Did anyone actually see their health insurance costs drop after the Affordable Care Act?

[exitseven]

Obama promised that the average person would save $2400 a year. Instead I was paying more every month and my copays had gone up a lot. Some treatments like a CAT scan was ten times what it was before.

[loveslongnails]

LOL Probably because you couldn't figure out how to use the exchange. LOL The ACA, along with the subsidies, helped 37 million people get insurance. Many paid $0 in premium because of the subsidies, which your mf's decided was more important to give to Israel and to billionaires in tax breaks. The ACA wasn't perfect; it was a start. Where the ACA needed work was in the 55-65 yr age range, but you weren't that age when it began, so I attribute your personal issues to your personal issues; operator error.

The GOP refused to work on fixing the gap problem and instead just promised a better program of their own, like they always do, and never produce, like they always do, because they never have one. So for some people, it wasn't the greatest thing, but it didn't become unaffordable either.

Personally mine went down, but I was happier to see millions of people who had nothing be able to get something. Most Republicuf's don't really care about who else it affected and how so long as it benefits themselves.

[exitseven]

so the rest of us paid for 37 million people to have health insurance. That is just great. What a novel idea. Lets get the people who work for a living pay for the health insurance for the loafers that stay home and collect welfare.

[loveslongnails]

You pay this thing called "taxes", genius, and they provide for the general welfare. Someone who doesn't eat dairy is paying for the government to subsidize butter producers via taxes, but I don't hear them complaining. Only you, because you don't give a shit about community, nor do you comprehend the VALUE of a healthy, educated population.

[WhiteSteve]

I don’t know. I’m personally losing my health insurance because of Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill”, so I’m just trying to stock up on inhalers so I don’t die playing hockey the next two years

[Chazmatazz269]

Please elaborate. How did Drumpf’s tax bill impact your insurance coverage?

[exitseven]

How did you lose your health insurance because of Trump's bill? Can you be specific. Inquiring minds would like to know.

[WhiteSteve]

@Chazmatazz269 @exitseven Says right on my letter from MassHealth that starting January 1st, 2027 “the Trump administration will require certain MassHealth members to work, be enrolled in school, or volunteer to keep their MassHealth coverage.

I am unable to do any of those things in my current caretaking situation. So I’ll be losing my coverage, thanks to Trump’s federal work/education requirements to keep your coverage.

I just don’t think getting healthcare should be performance-based in any way. It doesn’t need to be like that, and it isn’t in most of the civilized world.

[exitseven]

The vast majority of people manage to either get healthcare from their employer or else they pay for it. I collected unemployment for a year and got extra money for health insurance but it was only meant to be temporary until I found a job.
I know you take care of your father and that must be really hard.. Maybe there is an appeal process that you can try.
There is a lot of fraud in the Medicaid system and the Trump administration is trying to serve the taxpayers of this country by actually doing their job.

[WhiteSteve]

Don’t worry about me. I can quit hockey if it’s now going to be medically unsafe for me to play due to lack of access to a very basic medication. But I mean, I’m a little short of breath this morning, and I’m not gonna die or anything, but do you know how much more comfortable I would be if I could just take a couple puffs from my inhaler? But ever since I got this letter last week, now I have to think long term, and ration my own medicine. That kinda sucks.

Like there are people in places we deem “lesser” countries who get to just wake up and take their medicine so they can function properly. I’m sitting here in the allegedly “greatest country in the world”, but I and probably hundreds of thousands, if not millions of others, can’t breathe great right now, and I’m just having to sort of uncomfortably sit with it til it goes away on its own.

But I’ll live. Worry about people with diabetes who need insulin. Worry about the estimated 450 hospitals and medical centers, mostly in rural America, and the estimated 6.6 million Americans who now face reduction in services or outright closures. That’s life and death stuff. It’s no problem in Metro Boston, but if you live in The Ozarks and you have a heart attack, a 20 minute ambulance ride and 2 hour ambulance ride (remember how huge non-New England states are) is the difference between an empty seat at the Thanksgiving table. I worry about that much more than alleged fraud or what the tax money hit is like.

