If you get sick, America, the Republican health care plan is this: "Die quickly." That’s right. The Republicans want you to die quickly if you get sick."
...Consider this question: Should society have as its goal that the government prevents all deaths from any health-related ailment other than natural causes associated with ripe old age? The notion is absurd — to both conservatives and liberals. There are limits to the proper amount of scarce resources, funded by taxpayers, that Washington should redirect toward health care.
So, Mitt Romney, who spearheaded the original version of the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) in Massachusetts a decade ago, and then ran for President on a platform of repealing essentially the same law implemented nationally that he pushed through at the state level, has decided to run for President again.
Some 3 million to 6 million Americans will have to pay an Obamacare tax penalty for not having health insurance last year, Treasury officials said Wednesday. It's the first time they have given estimates for how many people will be subject to a fine.
The penalty is $95, or 1% of income above a certain threshold (roughly $20,000 for a couple). So you could end up owing the IRS a lot of money.
Take a married couple with $100,000 in income - their bill comes to $797, according to the Tax Policy Center ACA penalty calculator.
The penalty for remaining uninsured rises to the larger of $325 or 2% of income in 2015.
OK, this is just an overview of the upcoming tax penalty. Nothing noteworthy. However...
Still, the good news is that it looks as though a certain segment of people have finally started to smarten up; perhaps it was last fall's Ebola panic, because this shift happened before the measles outbreak:
The number of California parents who cite personal beliefs in refusing to vaccinate their kindergartners dropped in 2014 for the first time in a dozen years, according to a Times data analysis.
...Statewide, the rate of vaccine waivers for kindergartners entering school in the fall declined to 2.5% in 2014 from 3.1% in 2013. Bigger declines were seen in districts with some of the larger vaccine exemption rates.
Recalcitrant red states have done little — or nothing — to promote Obamacare. Yet their residents are getting health coverage by the millions.
Across the country, efforts to resist or undermine the law persist. Calls for repeal haven’t died down. Most of the states with Republicans in control aren’t running their own insurance exchanges, but their residents are still getting covered and still getting subsidies — unless the Supreme Court in an upcoming case rules that the subsidies are illegal in states using HealthCare.gov.
Fewer workers received employer-sponsored health coverage after the Great Recession than they did before, but don’t put the blame squarely on the Affordable Care Act, a study released Thursday says.
However, I just realized that they also threw in a new QHP enrollee update:
In addition, Lee reported Wednesday that as of Jan. 26, 273,111 consumers had picked a plan during open enrollment.
Add that to the 944K renewals and you have a grand total of 1,217,111 through 1/26.
That's an increase of 44,345 since January 12, or 3,167/day. Of course, this also includes the January 15th deadline, so it doesn't tell me much about the next week or so. For that, I'd have to look at the increase since 1/18 (1,200,427), which is just 16,684, or 2,085/day.
The following numbers are up-to-date as of 11:59pm Monday, January 26, 2015.
New Vermont Health Connect Customers
10,399 individuals have checked out a 2015 health plan. This includes 4,098 individuals in Qualified Health Plans (private health insurance) and 6,301 individuals in Medicaid or Dr. Dynasaur plans.
After a new customer checks out a plan, they must make an initial premium payment and have their selection processed before they have an active health plan. Of the 10,399 individuals who checked out, 8,853 have completed the enrollment process and have an active health plan (i.e., effectuated enrollment). Of those who completed the process, 2,713 are on a Qualified Health Plan and 6,140 are on Medicaid or Dr. Dynasaur.
Renewing 2014 Vermont Health Connect Plans
Unless a customer requested otherwise, all individuals who had an active health plan through the end of 2014 currently have health insurance coverage through Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont, MVP Health Care, Medicaid or Dr. Dynasaur. The insurance issuers have their information in their systems and ID cards remain active.
Over at Talking Points Memo, Sahil Kapur has a story which, on the one hand, reveals nothing that most people didn't already know...but at the same time includes some quotes from anonymous Republican staffers which are almost Onion-like in their point-blank candor:
"It's an opportunity that we've failed at for two decades. We've not been particularly close to being on the same page on this subject for two decades," said a congressional Republican health policy aide who was granted anonymity to speak candidly. "So this idea — we're ready to go? Actually no, we're not."
...But conversations with more than a dozen GOP lawmakers and aides indicate that the party is nowhere close to a solution. Outside health policy experts consulted by the Republicans are also at odds on how the party should respond.
Thanks to the massive snowstorm which hit New England (yes, it was pretty bad even if NYC itself only received a glancing blow), it's been several days since the last MA Health Connector update. Today, however, they released a new daily report which covers the past 3 days.
OK, that's 3,922. To get an idea of the drop-off from a deadline day to a post-deadline day, on 1/23 alone (MA's deadline for February coverage), they had 3,440 QHP determinations.
Anyway, assuming at least a 45% plan selection rate, that should be another 1,800 QHPs for Massachusetts, bringing the total up to at least 112,000 to date.
Meanwhile, Medicaid enrollment is now up to over 211K so far.
Last year I assumed, for months, that once March 31st came and went, I'd be free to close up shop. Then they tacked on the 2-week "extension period". Then a whole mess of other stuff happened, and, well, here I am, still chugging along almost 10 months later. This year, however, I was operating on the assumption that once February 15th came along, I'd be able to pull the plug (not saying that I would, just that I'd be free to do so if I wished). However...
Open Enrollment ends February 15. As a retail tax preparer, I'm flummoxed by this. We're barely beginning to see clients--the first ones with nothing but a W-2 are just trickling in the door.
