re: NYT--Obama and the insurance industry have beneficial partnership

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You didn't hear me say any of that crap.

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It doesn't really matter what you said. The fact of the matter is medical loss ratios were LOWER than 80-85% before ObamaCare. So if the insurance companies are making more money it isn't because they have a higher profit margin (unless you're arguing their overhead expenses are lower now, which can't be a bad thing) - it is because they are insuring more people. Which brings us to what the right wing is truly opposed to - more people on health insurance.

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Nope...wrong again....it should NEVER have gotten into it in the first place....but it did.

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Its so oppressive, too. Our senior citizens have the worse health care in the world, don't they?

So?
Why didn't the Dems hold water on Nov 4th?

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SpidermanTUba

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You do know we will never agree on things ? You and I have some basic beliefs that are unrconcilably different. Thus, I suggest we concentrate on things on which we find common ground....
.......Les has GOT TO GEAUX!!!!!

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It doesn't really matter what you said. The fact of the matter is medical loss ratios were LOWER than 80-85% before ObamaCare. So if the insurance companies are making more money it isn't because they have a higher profit margin (unless you're arguing their overhead expenses are lower now, which can't be a bad thing) - it is because they are insuring more people. Which brings us to what the right wing is truly opposed to - more people on health insurance.

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They are making their customers, like me, buy more insurance. I doubt their margins have changed much. it is a top line thing as you suggest.

BUT if you will put away your "I am democrat and all republicans are bad" thought process for a minute I will make a case that Paul Ryan was right in his proposal to change the pricing model of medicare.

Ryan wanted to take the spending we do on medicare and voucher it out to medicare folks to buy their own health care.

This was a great idea and one that would lead to system more like the single payer you always want.

First by having vouchers providers--not just insurance companies--would begin pricing their services by subscriptions. THIS IS WHAT WE NEED--subscription based pricing. Suddenly with subscription based pricing health care becomes much easier to shop. It eliminates this arcane fee for service pricing model that is the root cause of the huge increases we have seen in health care cost.

Second it gets the government out of the direct buying of health care services. Government buying of services is corrupt. Drug companies lobby for increases, doctors lobby for increases and on and on.

Third it makes health care subsidies easy to administer. We could say all medicare people get $2000 a month and can keep any money they save by shopping so long as they buy a certain level of coverage. If we find that in some places that is not enough we can easily adjust it without dealing with the thousands and thousands for fee for service prices we deal with now.

Moving medicare to this pricing model will move private and medicaid pricing to this same model over time. I would much rather subscribe to my services than to pay the middleman BCBS.

Providers will like it too as they get revenue on a steady basis. Most of their cost are fixed so this will help them match revenue with cost.

The problem with health care is that the government is a very poor shopper and the government is the largest shopper of health care.

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BTW - TURN OFF FOX NEWS.

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NEVER gonna happen....

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BUT if you will put away your "I am democrat and all republicans are bad" thougth process for a minute

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He seriously is incapable of doing that. I've tried to point that out to him many times without success.

You shouldn't waste your time.

It isn't even politics to people like that anymore. Like those on here who constantly call Democrats "Dimocrats" or "Dumbocrats," they are too entrenched in their own political beliefs and parties.

Those ideas seem to be doing something for the sake of doing something and while I am not saying anythinng bad is in what you suggest I simply do not see any upside.

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Its funny how prior to the ACA, righties were proclaiming there was no way health insurance companies could meet the 80-85% medical loss ratio requirement. And now they are whining that the insurance companies are making too much. WHICH IS it guys?

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Yeah, because everyone on the right believes exactly the same thing.

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And to the idiots that state millions more are insured which is why they are making more money,it also gave them a reason to jack up rates on other ones such as me and my family. Once the Cadillac tax goes into effect, my rates will go through the roof.

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that is all true. The insurance companies are making a lot more money on the additional coverage ACA mandated their existing customers buy like birth control and kids on policies to age 26 than they are making on new customers I suspect.