ACA and You can keep your health insurance (Page 4)

If you are the employer it is completely about their value to YOU.  Duh....  Welcome to the real world.  

And as someone who paid off my student loans through getting a good degree, finding a good job, and busting my a$$.  It was definitely worth it.  Things cost money.  My education included.  No need for people to pay a bagger at the grocery store $15 per hour.  (That was my job during college).

Oh and if you can't afford the degree or don't want debt, don't go to college.  There are plenty of good jobs out there that don't require a 4 year degree.

The US is not a socialist Utopia.  And I hope it never becomes one.  

How old are you?

Why what does that matter.  Do you need to be a certain age for your opinion to matter?  Or is it that if you are of a certain age you can't relate.  I'm sure you would take either side and try to make your point.

So what is your point?  That everyone should believe like you.  Maybe you should run for president.  Seems a little thin on the Dem side.

Well my point was going to be about how much college costs now in comparison to when you were there.  In state tuition/room and board here would have left me with 100k in debt if I didn't have scholarships.  With the 8% interest rate I have that is about equivalent to a mortgage payment on a quarter million dollar home every month for 10 years.

O.k., not being snarky here, so please don't take it that way.

1.  I think it is awesome when people receive academic scholarships for good grades, high test scores, etc.  (Assume that is what you did)  So you earned the discount.

2.  There are schools that don't cost 100k.  Though I know many, even with in-state tuition do cost that much or more for in-state.  Right now, a year at the University of Colorado will set you back about 34k+  So more than 120K for 4 years.  What is interesting is that there are many schools around the country (good schools) that have lower costs and give more scholarship money than other in-state schools.  

3.  It is not a bad idea to take much of your core cirriculum at a community college.  Most of those classes will be transferable.  Math, English, etc.  That can save a ton of money.

4.  Pell grants have a lower interest rate than private loans and are available for most undergraduates working on their first degree.

O.k., back to snarkyness...

I do think college tuition is out of control and hope that they figure something out.  But I believe the fix should be at the school level, not at the student level.  I am not for debt forgiveness, and I'm not for giving people money that they have not earned.  In fact I don't believe in giving people much of anything unless they earn it.  And just being a human being is not enough for me.  There are animals that I value more than some people.

What do you think would happen if people said to colleges, "I can't afford your prices anymore."?  My guess is that they would either lower prices, offer more scholarships, offer better loan rates or close.  

Now what do you think would happen if colleges saw that people were making more money and could afford their prices?  My guess is they would raise prices.  

Don't mean to be a troll, but....

One side of me kinda hopes  SCOTUS  DOES rule against the ACA.  The Repubs have No PLAN "B".   With election season rolling around I can imagine the endless commercials telling the heartbreaking tales of people suffering because their health insurance was cancelled.   And the blame will lay firmly in the lap of the GOP.  And we shall hear no more of them for several elections.    It's a dream I have. 

The irony is that the very thing you're complaining about is a direct result of our government creating policies to "help you".  Our government has put in place the idea that everyone needs an education and no matter what application in life the degree has they'll fund it endlessly.

Economic law is in full effect because the endless supply of "free" money to 18 year olds and everyone in society pumping the need for a degree equals a near infinite supply of students with bottomless wallets.  The schools have raised and raised and raised and raised their tuition and guess what?  Our government just gives more and more and more and more money so it spirals out of control.

I was listening to the radio the other day and a lady had $250k in student loan debt for some stupid degree that was worthless and she was working a $12/hr. job managing a Burger King.  WTF is all I can say
How is the current government programs "meant to help kids" any different than the endless mortgages to anyone who could fog a mirror back in the mid 2000's?  It's the exact same thing only I feel it's worse because they're preying on 18 year old kids and the loans are permanent and unable to even be bankrupt away.

College tuition will continue to spiral out of control until our government stops trying to give everyone a freaking trophy.

I truly love your passion for equality and fair treatment of all dmiller, but it unfortunately doesn't work in reality.  It never has and it never will.  That doesn't mean we can't try to do what we can, but until you repeal the laws of economics it is a pipe dream.

please no, i can't take any more healthcare commercials.  lol

On a serious note I am genuinely curious as to what the politicians are going to make a "big issue".  I truly hope that "stop the freaking spending" is the winning message and a total outsider gets in.  F both political parties.  (I know, a guy can dream)

but tuwood, the pope agrees with me

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/pope-francis-says-charity-isnt-enough-true-christians-give-all-their-money-to-the-poor/

Then maybe he can sell his multi-billion dollar palace and practice what he preaches.

edit: oh, and I couldn't be less Catholic.  Iol

I was just informed that our Company health insurance is going up 20% in January.  Yay, ACA is working (NOT)

I can't remember all the rate increases over the last 6 years, but it's typically been in the 4%-8% if I recall.  This is quite a divergence from the old norm (that was so horrible we had to create the ACA).

