Health insurance costs break through earth orbit
California isn’t the only state where consumers may be subjected to outrageous health insurance hikes. But, according to many of my readers, no insurance reform is needed.
From Associated Press:
Consumers in at least four states who buy their own health insurance are getting hit with premium increases of 15 percent or more — and people in other states could see the same thing.
Anthem Blue Cross, a subsidiary of WellPoint Inc., has been under fire for a week from regulators and politicians for notifying some of its 800,000 individual policyholders in California that it plans to raise rates by up to 39 percent March 1.
The Anthem Blue Cross plan in Maine is asking for increases of about 23 percent this year for some individual policyholders. Last year, they raised rates up to 32 percent.
And in Oregon, multiple insurers were granted rate hikes of 15 percent or more this year after increases of around 25 percent last year for customers who purchase individual health insurance, rather than getting it through their employer.
Premiums are far more volatile for individual policies than for those bought by employers and other large groups, which have bargaining clout and a sizable pool of people among which to spread risk. As more people have lost jobs, many who are healthy have decided to go without health insurance or get a bare-bones, high-deductible policy, reducing the amount of premiums insurers receive.
Steep rate hikes in this sliver of the insurance market — about 13 million Americans, as of 2008 — have popped up sporadically for years. Experts see them becoming increasingly common.
“You’re going to see rate increases of 20, 25, 30 percent” for individual health policies in the near term, Sandy Praeger, chairwoman of the health insurance and managed care committee for the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, predicted Friday. (h/t, Karen Tumulty, Swampland)
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127 comments Add your comment
BADA BING
February 15th, 2010
4:27 pm
The insurance companies are muttonheads.
Kamchak
February 15th, 2010
4:48 pm
The 2009 financial reports from the nation’s five largest insurance companies reveal that:
* The firms made $12.2 billion, an increase of $4.4 billion, or 56 percent, from 2008.
o Four out of the five companies saw earnings increases, with CIGNA’s profits jumping 346 percent.
* The companies provided private insurance coverage to 2.7 million fewer people than the year before.
o Four out of the five companies insured fewer people through private coverage. UnitedHealth alone insured 1.7 million fewer people through employer-based or individual coverage.
o All but one of the five companies increased the number of people they covered through public insurance programs (Medicaid, CHIP and Medicare). UnitedHealth added 680,000 people in public plans.
* The proportion of premium dollars spent on health care expenses went down for three of the five firms, with higher proportions going to administrative expenses and profits.
During the biggest economic downturn in decades, these guys posted record profits.
Just sayin’.
Cynthia exposed
February 15th, 2010
4:52 pm
Cynthia is wrong on this one and I know this because my MOMMY was in the insurance industry for over 40 years and she told me so.
Actually I think Cynthia is right to bring up this subject and the denial that many have, I just wanted to point out how foolish it looks to defend a point of view because MOMMY likes you.
ctucker
February 15th, 2010
4:53 pm
Cynthia exposed, If you want to continue to comment on this blog, knock it off. You’ve heard from me on the subject of “adults” changing test scores. Do you have something you wish to say about health care?
Cynthia exposed
February 15th, 2010
5:08 pm
Cynthia, dear Cynthia, if you had only said “adults” in the first place, there wouldn’t have even been a need to bring it up!
As far as health care, it’s similar to education in that as both systems lose integrity, it’s the little guy who’s getting the squeeze.
For starters, why can’t someone go to the doctor or hospital and know EXACTLY what things are going to cost BEFORE they undergo the procedure? Why would those same folks who justify exorbitant medical prices as part of the free market not want consumers to know what the market is charging? I thought the free market was based on consumers having INFORMED choices.
And how is an insurance company allowed to “approve” something, yet at the same time allow themselves wiggle room to say that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be fully reimbursed? Can Home Depot approve your credit card transaction, then refuse to deliver the hammer you requested, but still bill you?
And finally how do you balance an insurers right to make a profit with the contradiction that the best way for an insurer to MAXIMIZE profit is to make it a point to DENY care?
Are those meaningful enough questions for the topic at hand?
ike5266
February 15th, 2010
5:12 pm
Hey, Kamchak, if I weren’t intelligent, I might think you actually had a point. But your cut-and-paste talking points don’t hold water. Of course the companies insured fewer private individuals last year. It only jibes with the increase of people using public plans as more people qualify for Medicare, and a lot of people lost their health insurance as well as their jobs as a result of Obama’s failed economic “stimulus” and acceleration of unemployment rates during the past year. About a year ago Obama said unemployment wouldn’t top 8 percent. It’s gone way beyond 8 percent — estimates place real unemployment at 17 percent or more in the Untied States — and people lost their insurance coverage as well as their jobs.
