sign up). The hysterical posts I saw on FB were again full of falsehoods. I followed the postings of a consultant who was the Healthcare Insurance Guru at his firm and whose sole job was to advise clients buying health insurance for their employees. He was always good at separating the "maybe" from the "definitely".

Take a deep breath and wait to see what happens.

 

[Z3Dreamer]

Not defending the AG's actions or disagreeing. The logic given was that the mandate had previously been used by SCOTUS to consider the law a tax and therefore constitutional. Since the new tax law invalidated the mandate, AG feels the law is no longer constitutional. That's the logic.

Personally, I will not be a happy camper if I lose my health insurance before Medicare in 4 years. Cost is a huge factor but even greater is that DW is a cancer survivor and no one would insure her. I am almost uninsurable as I used to be obese, used to be pre-diabetic and I used to have sleep apnea. And, and I am old so I am subject to using more insurance.

 

[kimcdougc]

DH and myself have the wait and see attitude. The ACA was one of the reasons we retired early. Although the cost is very high. Almost $20k per year for both of us. We did plan for this in retirement. Much better off than others. With the new VA benefits coming out, DH might be able to switch over to VA health care. We will give that a few months for that program to get going before checking into it more.

 

[Dtail]

Counting on the ACA to go on. Also have pre existing conditions. We shall see. Will not lose sleep over it for now. 6 years to go for me. DGF already on Medicare.

 

[jetpack]

The real problem is the high cost of health care, not the high cost of health insurance. Getting free or lower cost insurance doesn't deal with the fact the price of health care is too high.

 

[MRG]

The real problem is the high cost of health care, not the high cost of health insurance. Getting free or lower cost insurance doesn't deal with the fact the price of health care is too high.

+1000000

Besides the premium increases I've noticed that meds I used to get with a prescription now require prior authorization or step therapy. I love it when the insurance company knows more than my doctor.

The step therapy damn near killed me. Next time I'll be the judge of if I'll take that medication.

 

[marko]

IMO, the demise of ACA is akin to the age-old discussions about SS or Medicare going belly-up.

It's one of those things that can drive you crazy if you let it but in the end nothing of substance ever seems to change.

Wish I had a dime for every calamity-in-the-wings that the media shovels out.

A few tweeks maybe, but once these things get entrenched it's really, really hard to undo them.

 

[scrabbler1]

I remember what I paid for HI in 2009 when I first ERed, and how the premiums rose nearly 50% in 2 years. Even with recent increases, without the small ACA subsidy I'd still be paying a little less than what I was paying in 2011 before I ditched the policy for a bare-bones policy you can't buy today because it is not ACA-compliant.


And all of that was before I was diagnosed with Diabetes 3 years ago. Without insurance, my biggest cost would be one costly prescription drug I take daily, costlier than all the doctors and labs I visit each year. And I'm still 10 years away from Medicare.

 

[ceciledian]

IMO, the demise of ACA is akin to the age-old discussions about SS or Medicare going belly-up.

It's one of those things that can drive you crazy if you let it but in the end nothing of substance ever seems to change.

Wish I had a dime for every calamity-in-the-wings that the media shovels out.

A few tweeks maybe, but once these things get entrenched it's really, really hard to undo them.

This IS the real calamity if the DOJ were not to defend. Maybe it doesn’t affect you but for those it does it’s a big deal.

 

[DatumPoint5]

The other side of the story on Vox

Vox just published an article that speaks to this issue. Bottom-line, some people in states such as Texas have filed to have the whole ACA ruled as "unconstitutional" because of the recent tax law changes and the fact that within those changes they "repealed" the part where every individual MUST have minimum coverage, or, they would pay a "tax".

So now, Texas has filed a lawsuit that says if the health insurance requirement piece of the law is gone (because of the recent tax law changes), then all of the ACA must be held invalid and unconstitutional.

Currently, most legal scholars think this is a weak argument. We shall see.

the Vox article can be read at this link......
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/6/8/17441512/obamacare-lawsuit-texas-trump

 

[kite_rider]

The real problem is the high cost of health care, not the high cost of health insurance. Getting free or lower cost insurance doesn't deal with the fact the price of health care is too high.

