Submitted by lambert on Thu, 05/02/2013 - 7:25pm
Ha. Obama's big public relations push screws the states that took ObamaCare most seriously, and have done the most work:
[T]he decision [for the shorter forms] could pose problems for states that are already far along in developing their exchange IT systems, according to the executive director of one state-run exchange.
Kevin Counihan, CEO of the Connecticut Health Insurance Exchange, said the change announced Tuesday came after his exchange has already completed coding required for system integration based on the original, 21-page application. The state exchange's IT system may not recognize data from the new form.
Wowsers. Who could have predicted that a late-stage change on all the inputs to the fucking system would cause ripple effects on dependent subsystems? But read on for CMS's response: Read below the fold...
Submitted by lambert on Thu, 05/02/2013 - 7:20pm
Jeebus, can't Obama even take care of business in his home state?
Only six insurance carriers have told Illinois that they want to sell health coverage through the state's new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).
The carriers hope to sell 165 policies -- or "qualified health plans" (QHPs) -- through the exchange, but the numbers are far lower than expected.
If many exchanges attract fewer health plans than organizers expect, that could mean less competition and higher premium prices for exchange users.
Illinois officials had been estimating that 16 different carriers would offer 260 health plans through their state's exchange. The officials based that estimate on a survey the Illinois Department of Insurance conducted last fall.
Why would anybody ever assume health insurance companies want to compete? Read below the fold...
Submitted by lambert on Thu, 05/02/2013 - 6:22pm
Submitted by lambert on Thu, 05/02/2013 - 6:03pm
That's fucking pathetic. Bloomberg, in a story about how insurance companies are just inexplicably* refusing to compete with each other on the exchanges:
There are a number of reasons for caution, company executives say. These include a lack of clarity about the kind of prices they can charge and the number of plans they can sell on each exchange, the expectation that the program is only expected to reach about 7 million people nationwide in its first year and uncertainty over whether all of the exchanges will be ready in time.
This is the first time I've seen that stat, and I do try to pay attention. Read below the fold...
Submitted by letsgetitdone on Thu, 05/02/2013 - 5:26pm
Submitted by jawbone on Thu, 05/02/2013 - 4:12pm
Submitted by lambert on Thu, 05/02/2013 - 12:37pm
(Or, more precisely, given that ObamaCare now includes a massive PR component, perceived successful backend implementation). First, let's look at what Scott Gottleib of Forbes thinks is wrong with the form. Good description, wrong analysis:
The length of the old application was largely driven by the need to ensure that consumers were actually eligible for the government subsidies that Obamacare offers as a way to offset the cost of buying health insurance.
Stop right there. It's the eligibility determination that's the fundamental architectural flaw. It cannot be fixed. Americans have to be thrown into different buckets in a complex and confusing system of eligibility determination, and inevitable get thrown in the wrong buckets, or there aren't even the right buckets for them. Adding to the mix is that buckets differ by state, both legally and in terms of insurance markets, and so what should be a simple, national system of Medicare for All instead creates second-class citizens all over the place, both within and between states. Obama chose to go that route. Under a single payer system, where health care is a right, the eligibility paperwork is very simple. There is one form, and it's already been filled out: Your birth certificate. That's the real policy discussion that's being hidden under the discussion about the length of the form.
Back to the complexity: Read below the fold...
Submitted by lambert on Thu, 05/02/2013 - 12:11pm
Submitted by libbyliberal on Wed, 05/01/2013 - 7:17pm
“Braying for war against Syria” by Bill Van Auken:
Van Auken accuses the Washington political establishment of seriously escalating a campaign of propaganda about the alleged use of chemical weapons. This has been prompted, contends Van Auken, from Syrian government forces having military successes in recent weeks. Read below the fold...
Submitted by lambert on Wed, 05/01/2013 - 12:54pm
Noisy assholes in the other unit partying. Grr! On the bright side, I would greatly prefer to have Seborrheic keratosis rather than melanoma, and that is how matters worked out. Read below the fold...
Submitted by libbyliberal on Tue, 04/30/2013 - 8:58pm
EXCERPTS:
"6 U.S. Cities That Criminalize Homelessness" by Kevin Mathews:
... Rather than finding ways to provide assistance to some of the country’s least fortunate citizens, lawmakers have developed strict regulations to criminalize homeless people’s activities, as if they were sleeping on the sidewalk and panhandling out of malice rather than necessity.
Read below the fold...
Submitted by lambert on Tue, 04/30/2013 - 3:12pm
Wowsers. How about I write those kind words down on a piece of paper, take it to the clinic, and try to pay for some health care with it? Jonathon Cohn, TNR:
The whole enterprise is going to be a work in progress. And that'll be ok—because it will still do a lot of good and make life better for most people, particularly with the passage of time.
Comforting words from the political class; there speaks a made man who doesn't personally have to worry about health care, but who's very keen to lecture others on why they should wait for it! Read below the fold...
Submitted by lambert on Tue, 04/30/2013 - 2:51pm
UPDATE The coverage says 3. Klein seems to think 5. The form I'm seeing is 5. Not sure where the difference comes from, whether coverage or revised forms or the different classes of forms. Needless to say, there should be exactly one form: Your birth certificate.
Blivet. n. Ten pounds of shit in a five pound bag.
Even Ezra Klein understands this:
The original form was lengthy because it included the forms for a family of six. If you were a single adult, you just ignored most of those pages.
The new form is short because it’s only for a single adult. But if you head to the HHS Web site, you can find the new form for family coverage. It, too, is shorter: A mere 12 pages rather than 21. But it only includes the forms for … two people. If your family includes more than two people, the form advises you to “make a copy of Step 2: Person 2 (pages 4 and 5) and complete.”
The result is that the new form for a family of six is 20 pages long and includes a substantial amount of time spent in front of a copier.
So the new form really is less intimidating for single adults, who now get an application catering to them. But it’s a bigger pain in the neck for a family of four, who now get an application catering to families of two — and to a media that equates fewer pages with better forms and laws. As larger families will now find out, shorter and simpler are not actually synonyms.
The whole "is the form too long" is an entertaining sideshow. The real story here is that Obama just got personally involved in the public relations. And have I mentioned lately what an asshole Obama is? Loading more work onto families of four so he can "win the week" on a PR exercise? Read below the fold...
Submitted by lambert on Tue, 04/30/2013 - 2:32pm
Submitted by lambert on Tue, 04/30/2013 - 2:17pm
(That is, "work" in any other way than further enriching health insurance parasites. To my knowledge, this is the first time a prominent poster at a "progressive" blog has ever said that ObamaCare's problems are architectural, hence cannot be "fixed.") Jon Walker:
Two numbers from the report really stick out. The survey found 54 percent of workers would prefer not to be more in control over their health insurance expenses and options because they will not have the time or knowledge to effectively manage it.
Parallel to the 410(k) scam. The rentiers take a cut for "managing" our plans, but the market is such a lemon market for us that management isn't really possible. So they shift risk onto our shoulders, take a cut, and then to add insult to injury, structure our "choices" so we get nothing for the cut they take. Note also that "the paradox of choice" shows that too many choices make people unhappy. Read below the fold...
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