Also, health insurers did not post record profits during an economic downturn, as you so inanely claim. The numbers look outrageous due to the fact so many insurers LOST money in 2008. That they rebounded in 2009 only makes sense. And, no, there is no need for health insurance reform. The nation’s health care system is superior to Canada’s, England’s, etc. And even people without health insurance can get first-rate care right here in the United States. It happens every day. You won’t see any U.S. officials traveling to Canada or England to get a heart procedure done.
midtownguy
February 15th, 2010
5:13 pm
I have a good health care plan provided by my employer. For me personally no reform is needed. I would like to see better care available for the uninsured but I will be honest and admit that one of my biggest fears about Health Care Reform is that either my premiums would rise or my coverage would reduce. If it is happening now for individual policies it will soon be happening for those of us who have company provided benefits. The company is only going to absorb so much increased cost then they are going to pass it on to the employees. They would have no other choice.
Jethro
February 15th, 2010
5:16 pm
Here’s the question: Why are they raising premiums? Cynthia, if you want to talk substantially about health care reform, enough of the “what” and more of the “why.” Why? Because they say so? Too expensive? Show me the books. Can’t do that? Change the law.
I’m not going to support giving everybody health insurance, Cynthia, until I start seeing breakdowns of costs. Something’s very fishy to me here, and throwing money at the problem without closer investigation. You want my money? Tell me why. Educate me. Don’t tell costs are going up. Tell why they’re going up. Don’t want to do that? Then talk to the hand.
Jess
February 15th, 2010
5:21 pm
So has health care reform now become insurance reform like global warming has become global climate change.
Whatever fits the theme of her argument I guess.
FrankRizzo
February 15th, 2010
5:23 pm
I have been self-employed for several years and have watched my health insurance costs double to $800 / mo. in merely two years. I wonder what will happen next year? I hope I don’t get sick because then I will have to either pay up or do without.
My friends who are employed and coverd by group insurance don’t understand. They think that health reform legislation is going to take money from their pockets to cover deadbeats. Not to worry since even that watered down legislation fell to the wayside. No one seems to realize how brutal the individual insurance market really is.
I’m simply baffled at how wrong it is to have profit-motivated corporations act as gatekeepers to health care.
ctucker
February 15th, 2010
5:26 pm
Jess, See FrankRizzo’s comment.
ctucker
February 15th, 2010
5:27 pm
I’m not raising those insurance premiums, Jethro. A private company is. And Congress has invited them to testify to explain the proposed rate hikes.
ctucker
February 15th, 2010
5:28 pm
ike5266, it’s simply not true that our health care system is “superior to Canada’s, England’s, etc.” Not true by any measure.
midtownguy
February 15th, 2010
5:28 pm
Source: National Geographic “Health Care Spending per Person vs Average Life Expectancy”
US, $7,920 (78 years), Japan, $2,581 (82.7 years), France, $3,601 (80 years), Canada, $3,896 (80.8 years, Mexico, $823 (75 years).
Looks like all our extra spending isn’t helping much, or it isn’t helping the majority much.
ctucker
February 15th, 2010
5:29 pm
Cynthia exposed, please go back and read the column. I did say “adults” in the first place. Did you lose your reading glasses?
ctucker
February 15th, 2010
5:30 pm
Cynthia exposed, This is the sentence: “Georgia’s public schools are currently enmeshed in a cheating scandal, in which adults are suspected of changing answers on the Criterion-Referenced Competency Test to raise the scores that are used to measure a school’s academic performance. Many of those schools are in less affluent Atlanta neighborhoods.” And it’s still up on the earlier post. Before you are accusatory, shouldn’t you have your facts right?
ctucker
February 15th, 2010
5:31 pm
Midtownguy, Amen and amen! of course, conservatives don’t want to hear that argument. They claim you can’t use life expectancy to judge a health care system. If not that, then what?
Health insurance costs break through earth orbit | Cynthia Tucker | Health Blog
February 15th, 2010
5:38 pm
[...] here: Health insurance costs break through earth orbit | Cynthia Tucker consumers-are, insurance-hikes-, insurance-reform, looking-at-outrageous, only, readers, [...]
