As soon as health care passes, the American people will see immediate benefits. The legislation will:
- Prohibit pre-existing condition exclusions for children in all new plans;
- Provide immediate access to insurance for uninsured Americans who are uninsured because of a pre-existing condition through a temporary high-risk pool;
- Prohibit dropping people from coverage when they get sick in all individual plans;
- Lower seniors' prescription drug prices by beginning to close the donut hole;
- Offer tax credits to small businesses to purchase coverage;
- Eliminate lifetime limits and restrictive annual limits on benefits in all plans;
- Require plans to cover an enrollee's dependent children until age 26;
- Require new plans to cover preventive services and immunizations without cost-sharing;
- Ensure consumers have access to an effective internal and external appeals process to appeal new insurance plan decisions;
- Require premium rebates to enrollees from insurers with high administrative expenditures and require public disclosure of the percent of premiums applied to overhead costs.
By enacting these provisions right away, and others over time, we will be able to lower costs for everyone and give all Americans and small businesses more control over their health care choices.
Crossposted on the House Democrat's blog.
Follow Rep. John B. Larson on Twitter:
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Unemployment Extension Funds Used for Health Care Reform-Unemployed Shafted Again
Once again the unemployed in America get the shaft. If you wondered what happened to the Tax Extenders Bill; HR4213, that left the Senate floor for the House a few weeks ago, wonder no more. The EUC and Cobra extensions that were attached to the tax extender Bill, were earmarked for the same monies that the House utilized to cover the Health Care Bill. I repeat-There is NO funding for the bill, HR 4213 that the Senate sent back to the House for approval. cont..
http://flyfishva.newsvine.com/_news/2010/03/24/4063209-unemployment-extension-funds-used-for-health-care-reform-unemployed-shafted-again
or here:
http://joblessamericanworkers.blogspot.com/2010/03/unemployment-extension-funds-used-for.html
Trusting insurance companies to do the right thing without a government run option to provide consumer choice and competition (to an industry that is exempt from anti-trust laws!) is a recipe for getting burned, as far as I'm concerned, and all this celebration is for a smokescreen/pipe dream. To the extent that the feeling now is "the health care debate is over," this law has not really moved us forward at all.
Attila Honey
By the by, I'm an American, and I'm pleased the bill passed. So enough with the lies that "Americans didn't want this." Yes we did. YOU didn't.
Were they simply lying to us again?
In the above example, $22K is the FPL for a family of four...they qualify because $22K x 400% = $88K
Essentially HCR says that if you and your family make less than 400% of FTL (determined by income and size of household) then expect to pay--at most--the sliding scale percentage of your income for health insurance premium contributions.
You would not pay that, of course, if your employer offers less expensive coverage--just as most people with coverage at work do not opt to pay for more expensive plans in the nongroup market.
That resulting health insurance coverage, due to HCR, would also have no limiting caps nor denial for pre-existing conditions.
The premiums, as scored by the CBO, for most types of coverage (94%) are also likely to stay the same or go down when purchased on the open exchanges, expected in 2014. The other 6% that will see increases are commonly known as junk policies, that will have to be increased in coverage to be on par with the other 94% being offered (this was specifically addressed by Obama at his summit).
Is that a bad thing?
...."cost containments" refers to the cost of the premiums--not necessarily what the citizens pay--which is why HCR costs nearly $1 Trillion--for example, a procedure may get more "costly" for a patient with Medicare, but that patient will not see the resulting rise in cost;
There are maximum percentages that one would pay on their premiums in the reconciliation bill (the difference being made up by the government) and are based upon a sliding scale between 2%-9.5% of their income...The eligibility for federal subsidies is tied to federal poverty levels (FPL);
Up to 133% FPL: 2% of income
133-150% FPL: 3 – 4% of income
150-200% FPL: 4 – 6.3% of income
200-250% FPL: 6.3 – 8.05% of income
250-300% FPL: 8.05 – 9.5% of income
300-400% FPL: 9.5% of income
For a list of family size/income that makes up FPL see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_the_United_States
This bill should have regulated the insurance companies profits too. If the Insurance companies want to be a monopoly then they need to be regulated as a utility.
Bingo!
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This all sounds well and good. But, unless there is some restriction on what they can charge, coverage will be unaffordable for people with pre-existing conditions.
Higher taxes implemented with new law.
High paid executives and social chaos are unaffected by the new law.
The majority of emergency room visits in many areas are illegals.
Nice try though.
I'm still waiting for them to tell us 6 to 12% will come out of our checks, the uninsured's.