HR 3962 Role of Agents Preserved - Good News

[ins.dave]

Oh the GI piece is coming. You can take that one to the bank. At least for subsidized/credit-eligible plans.

Are you saying that there will be no more underwritten plans offered?

They should help out the gimps with no other options, but to combine both markets would be a mistake. Besides the large rate increases for healthy people which would not exactly go over gang busters, they have to take in human nature. Often, people will only do what is in their best interests healthwise when there is a dollar amount built into it.
One lady client comes to mind where, first her husband and then she quit smoking as after a few renewal periods into the game, it became cost prohibitive for them to not do so.
Forget about the fact that smoking is suspected to cause health issues ...

 

[Winter_123]

Are you saying that there will be no more underwritten plans offered?

...

Nope. Didn't say that at all. I said there will be a system of government-approved creditable plans that qualify for subsidy or tax credit because they include the elements that the government wants to see in a plan. One of those elements will be guaranteed issue. Thus if you want to get in on the government freebies or get a tax credit for your plan you are enrolled in a guaranteed issue plan. Go figure what that does to the market.

The issue of whether there will still be fully underwritten plans available somewhere is an open question because it hinges on the question of mandate and whether other plans will satisfy the mandate requirement. That part is unsettled as is the overarching question of mandate. If there is no mandate involved then some folks will still find it more affordable to just skip the government subsidy/credit and get an underwritten but high deductible plan. Right now, the administration intends to keep you from doing that by having mandate and also telling you that a high deductible plan does not meet the mandate. Quite likely that scenario will fall apart along the way. Some of this they are going to make up as they go along anyway. If they offer government bennies to be in the creditable plan and that gets most people into the plan they want you to "choose" then they may leave some alternative type of plans out there on the market. However if the alternative plans are taking away from their desired level of participation in the approved plans, they will simply tighten up and close that loop.

Even if they dont know it yet they would actually prefer to have a couple oddball plans floating around out there so they can pretend that their system did not completely kill choice and the free market. Not sure they are that far along in their thinking yet though.

My guess is that mandate will not fly in the bill in the first year and the dems will smarten up and see that they can just add it in following years or see whether the overall levels of coverage still go up or down without it and then make the case from there. Guaranteed issue/ no underwriting...........err.....different story.......thats coming for the mainstream individual and group markets and it is coming in phase one. Of course Phase One might not be implemented for a few years but that's another matter. You see that I think of this in terms of phases. Trust me that is where the dems will be about February too. They are going to have to lock in their gains but live to fight for another day. Something that Senator Chappaquiddick would have helped them to understand. Bubba is trying to do it right as we speak but Bubba is just Bubba and who cares about Bubba anymore. Just some California libs who are already over in Che Gueveraville already.

Also, I am assuming public option is not coming in phase one but will be subject to trigger but that is just analysis on my part. In my own mind though, I have been beyond analyzing whether guaranteed issue is coming or not for about 4-5 years so you have to consider my bias here. That stake is in the ground all the way around regardless of which bill does or does not pass.

Change you can believe in.

 

[ins.dave]

Nope. Didn't say that at all. I said there will be a system of government-approved creditable plans that qualify for subsidy or tax credit because they include the elements that the government wants to see in a plan. One of those elements will be guaranteed issue. Thus if you want to get in on the government freebies or get a tax credit for your plan you are enrolled in a guaranteed issue plan. Go figure what that does to the market.

The issue of whether there will still be fully underwritten plans available somewhere is an open question because it hinges on the question of mandate and whether other plans will satisfy the mandate requirement. That part is unsettled as is the overarching question of mandate. If there is no mandate involved then some folks will still find it more affordable to just skip the government subsidy/credit and get an underwritten but high deductible plan. Right now, the administration intends to keep you from doing that by having mandate and also telling you that a high deductible plan does not meet the mandate. Quite likely that scenario will fall apart along the way. Some of this they are going to make up as they go along anyway. If they offer government bennies to be in the creditable plan and that gets most people into the plan they want you to "choose" then they may leave some alternative type of plans out there on the market. However if the alternative plans are taking away from their desired level of participation in the approved plans, they will simply tighten up and close that loop.

Even if they dont know it yet they would actually prefer to have a couple oddball plans floating around out there so they can pretend that their system did not completely kill choice and the free market. Not sure they are that far along in their thinking yet though.

My guess is that mandate will not fly in the bill in the first year and the dems will smarten up and see that they can just add it in following years or see whether the overall levels of coverage still go up or down without it and then make the case from there. Guaranteed issue/ no underwriting...........err.....different story.......thats coming for the mainstream individual and group markets and it is coming in phase one. Of course Phase One might not be implemented for a few years but that's another matter. You see that I think of this in terms of phases. Trust me that is where the dems will be about February too. They are going to have to lock in their gains but live to fight for another day. Something that Senator Chappaquiddick would have helped them to understand. Bubba is trying to do it right as we speak but Bubba is just Bubba and who cares about Bubba anymore. Just some California libs who are already over in Che Gueveraville already.

Also, I am assuming public option is not coming in phase one but will be subject to trigger but that is just my analysis on my part. In my own mind though, I have been beyond analyzing whether guaranteed issue is coming or not for about 4-5 years so you have to consider my bias here. That stake is in the ground all the way around regardless of which bill does or does not pass.

Change you can believe in.

