The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, better known as ObamaCare, is the 2700 page monstocity that Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said we had to pass to see what was in the bill. Its passage has given rise to the ObamaCare waiver fiasco and now there are some new provisions cropping up.
On December 2, 2011, the medical loss ratio – a ratio that requires health insurance companies to spend a certain amount of their consumers’ premium dollars on medical care rather than overhead, marketing expenses and profit -will be raised to as much as 85%. Failure on the part of insurers to meet this requirement will result in the insurers having to send their customers a rebate check.
The Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) issues the rules of what insurer expenditures will, and will not, qualify as a medical expense for purposes of meeting the requirement. For example, HHS denied that health insurance brokers and salespeople the commissions they earn for selling an insurer’s program to consumers be included as a “medical expense” for purposes of the rules.
Rick Ungar concludes with, “Whether you are a believer in the benefits of single-payer health coverage or an opponent, mark this day down on your calendar because this is the day seismic shifts in our health care system finally get under way.” He continues, “There will always be a for-profit health insurance industry for those who want to pay for it. The only difference will be that those who cannot afford private coverage will also have an opportunity to get their families the medical care that they need. Everyone wins – except the for-profit health insurers.”
There are several things wrong with Rick Ungar’s reasoning. Here are a few (I’m sure you can think of others):
Why, you ask, reference a source with which I disagree, such as the one Ungar wrote? Two reasons: (1) always know what the other side is thinking/saying in order to be ready if an argument/exchange of ideas opportunity occurs, and (2) Ungar’s article is a great source of facts.
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