Scott Brown: Obamacare beneficiary
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  Scott Brown: Obamacare beneficiary
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Author Topic: Scott Brown: Obamacare beneficiary  (Read 4355 times)
Brittain33
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« on: May 01, 2012, 09:00:20 AM »

Scott Brown ran as the 41st vote to block Obamacare, but now that it's in place, he takes advantage of one of its planks to keep his 24-year-old daughter insured on his heathcare after she would have aged out in the old regime.

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/05/01/474099/scott-brown-aca/?mobile=nc

Now, I don't think that his opposition to health care reform, no matter how opportunistic, should mean that he has to forego its benefits; any more than Obama should sit back and be outspent 10-1 by Romney's billionaire donors because he opposes the Citizens United decision. However, this shows why repealing Obamacare is harder than it looks. Obama's health care reform bill helped fill in many of the awkward and inefficient holes in our health care system, and many people are happy that their kids who had been priced out of the individual health care market have access to their employers' group plans.
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Torie
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« Reply #1 on: May 01, 2012, 09:27:02 AM »
« Edited: May 01, 2012, 09:29:25 AM by Torie »

The failure to means test all of these goodies is one of the major reason the US is in the fiscal soup that it is in. The Tories read the memo in Britain, but it appears both parties in the US are illiterate.

Wouldn't it be better to keep taxes relatively lower, and higher income folks' snouts more out of the public trough, than the reverse?  The worst of all worlds of course is what we have now: relatively lower taxes, and entitlements gone means test-less wild.
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Lief 🗽
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« Reply #2 on: May 01, 2012, 09:33:18 AM »

Torie, we all know that means-testing medicare and social security is the first step in doing away with them completely. Once the programs are no longer universal, they become "welfare" and are slowly chipped away at and "reformed" until they no longer exist.
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Brittain33
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« Reply #3 on: May 01, 2012, 09:36:30 AM »

Bringing the Ayla Browns into the insurance market benefits everyone. For the insurance market as a whole, it helps spread risk among more people and lowers rates. For the young people themselves who (for whatever reason) don't have access to the super-cheap insurance Torie's nephew has, it gives them access to the health care market and price levels set through large party negotiation as well as catastrophic insurance. It helps the economy because young people are free to pursue jobs without worrying about whether they carry benefits and include them in the health care market. Pretty much the only group that doesn't benefit are the employers who are on the hook for a small increase in their overall insurance payments--but happily, they're paying on the lowest risk demographic out there and strengthening their ties with employees while doing it. Ultimately they can shift some cost from salary to this and come out equal in the end with parents being able to support their kids with their institutional health care. It's a win-win-win-win.
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Brittain33
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« Reply #4 on: May 01, 2012, 09:38:29 AM »

Wouldn't it be better to keep taxes relatively lower, and higher income folks' snouts more out of the public trough, than the reverse?  The worst of all worlds of course is what we have now: relatively lower taxes, and entitlements gone means test-less wild.

I don't consider Ayla Brown to be a high income person. She has access to a fair bit of family support, but she's not rich herself. Scott Brown isn't wealthy by Senate standards, although he and his wife are probably 1% because he had a book deal and she's a news anchor.
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Torie
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« Reply #5 on: May 01, 2012, 09:52:37 AM »
« Edited: May 01, 2012, 10:11:43 AM by Torie »

Wouldn't it be better to keep taxes relatively lower, and higher income folks' snouts more out of the public trough, than the reverse?  The worst of all worlds of course is what we have now: relatively lower taxes, and entitlements gone means test-less wild.

I don't consider Ayla Brown to be a high income person. She has access to a fair bit of family support, but she's not rich herself. Scott Brown isn't wealthy by Senate standards, although he and his wife are probably 1% because he had a book deal and she's a news anchor.

Well if she qualifies for a subsidy to buy health insurance, fine. If the youngs were not expected to cross subsidize the olds, since most youngs are healthy, the insurance would be cheap. Yes, there will be an expense hit to cover impecunious uninsured sicks. There is no way to "finesse" that. Just why should youngs be tied to the hip of their parents anyway? Doesn't that send the wrong message?  Suppose the parents don't have health insurance?

Oh, I understand very well Lief the Dem brief for handing out goodies to the rich. I put that brief in the shredder, and then incinerated the paper shavings, decades ago.  It's unprincipled, and economically inefficient, and a dishonorable way to prop up of the popularity of entitlement programs one cannot afford in my opinion. Thank you.
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Small Business Owner of Any Repute
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« Reply #6 on: May 01, 2012, 09:56:49 AM »

Wouldn't it be better to keep taxes relatively lower, and higher income folks' snouts more out of the public trough, than the reverse?  The worst of all worlds of course is what we have now: relatively lower taxes, and entitlements gone means test-less wild.

I don't consider Ayla Brown to be a high income person. She has access to a fair bit of family support, but she's not rich herself. Scott Brown isn't wealthy by Senate standards, although he and his wife are probably 1% because he had a book deal and she's a news anchor.