Cynthia exposed
February 15th, 2010
5:39 pm
Cynthia I should have parsed my words more carefully, and said if you had only said “adults” and then followed it up with the words teachers AND administrators, we wouldn’t have had this discussion.
Think about who’s causing the most problems with health care in this country. Is it the low level service provider, the doctor or the nurse, or is it the ADMINISTRATORS of the insurance?
If you think about the dynamics of both situations, there are not dissimilar. In both situations you have a monumental lack of transparency that generates a lot of the abuses, do you not?
joan
February 15th, 2010
5:42 pm
I would imagine life expectancy to go up as obesity and drive by shootings go up. About insurance going up, I believe a lot of prices have gone up across the board. Possibly they have gone up for no other reason than that fewer people are buying and companies still need to make their nut, or the same total dollars. Finally, although everyone who goes to emergency gets it, I don’t believe that health care is a “right”.
Peadawg
February 15th, 2010
5:43 pm
Ok Cynthia, I’ll give in a little. Whether or not it’s constitutional we’ll see, but I’m in favor of mandating everyone to have insurance. It will lower costs.
With that said, I’m still not in favor of the “public option” until they raise the age on Medicare to 67 and fix Medicaid.
joan
February 15th, 2010
5:44 pm
whoops. i meant life expectancy to go down as obesity and drive bys go up. Oh well.
midtownguy
February 15th, 2010
5:44 pm
I have a friend who works at the UAB Heart Center in Birmingham. And yes, leaders from all over the world are flown there for heart surgery. BUT, if you can’t pay up front or have private insurance that will cover, at a minimum, 95% of the cost you aren’t getting in the front door.
Isn’t that one reason for reform?
MrLiberty
February 15th, 2010
5:45 pm
Tomorrow the state legislature could eliminate all mandates on health insurance, allow any insurance company to sell insurance in this state, and eliminate business taxes for all businesses. The Congress could immediately elminate the advantage businesses have for providing health insurance to their employees and could properly use the interstate commerce clause for a change and elminate all barriers to interstate insurance sales.
These three things would open up so much conpetition between insurance companies, and allow them to offer low-cost lower coverage options that prices would plummet immediately.
This will never happen because both democrats and republicans love the contributions (payoffs) they receive from the insurance companies to keep the market restricted, force mandatory minimum coverages, and eliminate real consumers from the market.
So stop complaining about the industry Cynthia. Government, as always, is the real source of the problems. People have always been greedy. It is only through the power and control of government that they can truly hurt us.
haliburton hand-job
February 15th, 2010
5:45 pm
I’m pro-death panel-let’s get rid of the old farts, they are living way past their born on date, sorry curmudgeons sucking on the government tit, a bunch of wrinkly socialists-good riddance….
StevenCee
February 15th, 2010
5:46 pm
ike5266: If you’re really “so intelligent” you’d see you’re making little sense. You don’t think the companies are making record profits, cause “so many lost money last year,”, and so “rebounding in 2009 only makes sense”? Really, how does it make any sense, what greatly improved in 2009??? And do you have stats that back up their losses in 2008? It sure didn’t affect the mega-million salaries their execs received!
And of course top U.S. officials don’t travel out of country for medical procedures! They have (socialist) GOVERNMENT HEALTHCARE! But you may want to look at the thousands of Americans (many even WITH health insurance) who DO leave the country, going to Asia, or India, or Costa Rica, so they can afford very necessary surgeries!
And how do you explain a million people going bankrupt (again, many WITH health insurance) due to medical bills? None of the other nations with what you feel “inferior universal healthcare” ever have their citizens lose everything, simply because they get sick! Nor do they have tens of thousands of their citizens DIE every year, due to lack of access to care!
Finally, do you know how “not-intelligent” you sound, when you say, with a straight face, apparently,
“And even people without health insurance can get first-rate care right here in the United States. It happens every day.”
Really, where? What planet are you talking about? Cause here in the United States many people WITH health insurance don’t get first rate care! There are countless cases of insured people dying, due to insurance companies turning down, or delaying, needed medical procedures….
Kamchak
February 15th, 2010
5:46 pm
and a lot of people lost their health insurance as well as their jobs as a result of Obama’s failed economic “stimulus” and acceleration of unemployment rates during the past year. About a year ago Obama said unemployment wouldn’t top 8 percent. It’s gone way beyond 8 percent — estimates place real unemployment at 17 percent or more in the Untied States — and people lost their insurance coverage as well as their jobs.
Of course had you actually read the article I linked you wouldn’t have made that point.
