Mason

Jun 19 2014, 12:41 AM

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http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2014/06/18/Michigan-Hospice-No-Longer-Accepting-Patients-Due-to-ObamaCare.


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According to a report that aired on Grand Rapids, MI Fox affiliate WXMI on Tuesday, ObamaCare is responsible for the end of another health care service due to cuts associated with the law's implementation.

Holland, MI's Hospice of Holland's board of directors voted to shut down June 12 according to the report and Torrey Husmann, executive director facility, said its due to money woes.

“The biggest issue under the Affordable Care Act is we know we’re going to see cuts in reimbursement,” Husmann said. “It’ll be about 12 percent.”

LTC8K6

Jun 19 2014, 08:46 AM

http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottgottlieb/2014/06/19/obama-health-official-the-obamacare-bailout-of-insurers-will-be-financed-by-a-new-tax-on-every-health-plan/

Obama Health Official: The Obamacare "Bailout" Of Insurers Will Be Financed By A New Tax On Everyone's Health Plan

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...Mandy Cohen, the Acting Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicare Service’s Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight, delivered that message yesterday. Cohen was testifying before the House Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Job Creation and Regulatory Affairs. She said that if funding for the risk corridors can’t be financed off the money that gets clawed away from profitable insurers (therefore allowing the entire scheme to remain budget neutral) then CMS has the authority, if not the intention to impose additional “user fees” on all health insurers to cover the higher losses experienced by the Obamacare plans.

At issue is what’s being referred to as the “three R’s.” These are Obamacare policy constructs that are designed to offset losses that insurers will take as a result of the mostly older, and less healthy mix of patients that enrolled in the exchanges.

These three R’s include: A reinsurance fund of about $25 billion (financed off a fee on commercial insurance plans) that compensate health plans that enroll a costlier pool of patients; “Risk corridors” that substantially limit insurance company losses by shifting these costs to taxpayers; and Risk adjustment that balances health plans that enroll a disproportionate share of costlier patients.

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• [M]any Senators who voted for the PPACA concurrently sponsored other legislation that offered tax credits only in cooperating states. Moreover, while the PPACA’s language restricting tax credits to cooperative states was taken from the bill approved by the Senate Finance Committee, the other leading Senate bill, produced by the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, also withheld subsidies from residents of uncooperative states. If a state refused to establish an Exchange or the Exchange did not comply with federal standards, the HELP bill denied health-insurance subsidies to that state’s residents for four years. If the state refused to implement the HELP bill’s employer mandate, the bill would have withheld subsidies from residents forever, even as residents of cooperating states received subsidies.

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http://dailycaller.com/2014/06/18/house-panel-takes-aim-at-obamacare-program-that-could-cue-1-billion-taxpayer-bailout/?advD=1248,153371

House Panel Takes Aim At Obamacare Program That Could Cue $1 Billion Taxpayer ‘Bailout’

...Official estimates on the cost of the measures are ever-changing. In February, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that the risk aversion measures would actually save taxpayers $8 billion, but by April, the CBO revised its projection, saying the taxpayers will likely break even. The budget office has since ceased to measure the cost of the risk aversion measures, but the panel’s experts believe it will end up actually costing taxpayers.

Seth Chandler, a University of Houston law professor and expert in insurance law and mathematics, called the CBO’s analyses into question.

“The CBO simply capitulated to the executive branch that it would balance risk corridor books by paying off any deficiency with proceeds with what it hoped would be the following year’s surplus,” Chandler told the subcommittee, saying the method doesn’t make “mathematical sense.”

...But it’s possible that Congress may put a damper on the payments. Republican Senator Jeff Sessions, ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, made an unusual appearance at the House hearing to discuss a recent Senate report that found that HHS doesn’t have the legal authority to make any of the payments without a Congressional appropriation.

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Important: please respond within 30 days to keep your help paying for Marketplace health coverage.

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http://washingtonexaminer.com/why-obamacare-good-news-applies-only-to-the-poor/article/2549978

Why Obamacare 'good news' applies only to the poor

To hear administration officials and their supporters in the press tell it, this is a great time for Obamacare. People who signed up for coverage are actually paying for it; more insurance companies are joining exchanges; some consumers have more choices than originally envisioned. "The news surrounding the Affordable Care Act has been so good this week, it's almost hard to know where to start," wrote MSNBC's Steve Benen in a recent post headlined "Everything's Coming Up Aces for the ACA."

