If you want to see just how expensive government approved health insurance will be in the new health insurance exchanges. Just click on the Kaiser Family Institute’s Exchange Calculator here. Then, enter an income of $50,000 for a family of four. First, look at the “unsubsidized health insurance premium“. This is the actual premium for the health insurance. As you can see, the cost of these policies are extremely expensive. Why? Because the “Affordable Care Act” mandates that all of these Preventative Care benefits must be provided to the policy holder with no copay, deductible or any other out of pocket expense. Add to all of those newly mandated Preventative Care benefits, the recently added “Essential Health Benefits” which will also now be included on all health insurance policies sold inside and outside of the health insurance exchanges.
As I have mentioned many times before, government imposed mandates on health insurance carriers are the primary driver behind high health insurance costs. Historical precedent proves this. In 1979 there were a total of 252 mandates forced upon the health insurance industry nationwide, by 2007 there were nearly 1900. Today, there are more than2,262 mandates. The new “Affordable Care Act” mandates will drive up health insurance costs even higher.
Still using the calculator, take a look at how much the consumer will actually pay for their health insurance once the few, the proud, the 51% of us who still pay income taxes have subsidized their premium. The “Affordable Care Act” doubles down on what I call “Consumer Detachment Syndrome”. This ‘syndrome’ is a result of WW2 era legislation that tied health insurance to employers. Since many employers pay much of the cost of health insurance for their employees as an added benefit. Many consumers have no idea what health insurance truly costs until they lose their job and receive a COBRA continuation premium that rivals the size of their mortgage payment.
This “Detachment Syndrome” will continue with the “Affordable Care Act” since many consumers will not see these massive new tax payer subsidies when they purchase health insurance in the exchanges. Instead, they will believe that the “Affordable Care Act” magically reduced the cost of health insurance, just like the President promised. And, the burden on the tax payer will continue to increase. Sadly, there are not enough producers to tax to sustain this massive new entitlement for long. This means that the printing and borrowing will continue at the Federal level and the cost of all of this will be passed on to our children and grandchildren. Either way, the “Affordable Care Act” is unsustainable.
States like Massachusetts have already developed a state-based health insurance exchange. In fact, the exchange in Massachusetts is the prototype that will be used to develop other health insurance exchanges under the PPACA. There’s only one problem, the cost to taxpayers. At last count, the Massachusetts health care overhaul initiated by Mitt Romney has cost taxpayers more than $8 Billion. The Federal tax credits provided to other states who make the catastrophic budgetary mistake to develop a state-based PPACA exchange should be equally staggering.
Still have that calculator open? Enter $30,000 for a family of four and $15,000 for an individual. As you can see, those people will not be getting health insurance. In fact, according to the latest CBO assessment, 17 million of them will receive a government welfare program called Medicaid instead. Medicaid is the worst and most dangerous health care program ever devised by man. Even though President Obama promised “Affordable Health Insurance for all Americans.”
Blog Source Credited: C Steven Tucker SmallBusinessInsuranceServices.com