Given the success Ayla has had as a result of her famous dad and stint on American Idol, I'd wager to say that she's about as high income as you can get for a 24-year-old.
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Brittain33
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« Reply #7 on: May 01, 2012, 10:13:21 AM »

Given the success Ayla has had as a result of her famous dad and stint on American Idol, I'd wager to say that she's about as high income as you can get for a 24-year-old.

I'm looking at Wikipedia and I can't judge if she's achieved any lasting success. Her music career looks to be struggling. But I don't really know.
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Lief 🗽
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« Reply #8 on: May 01, 2012, 12:20:53 PM »

Oh, I understand very well Lief the Dem brief for handing out goodies to the rich. I put that brief in the shredder, and then incinerated the paper shavings, decades ago.  It's unprincipled, and economically inefficient, and a dishonorable way to prop up of the popularity of entitlement programs one cannot afford in my opinion. Thank you.

Not sure I understood you. Do you disagree that what I posited will happen will actually happen if these programs are made means-tested? Or do you simply not care?
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bgwah
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« Reply #9 on: May 01, 2012, 01:05:58 PM »

Silly Democrats, don't you get it? The invisible hand has determined that healthy working people in their mid-20s are a bad investment.
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Napoleon
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« Reply #10 on: May 01, 2012, 01:13:24 PM »

Silly Democrats, don't you get it? The invisible hand has determined that healthy working people in their mid-20s are a bad investment.
Grin
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Joe Republic
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« Reply #11 on: May 01, 2012, 01:46:18 PM »

Wait, isn't she covered under Romneycare?
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Torie
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« Reply #12 on: May 01, 2012, 02:00:13 PM »

Oh, I understand very well Lief the Dem brief for handing out goodies to the rich. I put that brief in the shredder, and then incinerated the paper shavings, decades ago.  It's unprincipled, and economically inefficient, and a dishonorable way to prop up of the popularity of entitlement programs one cannot afford in my opinion. Thank you.

Not sure I understood you. Do you disagree that what I posited will happen will actually happen if these programs are made means-tested? Or do you simply not care?

I prefer to fashion programs propping up the social safety net that are the most economically efficient in moving money to those who really need it with the least economic distortion, and the most meritorious on their merits, as opposed to worrying about posited middle class greed undermining their support. I think better of the voters than that. In short, I think the Dem "fear mongering" on this is more of a rhetorical tactic to keep in place their favored regime, than something that would actually happen.
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« Reply #13 on: May 01, 2012, 02:38:01 PM »

Oh, I understand very well Lief the Dem brief for handing out goodies to the rich. I put that brief in the shredder, and then incinerated the paper shavings, decades ago.  It's unprincipled, and economically inefficient, and a dishonorable way to prop up of the popularity of entitlement programs one cannot afford in my opinion. Thank you.

Not sure I understood you. Do you disagree that what I posited will happen will actually happen if these programs are made means-tested? Or do you simply not care?

I prefer to fashion programs propping up the social safety net that are the most economically efficient in moving money to those who really need it with the least economic distortion, and the most meritorious on their merits, as opposed to worrying about posited middle class greed undermining their support. I think better of the voters than that. In short, I think the Dem "fear mongering" on this is more of a rhetorical tactic to keep in place their favored regime, than something that would actually happen.

Out of curiosity, why do you think the Democrats favor this regime, and what aspects of the Democratic platform do you think might suffer without it absent the middle-class resentment issue?
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Torie
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« Reply #14 on: May 01, 2012, 03:10:16 PM »

Oh, I understand very well Lief the Dem brief for handing out goodies to the rich. I put that brief in the shredder, and then incinerated the paper shavings, decades ago.  It's unprincipled, and economically inefficient, and a dishonorable way to prop up of the popularity of entitlement programs one cannot afford in my opinion. Thank you.

Not sure I understood you. Do you disagree that what I posited will happen will actually happen if these programs are made means-tested? Or do you simply not care?

I prefer to fashion programs propping up the social safety net that are the most economically efficient in moving money to those who really need it with the least economic distortion, and the most meritorious on their merits, as opposed to worrying about posited middle class greed undermining their support. I think better of the voters than that. In short, I think the Dem "fear mongering" on this is more of a rhetorical tactic to keep in place their favored regime, than something that would actually happen.

Out of curiosity, why do you think the Democrats favor this regime, and what aspects of the Democratic platform do you think might suffer without it absent the middle-class resentment issue?

It is a way to "explain" why the programs need to be so expensive (cut off the middle class parts and the programs will die, and that would be cruel and wrong), and sure, at the margins they think it might buy off some more votes from some of the underserving un-poor (much of the money just going out of one pocket into another, with some just lost through the cracks).  I know, it seems kind of insane, but the Left in general seem to loathe means testing, and that includes the Dems. Labor in Britain seems the same way, from my sense of things watching Prime Minister's question time.
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Brittain33
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« Reply #15 on: May 01, 2012, 03:25:59 PM »

Don't Dems favor the EITC? That's means tested by definition.
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Sbane
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« Reply #16 on: May 01, 2012, 04:16:36 PM »

How exactly is keeping kids on their parent's insurance a bad idea? You do realize that they are getting a much better deal than on the open insurance market where they are an individual as opposed to getting covered by a company that negotiates it's insurance rates. Are you in favor of exchanges where a huge group can be set up to lower costs for everybody? If you don't understand what a ripoff trying to buy health insurance is individually, then you are oblivious.
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Paul Kemp
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« Reply #17 on: May 01, 2012, 07:11:39 PM »

Wait, isn't she covered under Romneycare?

