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At the same time, can you really criticize them for spending money to influence legislation that could very easily reshape their entire industry, and not necessarily for anyone's better? I'd be more interested in how they're lobbying than in how much, but I don't suppose those details will be forthcoming.

 

NOG, the insurance industry is not on your side. Period.

 

AMaster, it's nice to know your beliefs, and that you can generalize so readily, but can you support that at all? I'm not saying you're wrong, but it would be nice to know there's more behind that conclusion than a Hallmark touch-your-heart movie.

 

It's not a conclusion, it's an assertion. And no, there's nothing more. Hold me?

 

Assertion or not, it is almost certainly true. Insurance companies are for-profit. That means the fewer claims they have to pay out the more money they make. The reaosn people purchase health insurance is to get their medical bills paid. If the insurance industry is doing what they can to NOT pay said bills then clearly they are NOT on your side.

 

FYI, not quite true. Blue Cross/Blue Shield is a non-profit charity.

 

It also depends on the type of insurance plan you have. My company is self-insured. We use an insurance company to administer our account within the boundries set by my company. The insurance company gets paid on both an annual fee and a processing fee for claims submitted (they get more money for processing more claims) -- and all claims are paid ultimately by my company (no out-of-pocket expense for the insurance company). In general, the insurance company is willing to do go to bat for a customer if it's within the limits my company has set.

 

I had them until just recently. For a "non-profit charity" they sure are expensive and they drag their feet as far as paying anything for the kids, with all kinds of deductibles. They don't even allow for wellness checkups for the babies. They are the pits.

 

Chandos, you get what you pay for, or more accurately you get what your company pays for. I know many people who are extremely happy with Blue Cross/Blue Shield (I was for the years I used them) but there are hundreds of plans and additions to those plans available -- for a cost -- and perhaps the people I know simply have more comprehensive plans.

You can have a great insurance provider with a crappy plan and be quite unhappy with the coverage (justifiably so). But even the best plan will not make up for a crappy insurance provider (been there, suffered through that).

 

YES! SHOUT IT OUT! That is exactly why there should be a competitve option.

 

I just wish there really was such a thing as a competitive option. A company get discounts for volume, a cafeteria plan will eliminate that. It will also put people in different plan brackets -- which may be reasonable (the older people who make more money will pay more, as will the older people who do not make more money). We want choice, but we also want lower costs; the two are incompatible in most cases.

A person has always had the option of going out and privately purchasing additional insurance -- for some people this was a reasonable option, for most it is simply too expensive.

 

It would depend on what a government insurance plan would look like. It has to be affordable, because they are talking about making health insurance mandatory, much like how auto insurance is in many states. The great thing is that it is portable, so it is not tied to the whims of your employer, and if you become unemployed, or your company should fold-up, you can take it with you.

Why should your insurance be tied to your employer? Why should your employer, or if you are a business owner, have to deal with health insurance in the first place? It's a dorky system.

 

Really, I have HMO Blue which is the HMO run by BC/BS and I have never had anything remotely close to a problem (at least one that wasn't resolved very quickly)

 

The thing is BC/BS does a lot of subcontracting as well. I have a PPO BC/BS plan through Anthem Health. While BC/BS may be non-profit, Anthem is for profit. To be fair, I do like my health plan. PPOs combine the best of both worlds IMO - you don't have to pick a doctor from a list like an HMO, and you don't have a deductible like you do with most non-HMO insurance plans. So if I get cancer and I want to go to Sloan Kettering, I can, although I will have to pay a little bit extra.

But would not a public option be high volume, even if there were multiple options available? Say the government puts up five different options, and gets a million people in each of them - that would easily be enough to lower costs through volume of people. I guess I don't completely understand what you're getting at.

 

BTA - I worked for several large corporations, and they all complained about the high cost and corporate hassle of healrh insurance, which is usually the excuse they give for cutting benefits, after they hire you. I can't imagine what it is like for a small business owner. And we all know this, sooner or later who pays for the cost? The consumer who buys the product or service from the company. It's your customers who bear the cost anyway in the long run.

Edit: Snook, I have bills from a year ago that they have yet to pay. Granted they are small, and there is no dispute over them, but for some reason they have not paid them.

When I worked at my last company, we had a young, single girl hire on. The waiting period for the BC/BS insurance is 90 days. During that time she found out she was pregnant. We all told her, don't tell the insurance company until after you sign on and start using the insurance. Eveyone at the store, that I knew of, dispised BC/BS (there were over 150 employees at that store, so I never talked to all of them). Of course, when she finally signed up, she told them anyway, and as we warned, they considered it "pre-existing," which you kind of had to figure, even though she was already working for the company when she became pregnant, so they refused to pay for anything related. The point was that it was when she found out, rather than when she became pregnant that they based it on. At least I thought that was strange. You never know with these guys.

 

Aldeth, it might be, but that would only be true if there were a few options. However, I think every insurance company is going to be able to enter the fray. A hundred companies with five plans each lowers the pool considerably. Plus will the insurance companies be able to further divide in those plans into groups defined by age and lifestyle? They can now when you purchase separately -- how many plans/groups will there really be?

That said, any insurance is better than none, but some of us will end up with worse insurance than we already have (at a higher price).

A slight modification BTA -- it gets companies high quality employees. Companies with poor health insurance have a problem keeping quality personnel.

 

That's not true. For instance, the last store I worked at paid very well, and bonused better than any other company I worked for, but had the worst insurance. Despite what you believe, not everyone chooses a company based soley on insurance, but why should they have to base it on that in the first place?