The thought that big insurance will pass the mandate profits on to the American people in

[grahamhgreen]

the form of lower premiums and better care is IMHO, laughable, just laughable.

There is no evidence to support this, instead the insurers have a well established pattern and practice of doing just the opposite - making more profits and providing less care. What's worse, they will take the money and lobby to destroy the reforms in the bill, even if it takes the next 50 years. Let's get rid of the mandate - this is a centrist position, advocated by the left and right alike, Obama should like it if he really is a centrist, and not just a corporate welfare proliferater.

The argument is specious - if there is any evidence to this major claim by supporters of the mandate, please list it here.

It's like saying if you force everyone to buy a "Sham-Wow!", that the "Sham-Wow!" company will lower the prices on "Sham-Wow!'s" - ridiculous.

[NJmaverick]

1. Do you have any evidence to support the assertions you just made?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

3. All it takes to support those asssertions is life experience and some

knowledge of the inner workings of corporate America.

Major corporations these days are run by shameless greedheads, and business schools (and undergraduate business departments) are still teaching people to be shameless greedheads.

[Echo In Light]

5. So obvious one would hardly think the explanation is even remotely necessary

[NJmaverick]

6. So that would be a no. Do you find any irony in demands for evidence while

not being able to provide any for the counter assertions?

[grahamhgreen]

8. oops

[grahamhgreen]

11. So, you have no proof for your argument that will cost us trillions?

[tom_paine]

14. Maybe you would be better served to find a corporation that acted ethically rather than increasing

it's bottom line when presented with the opportunity.

There should be MANY examples for you to choose from, no?

You are asking people to present evidence of an assertion about the future based on past repetetive patterns, not just in the health care industry, but which speaks to the basic characteristics of business and corporations going all the way back to Credit Mobiliere and the Buffalo-Erie Railroad scandal, if not back MUCH further.

How about it? Got an example of a corporation that had the chance to reap immense profits but didn't do so because of ethical considerations or to avoid abusing their customer base?

If you cannot, then perhaps speculating on the future and basing those speculations on a past pattern of behavior isn't as "out there" as you thought?

[NJmaverick]

15. Ever hear of a company called Costco?

[tom_paine]

20. I have, but are you allergic to specifics?

I know you enjoy brevity, but perhaps you might want to, just this once, elaborate on your standard one-liner?

[grahamhgreen]

26. Here is the study of health insurers raising profit while decreasing care, as they will do with the

with the mandate.

"Last year the five largest for-profit companies
breezed through the worst economic downturn
since the Great Depression to set records for
combined profits. WellPoint Inc., UnitedHealth
Group Inc., Aetna Inc., Humana Inc., and Cigna
Corp., reported total profit of $12.2 billion in
2009, up 56 percent from the previous year.

It was the best year ever for Big Insurance. How
did they do it? Not by insuring more people. In
2009, the five companies had 2.7 million fewer
Americans in private health plans than in 2008.
For policyholders who held onto their benefits last
year, the insurers raised rates and cost-sharing and
cut the percentage of premiums spent on medical
care. The industry has been reducing the share of
premiums spent on medical care for the last 15
years. In 1993 it hovered around 95 percent, while
today it’s around 82 or 83 percent.19"

http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:k2pZl0sNatwJ:hcfan.3cdn.net/578b1f7456962bfa7a_r6m6bhcjn.pdf+health+insurance+profits+statistics&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESh56pwmgB8l5InQ2t3oc7xLJEKE_v3HcGcpjJCFRUUVoHvN6YTCn6HsoZB-XIB7BDtzTUy3op8sk6yRKSvOOFylzqT7CYnyUNhj_f0IcKrGMcOH5CF8C1c4sVZeG1T1b3E4dYGK&sig=AHIEtbSW2Ts_zshh87DW8WRvqIlk4XlaFA

[grahamhgreen]

10. The proof is in the industies pattern and practice of denying deserved care.

People have the same established pattern of buying insurance without a mandate.

Your side is the one making this claim that will be a burden on tens of millions of Americans - a claim you can not support.

Think about it - if what you're saying is true - there must be a study you can google from somewhere...?

