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Monday, September 12th, 2016

Obamacare Is Faltering for One Simple Reason: Profit

Author:     Jon Schwarz
Source:     The Intercept
Publication Date:     Aug. 27 2016, 8:05 a.m.
 Link: Obamacare Is Faltering for One Simple Reason: Profit
Stephan:   In the United States uniquely in the developed world we have an Illness Profit System in which profit and not wellbeing is the first priority. I said at the time that Obamacare came in that it was inherently flawed because it was still structured in the service of profit. What should have been done was just to expand Medicare, and blend it with the VA, so that we had true public universal healthcare. Because of the Republican Party's opposition such a system was not politically possible. And so we have yet another case study showing why social policies that have purposes other than wellbeing are more expensive, less effective, less productive, less pleasant to live under than the wellness options. We pay 17.6% per cent of our GDP and get for it a 37th ranking compared to the rest of the world. For the reasons explained in this report, the profit first model is a failure. Obamacare is on a trajectory  to breakdown. Here are the issues.

dollarshcThere have been dozens if not hundreds of news articles about Aetna leaving the Affordable Health Care Act’s online marketplaces in 11 states, and whether this signals serious problems for Obamacare down the road.

But none of them have truly explained that what’s happening with Aetna is the consequence of a flaw built into Obamacare from the start: It permits insurance companies to make a profit on the basic health care package Americans are now legally required to purchase.

This makes Obamacare fundamentally different from essentially all systems of universal health care on earth. (There is one tiny exception, the Netherlands, but of the four insurance companies that cover 90 percent of Dutch citizens, just one is for profit.)

Why does this matter? The answer is complicated but extremely important if Obamacare is going to avoid collapsing.

Insurance companies like Aetna complain that fewer young people than anticipated are buying insurance on the exchanges. The Obama administration was aiming at over 38 percent of the exchange pool being between 18 and 35 years old, but right now that number is just 28 percent. That means insurers have to pay more in health costs […]

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1 Comment

  1. Mark Ruocco on Monday, September 12, 2016 at 8:56 pm

    ACA is a disaster, no surprise there. Right as I was about to obtain coverage through a Colorado exchange, it went bankrupt. The high deductible on my new bronze plan makes it absolutely useless to me because I cannot possibly pay it before insurance starts to actually cover major expenses. So I pay for “coverage” I cannot use or I go without so called coverage and pay a tax penalty…it’s time to permanently rid this planet of the fascist people who are wrecking the lives of Americans and others around the globe.