Not so fast. Yes, Obamacare is a big help for those now receiving something substantial from the government -- large subsidies for the lowest-income Americans who purchase coverage on the exchanges, free health care for people eligible for the expanded Medicaid program.

But for millions of other Americans, it's a different story. In fact, one respected analyst worries that Obamacare, while helping some, is actually "creating a chronically uninsured class" of those ineligible for its taxpayer-paid assistance.

Of the much-discussed eight million Americans who have signed up for Obamacare, the "vast majority ... are receiving financial assistance," according to a Department of Health and Human Services report released this week. What that means is this: Of the eight million, about 85 percent, or 6.8 million, actually paid for coverage. Of those, about 87 percent, or 5.9 million, receive taxpayer-paid subsidies to help them pay.

In other words, nearly everyone who has bought insurance through the Obamacare exchanges has done so with money from the government. And the subsidies are significant — an average of $264 a month, according to HHS. The average monthly premium is $346, according to the report, so minus the $264 subsidy, the average subsidy recipient is paying a net cost of $82 a month for coverage. The government pays the rest.

"It would appear from this data that it is the lowest income people who are most often signing up for coverage," writes insurance industry analyst Bob Laszewski. "That explains why the average consumer subsidy is so high and the average net cost is so low."

The problem is, for those who are not eligible for subsidies, or for those eligible only for smaller subsidies, Obamacare still presents higher premiums, higher deductibles, and narrow networks of doctors and hospitals. "The Obamacare plans are unattractive to all but the poorest who get the biggest subsidies and the lowest deductibles," writes Laszewski. "The working class and middle class are not getting access to attractive benefits."

So they have not purchased coverage. The Democrats who created Obamacare planned to pressure them into doing so by imposing an individual mandate -- a penalty euphemistically called a "shared responsibility fee" -- on those who go uninsured. The idea was, the mandate would not only increase the coverage rate but also raise revenue for the federal government.

But now comes word that very few will pay the penalty. In a study released this week, the Congressional Budget Office said that of the 30 million people estimated to be uninsured in 2016, only about four million will be required to pay. The rest -- 26 million people -- will be exempt from the mandate under various regulations issued by the Obama administration.

So this is one vision of Obamacare's future: Lower-income Americans purchase insurance because they receive the biggest subsidies. Others with somewhat higher incomes are priced out of the Obamacare market. The individual mandate is meaningless. The net result is tens of millions remain without coverage. "Obamacare looks to be on its way to creating a chronically uninsured class," says Laszewski.

That's certainly not what Barack Obama promised when he said his plan would make health care "better for everybody." It's not what he promised when he said the Affordable Care Act would "cut the average family's premium by about $2,500 per year." It's not what he promised when he said Obamacare would "bend the cost curve" of health care.

What happens now? After Democrats finish crowing about what a success Obamacare is, it's likely they will argue that subsidies must be extended to more and more Americans to pay for coverage that Obamacare has made more and more expensive. Republicans will resist, but at the same time realize Obamacare has changed the health care system in ways that will be difficult to overturn and hard to fix.

And for those millions for whom Obamacare is a bad deal? They're just out of luck.

LTC8K6

Jun 20 2014, 06:56 AM

An employee just received a letter from the Health Insurance Marketplace asking for documentation to prove their yearly household income in order to keep "your help paying for Marketplace health coverage."

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Important: please respond within 30 days to keep your help paying for Marketplace health coverage.

Oddly written, that.

It lists documents that can be sent to verify income. Pretty typical list, I'd say.

However, on the last page, it also says to provide documents proving citizenship and identity...

Strange...not sure why there would be any doubt about that, and I cannot remember any requests for such documentation during the entire enrollment process for everyone.