Like.
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« Reply #18 on: May 01, 2012, 10:00:40 PM »

Would Romneycare not have done this?
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Brittain33
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« Reply #19 on: May 02, 2012, 08:33:54 AM »


Romneycare doesn't mandate that employers extend coverage to adult children of employees, but it does (horrors!) offer reduced benefit plans through the commonwealth to young people who were previously priced out of the individual health insurance market.

So, in fact, I didn't set out to target Brown as a free rider, but if Ayla lives in Mass., she is. She could easily buy individual health insurance at an affordable price, an option not previously available, but instead she lets Obamacare mandate that her Dad's insurance cover her for free.
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Torie
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« Reply #20 on: May 02, 2012, 10:43:33 AM »

How exactly is keeping kids on their parent's insurance a bad idea? You do realize that they are getting a much better deal than on the open insurance market where they are an individual as opposed to getting covered by a company that negotiates it's insurance rates. Are you in favor of exchanges where a huge group can be set up to lower costs for everybody? If you don't understand what a ripoff trying to buy health insurance is individually, then you are oblivious.

Buying individual insurance is the cheapest route of all - if you are healthy - and particularly if you are young and healthy. The issue is about how best to to cover uninsured sicks who cannot afford to pay full freight to secure health insurance on their own, in the most cost effective way. Failing to separate the two issues clearly, and deal with them separately, is one of the reasons I suspect for so much of the confusion, and rather poor choices of options actually.
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Torie
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« Reply #21 on: May 02, 2012, 11:21:49 AM »

Don't Dems favor the EITC? That's means tested by definition.

Yes, Dems are not Satan. They are right once in awhile. Tongue  There is a fair amount of Pub support for the EITC as well, and certainly from this Pub. Hey, it's a negative income tax, which Milton Friedman was hawking before you were born. What could have a more distinguished Pub provenance than that?
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Sbane
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« Reply #22 on: May 03, 2012, 12:20:17 AM »

How exactly is keeping kids on their parent's insurance a bad idea? You do realize that they are getting a much better deal than on the open insurance market where they are an individual as opposed to getting covered by a company that negotiates it's insurance rates. Are you in favor of exchanges where a huge group can be set up to lower costs for everybody? If you don't understand what a ripoff trying to buy health insurance is individually, then you are oblivious.

Buying individual insurance is the cheapest route of all - if you are healthy - and particularly if you are young and healthy. The issue is about how best to to cover uninsured sicks who cannot afford to pay full freight to secure health insurance on their own, in the most cost effective way. Failing to separate the two issues clearly, and deal with them separately, is one of the reasons I suspect for so much of the confusion, and rather poor choices of options actually.

Yes, assuming insurance companies are offering much lower rates to youngs (and this is complicated by state insurance laws of course) they do get a decent deal. Of course not as good as they would be if they could get insurance through an employer, or a large public university or through their parents.
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Torie
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« Reply #23 on: May 03, 2012, 09:06:10 AM »

How exactly is keeping kids on their parent's insurance a bad idea? You do realize that they are getting a much better deal than on the open insurance market where they are an individual as opposed to getting covered by a company that negotiates it's insurance rates. Are you in favor of exchanges where a huge group can be set up to lower costs for everybody? If you don't understand what a ripoff trying to buy health insurance is individually, then you are oblivious.

Buying individual insurance is the cheapest route of all - if you are healthy - and particularly if you are young and healthy. The issue is about how best to to cover uninsured sicks who cannot afford to pay full freight to secure health insurance on their own, in the most cost effective way. Failing to separate the two issues clearly, and deal with them separately, is one of the reasons I suspect for so much of the confusion, and rather poor choices of options actually.

Yes, assuming insurance companies are offering much lower rates to youngs (and this is complicated by state insurance laws of course) they do get a decent deal. Of course not as good as they would be if they could get insurance through an employer, or a large public university or through their parents.

No, an employer pays more per person with group insurance vis a vis an individual policy for a healthy person. That is because the insurance company has to take the good with the bad. I walked all though this on a personal level.
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Sbane
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« Reply #24 on: May 03, 2012, 09:55:21 AM »

Hmm, yeah that makes sense. But what if a group of young people were to buy insurance from one insurance company, wouldnt that lower rates for all of them? Also it goes without saying that an employer plan would still be cheaper due to the employer contributions. We need to have employers have some skin in the game, either through forcing them to pay for insurance, or through higher payroll taxes which is used to subsidize employees.
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