[WhiteSteve]

All of this, because people want to nickel & dime their taxes, and maximize their own personal well-being while their neighbors might be struggling, in a way that can potentially be fatal for some. So just remember we live in a collective society where we’re supposed to look out for one another, and we have all these events, good or bad, where they tell us to “come together as Americans” or something….. for what? Because of a tragedy? Some holiday? The World Cup? And then we’re totally fine just turning our backs on those same people if it save us even one thin dim. That’s not really the kind of country I can be proud of, if I’m being asked to be patriotic about the place I live; and it speaks poorly of our government and citizens alike.

[WhiteSteve]

*one thin dime

[exitseven]

i have been paying way too much in taxes for way too many years. The one time that I went ro the government for assistance all I got was a blank stare and a bunch of excuses. Then when I applied for financial aid for my kids it was the same thing. And not dime for the white guy.
I always had to pay my own way and I just know that if I had a situation like you have I would get zero help.
I really feel bad for you because I know what you are dealing with, You always seemed like a good guy.

[DryGermanGuy]

@WhiteSteve
Buy your inhalers in Canada or Mexico or any country with regulated prices.

[WhiteSteve]

@DryGermanGuy Unfortunately it’s not a cost issue. The issue is that I can no longer see a doctor at all, which is who would give me the prescription. This just makes medical care not an option for me altogether.

[DryGermanGuy]

There are several countries where you can buy asthma inhalers directly in the pharmacy, without MD prescriptions. I did so in Spain, Turkey, Greece, Israel and Russia. I can imagine Mexico being similar.

@Agape93
Could you comment on the situation in Canada and Mexico?

[TrueConfection]

My family’s health insurance went up astronomically. Our premiums went up 400%, our copays and out of pocket costs went up so much that our family would cost us over $20,000 per year before coverage would start. That was at first. The costs have steadily climbed since then. I’d like to go back to paying for what we actually need and not all this extra garbage.

[TrueConfection]

I happened to meet a woman who is a financial adviser. She told me that families are now paying $30K+ in premiums!

[Jamie05rhs]

But at least now women can finally become men and men can finally become women!

[TrueConfection]

@Jamie05rhs Exactly! Men can get CAT scans, “just to see if there are any ovaries in there somewhere.” Men can have maternity care too.

[Jamie05rhs]

Lol. It's absolute madness.

[sage2021]

You should know by now that Obama lies! 🤥

I remember very clearly that one of his campaign promises was that he was going to clean up all of the intercities and was going to start with Chicago first because that's where he's from.
It never happened! 😞

[Just_Ken]

Told me I could keep my doctor. My doctor died...

[exitseven]

Everything got worse instead.

[Chazmatazz269]

Nope. That was the whole point. They created a law that allowed the insurance companies to gouge their customers and then fined them for not carrying insurance. All in the name of adding coverage to 400,000 previously uninsured people. They suggested that the ACA would help three times that many people. They failed. It was obvious that they failed because more people lost their insurance coverage than were added. By the end of the first year, the ACA was a complete failure for more people than it helped. The democrats didn’t repeal it because it enriched the insurance companies, and almost certainly the democrats themselves through kickbacks for that favorable legislation. But that is how capitalism works. All is fair in the name of profits, as long as the right people get their cut.

[OlderAndWiser]

It was all bullshit and lies, but the far left will never confront the truth when it challenges the validity of their ideology.

[NathanDavis]

Obama's ideas were all scrapped...

Republicans took out everything that would have been good about it... and Democrats, of course... paid off by the big Pharma, accepted that deal

whatever was presented and proposed, was NOT THE SAME that the congress, both sides... passed by the end of it and called by the name and pen of Obama

many of those congressmen are way way way richer today because of that

both sides too...

[AviatorTom]

Like most other things, my health care costs went up... monthly premium, copay amount, deductible amount... all went up

[jahaims]

It fucked my family over. My mom ended having to pay 900 dollars more a month

[fishbone77]

lol - much like the inflation reduction act it did the opposite.

[EmmaMary]

Fortunately we have the NHS here in the UK.

[Pterodon]

What I remember is his great lie. “You can keep your Dr.”

[DishLady]

Lol. No the reverse actually.

[laryipelss]

nope. obamacare was a mess

[888theGreat]

I can't afford it

[832dreamboy]

One great reason to be a Canadian !!!

[Jeff51]

No. Went up.