Tuesday, April 08, 2014

Obamacare In The News

Who could have foreseen this?
Americans have recently been hit with some of the largest premium increases in years, according to a Morgan Stanley survey of insurance brokers.

The investment bank’s April survey of 148 brokers found that this quarter, the average premium increase for customers renewing an insurance plan is 12 percent in the small group market and 11 percent in the individual market, according to Forbes’ Scott Gottlieb.

The hikes — the largest in the past three years, according to Morgan Stanley’s quarterly reports — are “largely due to changes under the [Affordable Care Act],” analysts concluded. Rates have been growing increasingly fast throughout all of 2013, after a period of drops in 2012.
I'm shocked.  Shocked, I tell you.


The administration is exaggerating the hosannas of Obamacare?  Again, I'm shocked!
A major new Gallup survey suggests the ObamaCare sign-up numbers are not as soaring as the White House claims. 
Even Gallup's numbers are suspicious, though:
Gallup has a fairly honest headline: “In U.S., Uninsured Rate Lowest Since 2008″. But, hm, what happened in 2008...

Since Obama was inaugurated in 20082009, the net change is from 15.4 percent uninsured to 15.6 percent. So the net effect has been that by the Gallup Survey the number of uninsured has improved in the last year, but gotten worse since Obama was inaugurated, and is 1.2 percent worse than under Bush.  
If it's so great, why did they have to lie to the public to get what support they got, pass it without a single Republican vote, and continue to lie and dissemble now that it's law?

Answer:  because socialism doesn't work--except for the people in charge.

1 comment:

maxutils said...

I really wish you could bend...just a bit. Obama care sucks, socialism is inefficient, health care cost have definitely increased greatly, not just in the past year ... but in the past 15. So, we're right there on most of your points. But government does have a role it could play that would help. And it would not make it socialist. It would encourage capitalism, and eliminate middlemen. No one wants to hear it, though. What I cannot abide, though is the this typical (and you didn't cite it) is the I'm a man! Why should I pay for ovarian cancer coverage argument. There are many other similar ones. The minute you make that argument, you show yourself to be completely ignorant of why insurance works. My favorite example is "My house never burns down. Why should i pay for people who's do?" Women aren't going to get testicular cancer, but they'll pay for that coverage, too. Because it will make it work Obama care ... emphasizes the flaws and ignores the truisms. That's why it has already failed. And more people are insured because they were given subsidies, or encouraged to qualify for medicare. It is no triumph.