GOP's alternative health plans are a flop

For years, and particularly the past year, the GOP has been touting association health plans as the primarily alternative to the Affordable Care Act. (Nevermind that such plans have a long and somewhat sordid history before being regulated under the ACA.) Trump's regulators have unshackled them and he's been promoting them heavily, including on the campaign trail.

But one of the biggest proponents of this approach for decades, the National Federation of Independent Business, has now dismissed the concept as unworkable and other would-be association plan sponsors seems to be losing interest and enthusiasm, too.

Trump promised them better, cheaper health care. It’s not happening.

The GOP's approach to health care for the past few decades (not counting the exchanges in the ACA) has largely revolved around three things. We tried high-risk pools (1) and they weren't very effective. A handful of states tried interstate insurance sales (2) and it hasn't worked. And now association health plans (3) are proving to be a non-solution.

Back to the drawing board?

 

Well even I have to admit that was a complete flop.

And I am conservative as they get.

They got one wrong.

They promised this big change but then had to scramble to come up with something that was basically crap as opposed to **** at the last second.

Big failure.

 

True, but they've been pushing AHPs as the answer for decades. No argument that their bills last year were haphazardly slapped together at the last minute when they realized their bluff on having a real alternative to the ACA was being called. But this particular idea has been in their arsenal for a long time. It just took efforts to push AHPs to make their industry backers realize there's not much there there.

 

“We’re going to have insurance for everybody" -trump

he'll probably claim it was fake news then change topics and deflect to threatening Iran

 

By applying a risk tax based on the actual health cost of purchasing decision, on products such as cigarettes, sugar, salt, processed foods, beer and booze and other recreational drugs, junk food, and fast food, as well as taxing hardware for risky activities like skiing, scuba diving, mountain climbing, boating... half of all health care costs could be paid for as an elective tax at the point of purchase - elective meaning, don't eat sugar and you don't have to pay for the associated health costs.

It is estimated that sugar costs about $1 Trillion in health care costs in the US annually. That comes out to $20 a pound. So sugar should be taxed at $20 a pound and that money put into a general fund for health care. It is effectively pay-as-you-go insurance based on your purchasing decisions.

The taxes on cigarettes would need to be about $10 a pack, IIRC. Cigs are already heavily taxed in some States. That money should all go to a general health care fund.

Show me any other option that could reduce the basic cost of health insurance and health care by 50%.

Gym memberships and private purchases of new exercise equipment should be tax deductible.

I can't provide a link for this because I went through and did all the calculations myself.

 

I think we should just scrap ACA and go back to the way it was.

 

The system was already in crisis and getting worse fast. That won't solve anything. And 30 million people couldn't afford health insurance. That would probably be more like 50 million now.

 

Let the entire nation buy into the congressional health plan.

 

That sort of already happened.

 

You can't beat the cost of health care by shuffling the cards. At some point someone has to pay for it!

A risk tax is the only reasonable solution. 30% of Americans are obese and far more live on junk food and fast food. That is a huge driver that someone has to pay for. Why not tax those creating the cost and apply it to the health care system? At that point a single-payer system would be far more affordable.

Call it the McDonald's tax.

And how many men are obese because of beer? They should pay for that with a point of purchase tax. And I swear, I want to scream when I see all the fat little children sucking down their 64 oz Big Gulps.

It is scary to visit the pool when there are lots of kids down there. The majority are fat. The way to reduce the cost of health care is for Americans to get healthy and stop living on processed foods, junk food, and sugar.

You can buy a burger, fries, and a shake, and have more calories than one should have all day. Tax it according to its estimated cost. THAT is how you beat this problem. And it is entirely fair if based on the actual costs of those choices. It puts responsibility back on those making poor choices.

 

Obama care sucks if you are middle class. We have to do something what we had before Obama care was better than Obama care for most people.