Worried that this will sound politically biased, but this was a key point that my congressman Greg Walden (who was the chairman of the House Energy Subcommittee on Health at the time) kept bringing it up in one of the few 'town hall' style meetings he held with local constituents after the 2016 election. I fully agreed with that assessment.

But after a year and a half of political control in Washington, I'm still waiting to see legislation that addresses this. Instead, seems most of of the political action has been around dismantling previous legislation. So who is going to attack the high cost of healthcare?

 

[pb4uski]

....Currently, most legal scholars think this is a weak argument. We shall see. ....

It seems weaker than weak to me.

 

[daylatedollarshort]

I'm taking a hope for the best, plan for the worst scenario. We have a small business that could qualify for group rates and no pre-existing conditions, so I guess we'll ramp that back up just in case. The front runner for California governor is a single payer advocate, though that could take years to implement state-wide. Hopefully California will at least have a no pre-existing condition exclusion before then even if the ACA goes away. Plan B is to find a hobby / non-profit kind of job with insurance. Plan C is move to a state without pre-existing condition clauses or Europe until Medicare age so we'll continue to get the house decluttered and in shape to rent out if need be. We have some family reasons why Europe might be a good choice anyway and that was one of our original options, pre-ACA.

Pre-ACA we had a COBRA conversion policy but that is gone now due to being on an ACA plan. With the COBRA conversion we had guaranteed coverage. It was expensive, but with no but no pre-existing condition issues. But we don't have continuous coverage on the conversion policy any more due to the ACA, so there is no going back to that option.

 

[ShokWaveRider]

I think because cost sharing was defunded in 2017 that the rates are going to skyrocket in 2019 OR the cost sharing will be passed on to the punters. Either way we will all bear the brunt of the cost. In 2018 the insurance companies absorbed that cost.

I want to know that if people do not have healthcare because they can opt out, not that the mandate was ever cost prohibitive though, and they get sick, and they still get healthcare from somewhere, who pays for it? I m not sure that is clear.

Whoever bears the brunt of the uninsured healthcare costs will surely kick up a fuss.

The biggest losers are us; the doughnut hole folk stuck between ER and Medicare.

Will taking away the ACA mandatory coverage minimums REALLY make a difference to the Insurance companies? They will STILL need to get customers from somewhere.

 

[Chuckanut]

Just my opinion, take it or leave it.

Any political party, policitican, medical society etc. that returned us to the days of old when pre-existing conditions were an on-going part of our medical insurance system, would be making a fatal mistake. Fatal to their cause as well as the sick.

OTOH, there are those who would game the system by only purchasing insurance when they knew they had a big bill coming up. This is unfair to the rest of us and is not the way insurance is supposed to work.

I would be in favor of requiring that all adults over 18 be required to participate in some basic form of insurance if they don't want to worry about pre-existing conditions. (Children under 18 have no control over the insurance decsion so they would be exempt.) No waiting period for newly enrolled people if they could not enroll before, but they would have to do it within 3 months.

If they don't have insurance, a reasonable wait time of a year after they buy the insurance. Perhaps combine the wait time with some allowance for earlier medical care requiring very large personal payments, sale of most if not all assets (including homes, boat, RV's. IRA's, 401K's, etc.) and then a BIG loan that could only be forgiven by doing something HUGE for the American people - Like volunteering to parachute into People's Republic of Lower Slobovia to spy on their nucleur program.

In other words, plenty of compassion for a situation that any of us could find ourselves in despite our best efforts, and big disincentives for those who would try to game the system.

As, I said, just the opinion of somebody not part of the insurance business. I may be wandering about in the Wonderland of Fools.

 

[Chuckanut]

I guess that to me the principal of the DOJ declining to defend laws that it "doesn't like" is more disturbing and an erosion of the rule of law. Having practiced in Asia during part of my career I came to have a great appreciation for the rule of law in the US.

This seems to be a practice that is encouraged by people on the extreme ends of the political spectrum - assuming that the practice benefits what they believe. My 2¢.

 

[Aerides]

The mod team has reviewed several requests related to this thread: While we recognize that Health Care/Insurance will always be of great interest to this community, this particular discussion starts from a very specific approach from the current administration, and is inherently political.

We appreciate that most of the thread participants have attempted to keep things non-partisan, but believe it best to close this thread. If members wish to continue the discussion more generically, we suggest a new thread to speculate how to approach healthcare coverage, if the ACA were to disappear.