So people are stupid and idiots because they choose not to participate in socialism or bow to the emperor. I must be an *** too. I am not signing up either.
I'm not going to say any of these are not true, but there are some things that these people could do if they talked to their broker:
THEY CAN'T GET IN
Richard Kelleher, long-term unemployed and uninsured, spent five months sorting through the confusion in Phoenix. He tried to sign up for a marketplace plan and then the state's newly expanded Medicaid program, getting shutdown online, at state offices and by phone. At the same time, he was piling up employment rejections.
Kelleher, 64, felt invisible.
On Friday he got a letter accepting him into Medicaid - and an entry-level job offer the same day.
That puts his insurance situation in limbo for now. He thinks his earnings will end his Medicaid eligibility. But Kelleher says he's grateful for "an opportunity to at least be somewhere every day."
He should qualify for a SEP due to income change. If he's lucky, he will be able to get insurance through his new employer.
In Thomaston, Ga., it took Alan Thacker two weeks to get his answer online. It wasn't the one he wanted.
"I don't know how many expletives I hurled at the computer - 'Why are they doing it this way? Morons!' and other choice words," he recalled.
Thacker, 43, works for $7.55 an hour at Burger King, not enough to qualify for a discount plan for himself and his wife through the federal marketplace. People who don't earn enough for the marketplaces plans were supposed to be eligible for expanded Medicaid.
Really? $15.7k doesn't qualify him for a subsidy? How much is his wife making? What other issues are involved?
But because Georgia declined to enlarge its Medicaid program, the Thackers can't get help there, either.
Thacker said he likes the law, only wishing it could reach everyone in need.
"It's a great law and it's doing good stuff for people," Thacker said. "It's not doing anything for me."
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IT'S TOO EXPENSIVE
In theory, Rebecca Carlson has access to health insurance through her job. The marketplaces are mostly for people who don't.
A single mother in Asheville, N.C., she earns $11.50 an hour, around $23,000 a year, doing office work at a nonprofit agency that helps people suffering from mental illness or substance abuse. She makes too much to qualify for the aid programs that support many of her agency's clients.
Covering Carlson and her 14-year-old son under her workplace plan would cost close to $5,000 per year. That's out of reach on her squeeze-every-nickel budget.
This is one of the biggest problems with O-care. It's probably a 9.5% plan for individuals, but adding family forces it out of affordability. This is definitely an issue.
Depending on details of her workplace's offering, it's possible Carlson, 43, might qualify for an exception that would open the door to a marketplace subsidy. But she had so much trouble getting through online and by phone that she gave up trying; it seemed unlikely to help.
"They could offer me health care for $20 a month and I wouldn't be able to do it," Carlson said. "I have other responsibilities. I can't tell the power company that I can't pay the bill."
If she had someone to help her, perhaps she wouldn't have given up. She really can't afford $20/month? That sounds more like frustration than fact.
In New Jersey, Mary Moscarello Gutierrez, 44, could barely afford her catastrophic insurance plan before the Affordable Care Act.
Now she has no coverage.
She and her husband, Jorge, used to be insured through their small business: PatriaPet, a website that sells dog and cat collars decorated with world flags. They were falling behind on their $400 monthly payments and their insurance agent advised them not to bother catching up because their type of mom-and-pop business policy wouldn't be allowed under the new federal rules.
With her salary from various freelance writing jobs, the couple earns too much to qualify for a marketplace subsidy. She's priced bare bones policies at $900 to $1,200 per month, more than they can pay. Luckily, they can keep their 12-year-old daughter in an affordable state-run plan.
For now, the Gutierrezes are uninsured and facing a year-end penalty of about $800, or 1 percent of their earnings.
Her family is making $80k (about what my family makes in another expensive area to live) What sort of bare-bones policy is $1200/month?
"If I need some kind of major surgery, if I get hit by a crosstown bus, my family is sunk," she said. "It's scary."
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THEY DON'T WANT IT
"I love paying taxes," declares Justin Thompson of Provo, Utah. "I think it's the most patriotic thing I can do."
And he's pleased to help others through substantial gifts to his church and charities.
But buy insurance to prop up the law? No way.
"It is an injustice that our president can tell us to do something like this," Thompson said. "It's everything our Founding Fathers fought against."
This is his choice. I have no problem with him making this choice. I just feel that it's a foolish one.
Thompson thinks going uninsured is a reasonable risk for him. After all, he says, he's 28 years old, healthy and financially secure, making about $250,000 selling home automation and security systems last year.
Living on the central Florida coast, Jim Culberson, 63, has weathered heart attacks and cancer and says he barely scrapes by selling military histories and collectibles.
He would like health insurance if he could afford it, Culberson says. Just not through Obama's law.
Does he also not buy gas because there's a tax on it? Again, it's his choice and I won't tell him he can't make the choice, but I feel it's foolish.
He has no plans to look into the subsidies in Obama's law or its promise of coverage for pre-existing conditions.
"To me it looks like a load of hogwash," said Culberson, whose younger brother, John, is a Texas congressman pushing for repeal of the health care law. He adds: "I don't believe a whole lot the government says."
Culberson says he'll pay the uninsured penalty until he can enroll in Medicare in two years.
This makes a lot of sense in his case as long as he doesn't get sick in the next two years and doesn't make a lot of money.
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MAYBE NEXT YEAR
Need a 12-foot-long, flower-bedecked model plane for a wedding reception? Jose Espaillat will get it done.
He likes the challenge of setting up concerts, fashion shows and other flashy events in Miami, but it's part-time, seasonal work that doesn't come with a health plan. Espaillat, 26, hasn't seen a doctor in five years.
He found HealthCare.gov easy to use, but the $150 to $250 monthly premiums seemed too high. A cheaper option covering only major emergencies wasn't appealing. He decided to wait until next year.
His choice. No problem. Same as above.
"This year I'm just trying to get rid of as much debt as possible, student loans and stuff," Espaillat said.
Svetlana Pryjmak of Dade City, Fla., has been uninsured for about eight years, which she acknowledge "is really strange - because I'm a licensed insurance agent."
Companies that offer multiple insurance options hire Pryjmak to help workers understand their choices. She weighed her own options and decided to save the $70 or so a month she would pay for a heavily subsidized policy. The early troubles with the enrollment websites weren't encouraging, she said.
But Pryjmak, 47, expects to sign up someday.
"Next year I'll probably get in on one of the exchanges," she said, "if the problems are ironed out."
Lather, rinse, repeat
I won't fight the people that don't want coverage. I'll explain to them why they should have it, but everyone on this forum understands the basics of that. What SHOULD have happened though is the Democrats who were so eager for this to succeed should have talked about the benefits of going through brokers to help people get the best plan, AND made sure brokers were compensated enough to make us want to go out and help as many people as possible instead of having us do it out of the goodness of our hearts. (I get $0 for plans through the state exchange)
