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Obamacare Software Glitch Will Limit Penalties Charged To Smokers
turbosaab writes "The Obama administration has quietly notified insurers that a computer system glitch will limit penalties that companies may charge smokers under the new healthcare law. The underlying reason for the limitation is another provision in the health care law that says insurers can't charge older customers more than three times what they charge the youngest adults in the pool. The government's computer system has been unable to accommodate the two. So younger smokers and older smokers must be charged the same penalty, or the system will kick it out. A fix will take at least a year to put in place."
Then I invite you to look at Australia with a similar system and an economy not in the toilet.
better then the old system where you can pay in to plan for years and when you get real sick they drop you or say you hit the max pay out cap (easy to do when acetaminophen sold for $1.50 a tablet (you can buy 100 of those for the same price at Amazon); $77 for a box of sterile gauze pads (Amazon’s prices vary between $6 and $11); $18 for a single diabetes test strip (sold for 54 cents by Amazon); $108 for antibacterial Bacitracin ointment (Amazon’s prices vary between $2.50 and $6.50)
Medicare, which begin in 1965, is roughly the same in complexity, and we survived it.
If by "survived it" you mean "It vastly exceeded all cost projections and is helping lead us toward national bankruptcy," then yes.
Q: What does the "B." in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for? A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
Italy and Greece are the two worst off. Anyone that picks either as an example is clearly biased and looking to point out weeknesses. England is closer to the middle. Not as strong as Germany, but with longer-term socialist leanings, so a nice long history of NIH and such. Does pretty well at it. France is doing on, though their immigration policies have led to some internal discord. And there are what, 20-something others? Social welfare is local and not mandated across. England is doing OK, even with the conservatives complaining about the EU forcing the UK to let in the Poles and such. NIH covers anyone in the EU, if properly registered and in the UK at the time. So people could travel from all over Europe for "free" care, but they don't. Given the free travel amongst all the states, are they really that bad when there isn't mass migration from the bad ones to the "good" ones? Germany *must* accept any Greeks that want in, so why aren't there lines of Greeks trying to get in?
Learn to love Alaska
Been trying to warn folks for years that the smokers were the canaries in the coal mine but nobody listened. Look at your history folks, government ALWAYS gets bigger, NEVER smaller. Look at places like NYC telling you how big of a soda you are allowed to have and talks of sugar taxes and fat taxes, all under the "its because of healthcare" bullshit excuse.
This isn't unique to the government. When I was at my previous fortune-100 employer, they penalized smokers as well (actually what they did was raise the rates for everyone, but gave non-smokers a "discount"). It's not that uncommon. Additionally some places will hand out "fitness incentives" (i.e. penalize overweight people).
I agree with your last statement and I would like to point out (speaking as someone who has done government work for several years now) that the government never uses the lowest bidder, which I am sure is no surprise. What they actually have is a list of "trusted companies" that are suppose to bid on work, and of course try to do it cheaper than the others (now before I continue I need to mention that the government isn't allowed to favor one company and has to spread the work out no matter what). So with this said the companies just raise their prices sky high since they know that the government wont actually turn them down since they have to actually give them something. Also they may not get the exact job they have their eye on, but like I mentioned earlier they get something no matter what. Furthermore the companies have no incentive to do a good job since the government can't go with anyone else. Just thought I would share this since it is an issue that really tends to burn me up.
It's the insurance companies implementing the smoker vs. non-smoker policies, not the government. The government's just putting some limits on how much they can jack up the rates for smokers.
The expense cap stuff isn't smoking specific.
And you seem to be ignoring the fact that everybody dies of something, and most people have several long-tern degenerative conditions when they die. It's hard to get your head around when you're in your 20s or 30s, but as you age your body is just going to start breaking in ways that can't be fixed - you just have to manage the symptoms as best you can. Beyond a certain age, problems like heart disease, high blood pressure, and stroke are normal. If you reach 80, you'll be lucky not to be taking your own weight in pills each week.
By far the dominant factor in lifetime healthcare costs for most people is how many years you live past 70. Smoking and heavy drinking are two ways to significantly decrease life expectancy, and thus total lifetime cost. If your very costly final years come at 65-70 instead of 80-85, you'll pay far less in a lifetime, and those final five years for a smoker just aren't above average.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.