NYS Small Group or Individual Health Plan?

[somarco]

ability to buy health insurance across state lines the feds wouldn't have to trump the states on regulating insurance, the plans would just have to be regulated by the states in which they're licensed, regardless of where the insured resides. It's not a perfect solution, but I think it could help a lot of folks who don't have more affordable options.

How?

models like Medicare Supplements so folks could compare apples to apples

Since Med supps are standardized, do seniors make up their own mind and buy direct? Do they ever have questions about plans?

Term is about as vanilla as you can get but consumers still make poor decisions.

 

[Josh]

How?

Because they could be health underwritten and not pay the same rate as a 60 year old diabetic that has cancer.

Since Med supps are standardized, do seniors make up their own mind and buy direct? Do they ever have questions about plans?

I don't understand what point you're trying to make. I'm not suggesting there isn't a need for agents, but if your contention is that plans are too complicated and buying across state lines would only further confuse the issue, carriers having standardized plans could help clear that up. The best part of that is it wouldn't even have to be government regulated, in theory the AHIP or another organization like that could put out what the standard plans are and carriers could, at their option, build plans around those models and help make the process simpler.

 

[somarco]

Buying health insurance across state lines will do nothing to make health insurance more affordable. Those who promote this concept, including the folks in Congress, don't understand the current system.

A lot of things have to come together for interstate sales, including the lifting of various state mandates. If you do that, there is no reason to sell (or buy) across state lines. Carriers already domiciled in crazy states like NY with enough mandates to choke a horse will be able to offer lower cost alternatives without inviting out of state intruders.

Selling across state lines in itself does nothing to make health insurance affordable.

 

[Josh]

Selling across state lines in itself does nothing to make health insurance affordable.

It does make it more affordable for people who are in good health and would be able to buy an underwritten plan so they can avoid paying GI rates. How is that not more affordable?

 

[somarco]

It does make it more affordable for people who are in good health and would be able to buy an underwritten plan so they can avoid paying GI rates.

How many times have I stated this? Apparently not often enough.

Selling across state lines can only happen if the current system is abandoned or modified to ALLOW plans that do not comply with existing state mandates to be purchased. If the state is willing to allow plans to be sold without mandates there is no need to sell across state lines. Existing carriers will be able to modify their policies and compete.

 

[Josh]

How many times have I stated this? Apparently not often enough.

Selling across state lines can only happen if the current system is abandoned or modified to ALLOW plans that do not comply with existing state mandates to be purchased. If the state is willing to allow plans to be sold without mandates there is no need to sell across state lines. Existing carriers will be able to modify their policies and compete.

You're basing your argument on a false assumption. Selling across state lines would not necessitate completely abandoning the current system. The only change that would need to happen is for a law to be enacted which would allow insurance companies to sell across state lines and only be regulated by the state in which they are selling from. I'm not saying it wouldn't be a major change, but it's not completely abandoning the current system.

 

[somarco]

Stick to something you understand . . .

 

[Josh]

Stick to something you understand . . .

That's what you're going with? If things need to be changed at a national level your suggestion is to go over each states regulations and modify them until we're happy with what we get? That sounds like a great way to get little done because it involves entirely too many people and organizations getting on the same page. It would be simpler to allow carriers to market products over state lines rather than trying to go through each states insurance regulations and coming up with a universal code, but what do I know about anything? I don't know enough about the health insurance industry or this country to have any idea what type of bureaucratic hurdles rewriting each states insurance laws on them could create, that must be an easier way of handling things.