Finally, insurers will – perversely – try and blame the economy for their record-breaking fortunes, saying employers have been shedding jobs and therefor dropping insurance coverage, leading to a decrease in customers. And they’re certainly right in the sense that less jobs equals less employer-based health coverage, but that obscures the fact that employers have been steadily dropping health coverage for more employees for 15 years – even during good times – because the insurance industry’s prices keep skyrocketing much faster than inflation.
StevenCee
February 15th, 2010
5:50 pm
By the way, I’ve had personal insurance plans for 30 years, and each of the last 15 years, I’ve seen my premiums shoot up 20% a year! I get no better, nor more efficient care, yet my premiums have TRIPLED! Actually, when my out–of-pocket costs taken into account, it’s almost quadrupled. And my income has in no way, kept up with those increases. Those companies are robbing us blind, and destroying thousands of Americans yearly, literally, and financially.
Reality
February 15th, 2010
5:50 pm
Before anyone posts something too ignorant as they have recently in a similar blog, let’s set the record straight here…. Our health care system is not free enterprise and it does not operate at all under any type of choice for the consumer.
Most health insurance plans are provided through one’s employer. That empolyer ’selects’ one or more providers to offer as their ‘benefit’ to their employees. Why do I put those words in quotes? Well, I have seen too many employers get in bed with certain insurance companys that are not necessarily the least expensive or the best choice for the people – why do they select them? Kick backs, baby!
So the employee is limited from the get-go what they can pick… that is if they want to use the benefit. Yes, they could strike out on their on to get independent health insurance, but that doesn’t include the group discount and is very very expensive. So, the employee is stuck with whatever horrible plan is offered by the employer.
Then, when the employee really does need the health insurance, there is a possiblity that they either deny the claim or drag it out FOREVER and slow payment to the doctor or hospital or whatever. I’m not necessarily talking about regular check ups or the sinus infection here or there. I’m talking about something you REALLY need health insurance for. You make those monthy payments of hundreds of dollar each month, and when you really need them, they try every trick in the book to not pay.
And, because they do not pay, the doctors, hospitals, etc., then come after YOU for payment. You say, “but I had valid health insurance and its not my fault they aren’t paying. I’m filling out their 15 pounds of forms to fight their decision, but they say it takes a while.” They don’t care about that. They performed the service and they expect payment (can’t blame them). So….
They begin collections. You freak out and get a lawyer. Your FICO score begins to take a dive. Now, the lawyer expects payments, too. Months pass.
15 months later, you had to file for bankrupcy. You get a letter in the mail from your old health insurance company. It says, “sorry. You were right. We were supposed to pay.”
Your life is screwed, but hey, there is NO PROBLEM with the system, right?
Joann
February 15th, 2010
5:50 pm
The same thing happened in Michigan last year. Blue Cross Blue Shield raised rates for individual policyholders 22%.
We desperately need health reform.
Peter
February 15th, 2010
5:59 pm
Health care spending per person versus life expectancy does not carry as much weight as you think. It is well-documented that health disparities among races and cultures has a lot to do with why we spend so much more in the United States. To say that health care costs in industrialized nations are lower or grow at a slower rate than the United States is laughable. In the past ten years, both England and Canada have experienced higher annual increases in health care spending than the United States (I am citing data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development). Now, I am not implying that we are doing something right, but I am simply highlighting the fact that no health care system is immune from growing costs.
johnny
February 15th, 2010
6:05 pm
Lets compare the percentage increase of profits of the health insurance companies with the percentage increase in the fedreal debt since Obama took office. The “stimulus” slush fund, his budget for FY2011, the healthcare fiasco, cap and trade – he’s done more damage to this country in one year than any company or industry could ever do.
Health insurance costs break through earth orbit | Cynthia Tucker - Health Blog
February 15th, 2010
6:05 pm
[...] the original: Health insurance costs break through earth orbit | Cynthia Tucker Posted in Uncategorized by admin at February 15th, 2010. Tags: consumers-are, insurance-hikes-, [...]
Stanford McClure
February 15th, 2010
6:07 pm
It seems interesting that those not yet Affected by health care costs see no problem. They will soon as we are on a collision course with disaster,in health care in the USA. Why do some people refused to understand that execs just want more money/power over those with less?