I've always paid 100% of my employee medical coverages, but with this increase it cuts really deep.  The team's not going to be very happy Jan 1, because their entire annual raise is going to be taken out and applied towards their healthcare.

You'll never be President.

I will make a health program with so much care that you'll get tired of caring

I had already done this, but the other unfortunate issue that the ACA failed to address (because the insurance companies didn't want them to) was the state barriers.  In Nebraska we have Blue Cross and United Health (Cigna too, but they really suck).  That's it.  I do have an independent broker that I've used for years and he shops them every year and gives me quotes.  The alternative was an almost 50% increase.

For giggles I went out to the ACA SHOP to see what it would run me and it was more competitive than I thought but would still be around a 30% increase.  My business partner (who owns and runs another company) has 45 employees and he's seriously considering just canceling all healthcare and paying his employees $500/mo. to go have fun in the open exchange.  From a business standpoint this would be a real option because all cost increases from that point on would go against the employee and not the employer.  I'm not there yet, but it is tempting.

Educate someone who has no real business experience.  Why WOULDN'T you do that?  What are the pros and cons of paying your employees to find their own plans.  I really don't know!

Prior to the ACA small businesses were granted tax advantages for the money spend on employee health insurance and as a group the employees generally got better deals than as individuals.  ACA removed incentives for small businesses to provide health insurance. Since there are no longer incentives to the company, it does not make since for the company to provide for health insurance.  Giving the employee $500 to purchase their own health insurance isn't all that great either.  $500 is treated as income so both the employer and employee must pay income taxes and FICA (the employee does not have $500 in purchasing power).  Further, unless the company raises the amount every year to account for the rising health care premiums, the increases are borne by the employee - $500 gets less and less every year.  This is the scenario for small businesses that aren't penalized under the ACA for failing to providing health insurance.  

Agree, and to add there's also an expectation of healthcare by employees at the level I hire them.  Most of my staff are between $40k-$70k engineer type folks so everywhere they would work provides healthcare coverage for them.  So I feel it's important from a retention standpoint to provide healthcare and overall from an employee perspective they will still have cheaper healthcare than almost anywhere else they could go.  Unfortunately, I've been forced to stop providing 100% coverage to my employees which was a HUGE benefit to them.  All in all they're going to bear the majority of the brunt of this price increase which will mostly wipe out their annual COL raises.

I know the other question is always why don't I just suck up the extra costs and shelter the employees.  I could technically do that, but as an employer whatever costs are sucked up are multiplied by every employee in the company.  In my case it would be close the the equivalent of a full time salaried person.  So it would prevent me from hiring somebody new or possibly having to lay somebody else off.  We already charge a decent premium for our services and most of our business is locked into multi-year contracts so I don't have much of an option to raise prices at this point.

Also forgot to mention that I did some comparison shopping on the plans available through the exchange and in our state they're generally around the $500/mo. mark for single guys with multi thousand dollar deductibles.  For the families it's closer to and over $1000/mo. (depending on family size) plus an even larger multi-thousand dollar deductible.  So, in other words if I were to try and cover 100% of their healthcare expenses in the exchange as I do now my costs would be more than double.  If I do a smaller $500ish allowance which is closer to what I'm paying internally then the employees healthcare costs go up massively due to the deductibles.
In our company plans today we have an HSA that I pay 100% of the premium and I put a company contribution of $250/mo. into their HSA which covers the deductible.  I don't have the exact rates in front of me, but individuals are approximately $300/mo and family coverage is something like $800-$900/mo.  Most of my employees are single, so I'm ballparking the average cost at $500, but it's probably closer to $600-$700 per employee overall (including the contribution)

my premium is $160 per month in Maryland.........

I fi was young and you gave me 500.00 per month for health insurance that would BE my health insurance.  I would put that money in a dedicated fund and watch it grow if I didn't need it.

Then Obama would fine you for exercising your free will choice.