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http://aspe.hhs.gov/health/reports/2014/Premiums/2014MktPlacePremBrf.pdf
PREMIUM AFFORDABILITY, COMPETITION, AND CHOICE IN THE HEALTH INSURANCE MARKETPLACE, 2014
June 18, 2014
...Consumers may be eligible for financial assistance to offset the cost of premiums, if their income meets certain requirements.2

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• 2 The type of financial assistance offered is known as “The Premium Tax Credit (PTC)” and is calculated as the difference between the cost of the adjusted monthly premium for the second-lowest cost silver with respect to the applicable taxpayer and the applicable percentage determined by household income that a person is statutorily required to pay. An individual may choose to have all or a portion of the PTC paid in advance to an issuer of a qualified health plan to reduce their monthly premiums. This is referred to as the “Advance Premium Tax Credit” (APTC). APTCs are provided to people with projected household income between 100 percent (133 percent in states that have chosen to expand their Medicaid programs) and 400 percent of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL). A reconciliation of the APTC paid on behalf of an individual or family and the PTC they are eligible for will occur during their annual tax return. If an individual receives a greater APTC than the PTC they are determined eligible for, the individual may be required to repay the difference. The applicable percentage that a qualified individual or family will pay toward a health insurance premium will range from 2.0 percent of income at 100 percent FPL to 9.5 percent of income at 400 percent FPL

LTC8K6

Jun 20 2014, 06:56 AM

An employee just received a letter from the Health Insurance Marketplace asking for documentation to prove their yearly household income in order to keep "your help paying for Marketplace health coverage."

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Important: please respond within 30 days to keep your help paying for Marketplace health coverage.

Oddly written, that.

It lists documents that can be sent to verify income. Pretty typical list, I'd say.

However, on the last page, it also says to provide documents proving citizenship and identity...

Strange...not sure why there would be any doubt about that, and I cannot remember any requests for such documentation during the entire enrollment process for everyone.

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http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2014pres/06/20140618a.html
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 18, 2014

New report shows premium affordability, competition and choice in the Marketplace in 2013-2014

Shoppers paid an average of $69 per month after tax credits for silver plans
and had, on average, a choice of five health insurers and 47 plans

A new report released today by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) finds that people who selected silver plans, the most popular plan type in the federal Marketplace, with tax credits paid an average premium of $69 per month. In the federal Marketplace, 69 percent of enrollees who selected Marketplace plans with tax credits had premiums of $100 a month or less, and 46 percent of $50 a month or less after tax credits. Today’s report also looks at competition and choice nationwide among health insurance plans in 2013-2014, and finds that most individuals shopping in the Marketplace had a wide range of health plans from which to choose. On average, consumers could choose from five health insurers and 47 Marketplace plans. An increase of one issuer in a rating area is associated with 4 percent decline in the second-lowest cost silver plan premium, on average.

“What we’re finding is that the Marketplace is working. Consumers have more choices, and they’re paying less for their premiums,” said Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell. “Nearly 7 in 10 consumers who signed up for Marketplace coverage are paying $100 or less for that coverage. When there is choice and competition, everybody benefits.”

According to today’s report, on average, monthly premiums for people who selected plans with tax credits fell 76 percent after tax credits, dropping the cost of the average monthly premium from $346 before tax credits to $82 after tax credits across all plan types. People who selected silver plans, the most popular plan type in the federal Marketplace, with tax credits paid an average premium of $69 per month.

The Marketplace is also providing consumers more easily comparable, quality health plan choices than ever before. In 2014, there were a total of 266 issuers in the Marketplace by state, offering over 19,000 Marketplace plans across all ratings areas, excluding catastrophic plans. Overall, 82 percent of people eligible to purchase a qualified health plan could choose from 3 or more health insurance issuers, and 96 percent could choose from 2 or more health insurers in the Marketplace. In 2014, new issuers represent almost 26 percent of all issuers in the Marketplace, and the new Consumer Operated and Oriented Plans (CO-OPs) tended to have lower premiums than other plans. Early reports from the states suggest that additional issuers will be entering the Marketplace in 2015.

Today’s report demonstrates that the new tax credits are working as intended to make premiums affordable, and the Marketplace is bringing much-needed competition to the insurance market. In addition, the Affordable Care Act includes a number of other provisions to keep premiums affordable. The rate review grant program provides states with resources to enhance their rate review programs. HHS has previously awarded nearly $238 million to states to enhance their rate review programs, and, since the passage of the law, the proportion of insurance company requests for double-digit rate increases was cut by more than half. Consumers saved nearly $1.2 billion on their premiums in 2012 when compared to the amount originally requested by insurers. Health insurance companies also now have to spend at least 80 cents of your premium dollar on health care or improvements to care, or provide a refund. In 2012, 8.5 million consumers received half a billion dollars in refunds – with the average consumer receiving a refund of around $100 per family.

To read today’s report visit: http://aspe.hhs.gov/health/reports/2014/Premiums/2014MktPlacePremBrf.pdf