Rational Citizen
February 15th, 2010
6:16 pm
“…and a lot of people lost their health insurance as well as their jobs as a result of Obama’s failed economic “stimulus” and acceleration of unemployment rates during the past year. About a year ago Obama said unemployment wouldn’t top 8 percent. It’s gone way beyond 8 percent”
ike5266…your comments conveniently ignore reality. You claim that people lost insurance “as a result” of the economic stimulus?! Please provide statistics for your asinine claims. As for Obama claiming that unemployment would not top 8 percent, are you faulting him for not realizing the severity of the recession that he inherited from the Bush administration, or for not being able to accurately forecast the precise level of unemployment that the Republican-induced recession was going to create? Keep in mind that the Obama administration argued for a larger stimulus than what was eventually passed. Leading economists from both sides of the aisle agree that had there been no stimulus the unemployment rate would be significantly higher than it is now, and the economy would be in much worse shape.
Keep in mind that a third of the stimulus was comprised of tax cuts. Are you bitching about that, too? Did the tax cuts in the stimulus cause people to lose their health insurance? I’m sure you were watching Fox News when the President made the House Republicans look like complete fools for articulating the same tired talking points you presented today at their annual retreat, so I’d suggest you go back and listen to the unedited, uncensored version. And next time, try to be original. Your talking points are getting stale.
RGB
February 15th, 2010
6:21 pm
We don’t want Democrat Party-styled health insurance reform.
It has already been tried in other states, including Massachusetts where premiums climbed dramatically. And yes, it was a Republican that pushed that measure. So, other than increasing government’s hold on the average citizen, why would you insist that we make the same mistake again?
Government has already distorted the health insurance markets so they don’t work freely. This explains why we are in the mess we are now in.
Why is liberals’ natural tendency to have the government take over every industry and function?
What is it about a centrally-controlled economy that is so appealing to you?
Tai Chi – Health Insurance You Can Afford | Weakness With a Twist
February 15th, 2010
6:25 pm
[...] Commissioner on the radio for about 3 minutes this morning. He said California doesn’t sell health insurance anymore. The only products available are pre-paid-medical-treatment packages. There are 55 state [...]
Kamchak
February 15th, 2010
6:29 pm
•The percentage of all employers offering health insurance in the past eight years peaked in 2000 at 69% and has fallen steadily since, hitting 60% this year, according to an annual survey of employers by the non-partisan Kaiser Family Foundation. Among small firms of three to nine workers, the percentage offering insurance has dropped even more — from 58% in 2001 to 45% this year.
•From 2001 to 2005, the number of uninsured U.S. workers rose by 3.4 million. Almost 19 million workers — 17% of all employees — were uninsured in 2005, according to the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured.
Change is coming, whether you like it or not.
Tommy
February 15th, 2010
6:30 pm
As good as the goverment does at running all of the other agencies i would love for them to be in charge of my health care. They do a wonderful job with schools, roads, social secuity, boader control, spending control, pot hole fixing, may I continue.
It is the liberails and people who expect hand outs that see this as a good thing. The working people will always carry the burden of the nation. They are the ones that will foot the bill for a health care plan for the nation.
We need other things such as jobs, less exports, fair tax plans, secure boaders, the end to these costly two wars, a defense against Iran before this expensive health care bill.
RGB
February 15th, 2010
6:31 pm
Any time the government sucks trillions of dollars out of the economy, people don’t:
1. Open new business.
2. Expand existing businesses.
3. Stay in business (often).
Obama’s plan siphoned money away from private business to the government. People lost (and will continue to lose) jobs. When they lost their jobs, they also lost their health insurance.
So yes, Obama’s plans are largely responsible for many people losing their health insurance. And yes, I do hold Obama responsible for keeping his word.
Obama’s plan is to continue to tank the economy and have government continue to control industries, salaries, and all the factors of production that generally constitute a free economy. He intends on building government power through this method. Expressed differently: He’s doing this on purpose.
And as long as people are naive enough to continue to blame things on Bush, Obama will continue to get away with it. But folks in New Jersey, Virginia, Massachusetts, and other locales get the picture.
If you don’t–and you’re not one of the government elite who benefits from the takeover of the economy–then you’re in for a rough rest-of-your life.
Reality
February 15th, 2010
6:35 pm
RGB – OMG! It’s had to respond when you put so many totally wrong things in one little blog. Job losses started WAY before Obama took office. The economy was tanking WAY beforre Obama took office.
Obama’s plan(s) has made every attempt to halt this tanking.
I don’t know what pills YOUR medical plan has given you, but you really need to stop taking them.
All I'm Saying Is...