[progressoid]

16. How about the history of the actions of corporations in the last 200 years.

[Raineyb]

18. If past behavior is not enough of a tell then you're too fucking stupid

to bother with.

[blindpig]

21. "Don't believe your eyes"

Believe me.

:rofl:

[Forkboy]

24. LOL....life.

[Winterblues]

2. While they may not cut premiums they will have to justify raising them

Right now they don't really need to justify anything at all. However because of this new Reform Bill they must put 80% of all premiums into actual health care. It isn't the Insurance companies that are going to take advantage of this, it is doctors and hospitals. They are the ones that do the Billing. All the insurance companies do is pay the bills (or refuse to do so). With complete government backing there is no reason why the hospital won't now charge twenty five dollars for two aspirin instead of only twenty dollars. They are now absolutely guaranteed payment so why not take advantage of it?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

4. Eighty percent--big whoop

In the 1990s it was 95%, according to Wendell Potter.

Not so coincidentally, around the year 2000 was when premium costs started to increase by double-digit percentages and policies that never had deductibles before started to add them.

[Schema Thing]

19. No, it wasn't 95% in the 1990's

History and Evolution of MLR

In 1980, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners adopted “Guidelines for Filing of Rates for Individual Health Insurance Forms.”3 The Guidelines aimed at setting a threshold of what constitutes reasonable medical expense payments in comparison to premiums.4 The Guidelines delineated minimum MLR for determining whether premiums are reasonable.5 Here are some examples:

Optionally renewable policies (renewal at the option of the insurance company) – 60 percent
Guaranteed renewable policies (renewal cannot be declined for any reason, but company can revise rates for classes of individuals) –55 percent
Non-cancelable policies (no denial, no raise in rates) –50 percent6
According to Congressional research as spelled out in a November 2, 2009 open letter from Senator Jay Rockefeller, Chairman of the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, to H. Edward Hanway, the Chairman and Chief Executive Office of Cigna, in 2008, insurers in the individual market spent an average of 74 percent of premiums on health care, 80 percent in the small group market, and 84 percent in the large group market, with some insurers as low as 64 percent in the large group market.7 Insurers dispute the validity of the numbers. For instance, according to Cigna, where the study showed 87 percent MLR for individual market product, the MLR was truly 120 percent and Cigna was losing money.8

http://www.abanet.org/health/esource/Volume6/07/Stein.html

[laughingliberal]

28. I'm not sure of that source but it is the only one I've ever seen which disputes the 90+ % MLR

in the early 90's.

I have heard Wendall Potter state the over 90% average in the 90's many times.

[salguine]

7. Why would they have to justify raising them? What makes you think that, if some

Senator asked them to justify raising premiums, they wouldn't just laugh in his face?

[Winterblues]

9. The government doesn't usually put restrictions into place without ways of enforcing them..

I am not sure of what type of watchdog committee will be set up, but I amk fairly certain their books will be examined...

[salguine]

22. The government doesn't put restrictions on corporations unless they're riddled with

so many loopholes as to render them essentially meaningless. Do you want to go over examples of corporations flouting laws and regulations while government overseers do nothing? Don't make plans, we'll be here a while.

[kenny blankenship]

23. Fuck Yeah! Like the SEC!

This is gonna be great.

[bvar22]

17. "they will have to justify raising them"

Looks good on paper doesn't it?

how insurers can game healthcare bill
http://rawstory.com/2010/01/whisteblower-reveals-health-insurers-game-insurance-bill/

[ecstatic]

12. My understanding is tha mandate is a compromise to make insurers cover pre-existing conditions,

and to remove annual and lifetime caps. Also, people can't have their rates increased due to medical conditions.

[grahamhgreen]

27. Now that we have those reforms as law, we can remove the mandate that is disliked by both sides.

[gmoney]

13. It would be a miracle to see...

Any time a company finds a profit or cost savings from some regulatory change or tax cut or even massive layoff, any savings goes to shareholders, not reduced prices in the marketplace.

Competitive pressure or price regulation seems to be the only thing that pushes prices down. But if there's a nodding agreement among insurers that prices will NEVER go down, we'll never see it as customers.

Maybe we're forcing more healthy people into the system to pay for the sickly people we're finally letting into the system.

[Greyhound]

25. Never underestimate the power of denial. n/t