 

The Super Big Gulp is 44 oz (64 oz if you don't add ice but virtually everyone does) of pure, sweet, sugary crap. Just one of those drinks and you will have consumed approximately 523 calories and the equivalent of 35 teaspoons of sugar.
http://www.healthyandsimple.com/2010/03/44oz-super-big-gulp-is-anyone-really-ever-that-thirsty/

That equates to $6.50 cents in health care costs per Big Gulp. Tax it!!!

 

There were hospitals and such people could go to if they didn't have insurance.

 

Who pays for it?

Back in the 80s, hospitals started turning away people at the ER door if they didn't have health insurance of couldn't pay up front. We as a nation decided that was unacceptable. Who pays for that?

And beyond emergencies, if you can't pay, no health care, no drugs, and if life threatening, say if you need expensive medicine or an expensive surgery, you die.

 

First off, the GOP has no plan, never did, never will. They can't even repeal ACA, much less replace it. The ACA was nothing more than a good start with lots of flaws. Competent legislators concentrate on fixing the flaws, not tossing the plan. Oh well, so much for that one.

Universal health coverage (Medicare for all) would save us a bundle. The numbers have been proven more than a dozen times. The big problem is - who pays for it? Government? Corporations? Insurance Companies? Individuals? Snow White? Figure that out and we'll have meaningful progress. Or, just fix ACA.

 

You do.

 

Correct, we all do - those of us who can afford insurance or health care.

You beat this by making the nation healthy. We are all paying for the choices made by others every single day. The only way to beat that is to make people pay for the real cost of their choices.

What would happen to Big Gulp sales if it were taxed at a rate of $6.50 per 64 oz drink, as it should be? That is based solely on the real health care costs associated with that drink and it's 35 teaspoons of sugar.

PS. The $1 Trillion a year in costs due to sugar was from a big study done to estimate that cost. That wasn't my calculation. I just applied that to the amount of sugar we consume.

 

Note how righties never want to respond to the facts. Too busy sucking down your sixers and getting fat?

 

either way if someone's getting something for nothing we do. When you have to go to the county hospital that means you're only getting the Necessities which is what you should be getting if you can't afford more.

so the solution was make everyone pay more until the system is so broke it crashes.

Well if you buy health insurance when you're young and when there's nothing wrong with you it's cheaper. That was the idea. Then as you got older and needed more Medical Care in medicines all that money you paid in all along when there was nothing wrong with you adds up and so now you can reap the benefits.

When you make it against the law to deny someone coverage or to charge people at different risk level different prices you build a system where nobody buys health insurance until they need it so there's no equity built into it so you go buy insurance for the same price that everyone else pays even though there's crazy crap wrong with you and you get essentially free healthcare. Or you pay the same price everyone else pays for it.

Essentially you gut health insurance to the point where health insurance is just is expensive is it would be to pay the bill yourself. So we're back to square one except for now we have shity health insurance that no one can afford

 

You do anyway there's not a magical money fairy that pulls money out of its ass.

 

There isn't going to be any health care plan that gives anybody what they want. Guys like me that have no problem walking over corpses decomposing on the sidewalk aren't going to get what we want because too many rinos in the base. Democrats won't get anything that they want because we simply can't afford it.

At the end of the day, I'll eventually win. It's just that I really don't want to have to wait until the USD is as valuable as a piece of generic toilet paper.

 

You're blaming Trump of dismantling the Affordable Care Act, but forgot that Obama was doing the same thing. Obama signed the bill that eventually allowed the Affordable Care Act to be dismantled.

 

Destroying the ACA is the stated goal of Trump and the GOP and they've been working at it for seven years now.

 

Maybe the federal government should get out of the insurance business. Let the states tailor plans to fit their needs.

 

There would be several issues with that. Just for starters:

Lack of national standards would create havens for plans that don't cover expensive conditions. This would bypass the "shared risk" pool necessary to cover everyone and effectively create high-risk pools(which don't work).

States would not have the leverage needed to negotiate with national suppliers(i.e. drug companies with patented meds).