February 15th, 2010
6:39 pm
This blog sometimes reminds me of Nero playing the fiddle while Rome burned with far too many people arguing semantics (health care reform vs. insurance reform) or changing the subject (jobs created by the federal stimulus) instead of focusing on the fact that INSURANCE COMPANIES KEEP RAISING PREMIUMS YEAR AFTER YEAR BY DOUBLE DIGIT PERCENTAGES FOR HEALTHY, EMPLOYED PEOPLE GETTING COVERAGE VIA THEIR EMPLOYERS and FOR HEALTHY, EMPLOYED INDIVIDUALS GETTING COVERAGE FOR THEIR COMPANIES.
Without real reform, companies will drop medical coverage from their benefits packages (except for those in the executive suite) because it will be too expensive. Think they won’t? Come on, get real. They dropped pension plans, many have stopped matching 401k contributions and a few no longer offer 401k plans.
Only when the employed can no longer get coverage through their jobs and experience first-hand the expense of the COBRA type plans out there or the non-coverage of the high deductible ‘affordable’ plans will there be an outcry in this country about what is the deal with the US system.
We must have tort reform and health care reform or none of us will be able to afford to get sick.
RGB
February 15th, 2010
6:49 pm
“Obama’s plan(s) has made every attempt to halt this tanking. ”
So he’s made *every” attempt to “halt this taking”, but you are unable to provide a single example.
Maybe you can hit Bush again and we’ll all be distracted.
Expectantly Yours,
RGB
Reality
February 15th, 2010
6:55 pm
RGB….. I guess I mistakenly thought you were somewhat informed. The whole purpose of the stimulus package was to STIMULATE THE ECONOMY!
Wow. That’s all I can say. Wow.
Donn
February 15th, 2010
6:56 pm
Well said RGB.
It is common for the liberal media (you know them, don’t you Cynthia?) to erroneously state that conservatives are opposed to health care. They quite simply…… are not. However, what they are opposed to, and Cynthia knows this, is a GOVERNMENT takeover of not only health care, but 1/6 of our economy. The same economy that Obama is devastating in the name “stimulus bill” or “jobs bill”, the latter of which was killed by the snowstorm in DC, as it allowed the bill to actually be read before being passed in a back room somewhere. Ask Cynthia to tell you about the outright sleaze that was in that one! Despite the outright lies to the contrary, from the President on down to the media, conservatives have been actively throwing out common sense ideas for health care reform all along.
Kamchak
February 15th, 2010
6:58 pm
The whole purpose of the stimulus package was to STIMULATE THE ECONOMY!
Yep. Most economists say that too little money was used.
Some people, however aren’t Keynesian.
Donn
February 15th, 2010
7:00 pm
I guess I mistakenly thought you were somewhat informed. The whole purpose of the stimulus package was to STIMULATE THE ECONOMY! (From Reality)
Uhhhhhhh reality, how did that one actually work out? And RGB isn’t informed???
I got your “wow”! Are you serious? I guess in your mind, the stimulus worked, right? How incompetent.
RGB
February 15th, 2010
7:22 pm
You provided the answer I expected, so I was not disappointed.
When I typically engage liberals on the subject of the economy, all I have to do is ask a very simple question and await an answer that even a novice business person might appreciate.
Seldom do I receive an answer that reflects even a modicum of understanding.
If liberals would simply offer examples of vibrant economies that are centrally planned and government controlled, I would give them a fair assessment.
But neither France, Haiti, Cuba, the continent of Africa, nor Norway are examples that I’d like to emulate.
jconservative
February 15th, 2010
7:22 pm
Health care insurance has been going through the roof for 30 years and will continue to do so. My daughter pays $406. month for her share of employer provided insurance. It has been going up annually for years. If it goes up a modest 8% a year for the next few years she will pay $500. a month in 2013 for the same policy.
Will health care reform stop this? I have no idea. But health care cost controls would stop this. Make health care like Georgia Power, a
public utility. The majority of other countries do this and it works.
Or it works for them. Maybe we are inferior in some way & it will not work here. But we can try.
Me? I am on the Johnson, Nixon, Reagan & Bush 43 Medicare plan, you know, Socialized Medicine. I pay $96.40 a month for one of the best health care plans in the USA. As I said, Socialized Medicine.
North Georgia Dawg
February 15th, 2010
7:22 pm
I don’t want to pay for ANYONE else’s health care. The country is broke already. Ask the Chinese if they will continue to invest in Obama’s trainwreck…