I don't doubt any of that.
Time is their enemy.
No news is good news for us I believe.
Big money is real patient. Ins. companies can play the waiting game for a long time.
Kid Kenyan can not. Turkeys won't be the only things getting stuffed come the end of November.
To be a fly on the wall …
The fact (if there is any such word anymore) of the matter is that "reform" ala 3962 is destructive and nonreform based.
As time goes by, the American public, by their doctor's (who to them of course are living gods) are getting educated as to rationing, availability, early retirement, etc.
It's a hyperbolic situation where no one believes anybody. If you or I try to explain this to a client it is basically Charlie Brown and his homeroom teacher.
They aren't going to believe a word that comes out of our mouths because we are just thinking about our jobs or "six figure incomes," as it were.
Same with insurance companies. People have been trying to get the inside skinny from United, BC, Humana, etc. for months now. Even if their employees did know something, you can bet the ranch that "zip lock mouths" are the order of the day. Look at the low profile these companies have maintained, keeping silent except for when the P. option issue was being pushed. They, like us, know that they would be p*ssing in the wind.
Oh, but doctor's however, different story. They are the one party involved in this that will be listened to. Ironic, to me that usually, unless they are a client of course, that they can be a difficult link in the acquisition of new business chain of events with their A.P.S. letters, etc. For once, except maybe for the soon to be med. school graduates or the not so great English speaking, H.M.O. physicians, we are on the same team.
I think history will show that BO and buddies tried to do to much too quick. Haste makes waste. Again reform, if implemented one piece at a time,had a shot, but a hostile take over contains too many conflicting, unclear elements to get through the legislative process. [insert your own analogy here?] Kind of like a fire drill in a way. We are taught to calmly exit the building single file. Otherwise, everybody runs for the door at once and in doing the exit gets blocked and said drill is unsuccessful.

 

[Winter_123]

I think history will show that BO and buddies tried to do to much too quick. Haste makes waste.

History will show that some reform is needed to head off a total takeover. Republicans do not buy that philosophy, hence their venomous view toward Olympia. However they will come around and Obama will come around too, about February or March.

Republicans have played right into the dems hands by allowing a situation to develop where if you support any reform at all you have to go with a dem plan, because they dont have one. The closest thing that the repubs have to a plan now is having John Boner puff on his cigarettes and have a few scotches while Harry Reid is having a press conference and after that he comes out and belches at the reporters for three minutes. That is not much.

The only leadership that the repubs have on this issue now comes from two people that are either marginally in the party or not at all: Olympia and Joe Lieberman. I guess that is their fault, eh, because nature abhors a vaccum. Smarten up repubs, along with the dems. We are trying to build a better Republic and going to your room and sulking is not a strategy.

 

[ticker_shuffle]

History will show that some reform is needed to head off a total takeover. Republicans do not buy that philosophy, hence their venomous view toward Olympia. However they will come around and Obama will come around too, about February or March.

Republicans have played right into the dems hands by allowing a situation to develop where if you support any reform at all you have to go with a dem plan, because they dont have one. The closest thing that the repubs have to a plan now is having John Boner puff on his cigarettes and have a few scotches while Harry Reid is having a press conference and after that he comes out and belches at the reporters for three minutes. That is not much.

The only leadership that the repubs have on this issue now comes from two people that are either marginally in the party or not at all: Olympia and Joe Lieberman. I guess that is their fault, eh, because nature abhors a vaccum. Smarten up repubs, along with the dems. We are trying to build a better Republic and going to your room and sulking is not a strategy.

That's some funny stuff!!

 

[ins.dave]

History will show that some reform is needed to head off a total takeover. Republicans do not buy that philosophy, hence their venomous view toward Olympia. However they will come around and Obama will come around too, about February or March.

Republicans have played right into the dems hands by allowing a situation to develop where if you support any reform at all you have to go with a dem plan, because they dont have one. The closest thing that the repubs have to a plan now is having John Boner puff on his cigarettes and have a few scotches while Harry Reid is having a press conference and after that he comes out and belches at the reporters for three minutes. That is not much.

The only leadership that the repubs have on this issue now comes from two people that are either marginally in the party or not at all: Olympia and Joe Lieberman. I guess that is their fault, eh, because nature abhors a vaccum. Smarten up repubs, along with the dems. We are trying to build a better Republic and going to your room and sulking is not a strategy.

Actually secure and control the borders against continued invasion and allow the undocumented the right to work here legally as well as the ability to buy coverage.
Enforce a mandate to those that can afford it. And finally tort reform.
There you go. The repub alternative.

You tell'n me that wouldn't cut costs?
You tell'n me that middle America wouldn't get behind that?

You're right. They better figure out which way they are going to lose less money / constituents. This plan or sitting back and offering nothing.
Of course you are going to lose all that cheap labor but ...

Better pick the lesser of the
two evils boys cause y'all going to have to give some where.
Probably ain't going to just go away.

They could come out like heroes if they had the stones to do it.
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That's some funny stuff!!

What's funny is you and the flukemeister thinking that there is gonna be a piece for you if'n Kenyan and the gang get their way.
Unless of course you go to work for the govt? How is your Spanish?
Hey, at least you'll have good benes?

 

[0b1kanobee]

So are we screwed or not? That is all I want to know.............

 

[YouGotMyMoney]

No one knows yet.

 

[TXINSURANCE]

Are you saying that there will be no more underwritten plans offered?

If ANYTHING passes , this is correct - no more underwriting. Carriers will fold real fast as their is no pre ex waits for previously uninsured either.

 

[Dave020]

What's funny is you and the flukemeister thinking that there is gonna be a piece for you if'n Kenyan and the gang get their way.
Unless of course you go to work for the govt? How is your Spanish?
Hey, at least you'll have good benes?

I'm fairly familiar with government work and the "benes" are not bad.