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Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

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Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#41

Post by revelation »

oijaf888 wrote: post #34
DanBC wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jun2009/... > Medical problems caused 62% of all personal bankruptcies filed in the U.S. in 2007, according to a study by Harvard researchers. And in a finding that surprised even the researchers, 78% of those filers had medical insurance at the start of their illness, including 60.3% who had private coverage, not Medicare or Medicaid. EDIT: Insurance is a scam and…

How is insurance a scam? You are lowering the impact an extreme event has on you in return for the payment of monthly amount.

That's the point. An extreme event will be something that puts you out of work for at least a month, and for many people, they will no longer have a job after not working for a month. Since their insurance is coupled in intricate ways with their job, it ends when they need it most.

Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#42

Post by drivingmissm »

oijaf888 wrote: post #37
ck2 wrote: post #30

Best wishes to Molly for a speedy recovery and to feel better soon. Thank goodness she is famous, even if lesser known by the mainstream and friends can appeal to help her. For those that think the ACA (obamacare) will solve this after January, nope. A full half of the states [1] have denied medicaid expansion (because the supreme court ruled they could turn it down) which means if you fall into the gap where you "ma…

If you make less than (I believe its) 4x federal level of poverty in your area you are eligible for subsidies on your health insurance via the marketplace. The issue you are pointing out is where you make too much to qualify for your state's medicare plan but not enough to be able to pay for private insurance even with subsidies. So its not that you make "too much" to get health insurance, but you make too much to ge…

"subsidies" is the new fancy term for "welfare" or "handouts". That's what it is, and there's no such thing as "free health insurance" only taxpayer-provided health insurance.

Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#43

Post by potatolicious »

drivingmissm wrote: post #42
oijaf888 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you make less than (I believe its) 4x federal level of poverty in your area you are eligible for subsidies on your health insurance via the marketplace. The issue you are pointing out is where you make too much to qualify for your state's medicare plan but not enough to be able to pay for private insurance even with subsidies. So its not that you make "too much" to get health insurance, but you make too much to ge…

"subsidies" is the new fancy term for "welfare" or "handouts". That's what it is, and there's no such thing as "free health insurance" only taxpayer-provided health insurance.

Pure pedantry. Nobody is under the illusion that doctors and nurses work for free. When people say "free" they mean "free for the user at the point of service", which is a bit of a mouthful.

Exactly zero people believe that the health care doesn't have to be paid for by someone at some point. This is a straw man.

Also, "tax breaks" is the fancy term for "welfare" or "handouts". See, I can do meaningless feel-good rhetoric! Let's debate these issues at their core, not resort to meaningless weasel words.

Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#44

Post by potatolicious »

ck2 wrote: post #16
rtb wrote: post #5

(As a brit) I don't understand this: "Molly was employed at the small NPO Knowbility as the Open Web Evangelist. Knowbility was able to put her on Family and Medical Leave which allowed Molly to retain her health insurance coverage. The FMLA time period has ended and the only coverage available now is through COBRA." So she had health insurance, but now that she's ill and has to stop work, it is stopping? If health i…

Isn't this country crazy? If you watch our politics (please spare yourself) you could have seen a packed convention center for one of our two major political parties a few years ago cheering the idea that we should let people get ill and die if they could not afford to treat themselves. This is not an exaggeration, I am sure it is on youtube somewhere. [1] Oh and serving in the military means your claim request will…

> "cheering the idea that we should let people get ill and die if they could not afford to treat themselves"

For an extra level of sadness, said candidates were simultaneously criticizing other countries for allegedly letting people die unnecessarily (see: "death panels").

Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#45

Post by nollidge »

oijaf888 wrote: post #34
DanBC wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jun2009/... > Medical problems caused 62% of all personal bankruptcies filed in the U.S. in 2007, according to a study by Harvard researchers. And in a finding that surprised even the researchers, 78% of those filers had medical insurance at the start of their illness, including 60.3% who had private coverage, not Medicare or Medicaid. EDIT: Insurance is a scam and…

How is insurance a scam? You are lowering the impact an extreme event has on you in return for the payment of monthly amount.

I don't think DanBC is saying that insurance per se is a scam, but that the U.S. health insurance industry is unavoidably scammy.

EDIT: Put another way: you're 100% correct that that's what insurance should do and purports to do, but that's not how it actually plays out with American health insurance.

Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#46

Post by ck2 »

drivingmissm wrote: post #42
oijaf888 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you make less than (I believe its) 4x federal level of poverty in your area you are eligible for subsidies on your health insurance via the marketplace. The issue you are pointing out is where you make too much to qualify for your state's medicare plan but not enough to be able to pay for private insurance even with subsidies. So its not that you make "too much" to get health insurance, but you make too much to ge…

"subsidies" is the new fancy term for "welfare" or "handouts". That's what it is, and there's no such thing as "free health insurance" only taxpayer-provided health insurance.

Apparently there is free wars though. That money seems to be always available.

They should use that magic war money to actually help people.

Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#47

Post by declan »

DanBC wrote: post #40
oijaf888 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is insurance a scam? You are lowering the impact an extreme event has on you in return for the payment of monthly amount.

Insurance is a scam because insurance companies sell products with simple, big, headlines but complex fine print. They go to extreme measures to avoid paying out if possible.

If this were actually true then word would get around quickly and insurance companies would lose business as honest rivals emerge. (Hint: This hasn't happened. Because it's not true.)

See, from a cancer patient writing three days ago who had her insurance canceled because of Obamacare:

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB1000142405270230452750... "The second element essential to my fight is a United Healthcare PPO (preferred provider organization) health-insurance policy. Since March 2007 United Healthcare has paid $1.2 million to help keep me alive, and it has never once questioned any treatment or procedure recommended by my medical team. The company pays a fair price to the doctors and hospitals, on time, and is responsive to the emergency treatment requirements of late-stage cancer. Its caring people in the claims office have been readily available to talk to me and my providers."

Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#48

Post by maxerickson »

chrisrhoden wrote: post #9
rtb wrote: post #5

(As a brit) I don't understand this: "Molly was employed at the small NPO Knowbility as the Open Web Evangelist. Knowbility was able to put her on Family and Medical Leave which allowed Molly to retain her health insurance coverage. The FMLA time period has ended and the only coverage available now is through COBRA." So she had health insurance, but now that she's ill and has to stop work, it is stopping? If health i…

The standard in the US is that this is a different type of insurance (disability insurance) and it's often sold in parallel with life insurance. Disability benefits can also (often) become available in this situation, meaning that this is one of the only situations in which the fed will actually give you money (most other benefits are paid out by the state). Not saying that this is a good situation, just clearing up…

Noted spastic blabbermouth Jim Cramer makes a point of this in his books. He more or less calls disability insurance the most important financial product that people can buy.

Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#49

Post by ck2 »

nonrecursive wrote: post #38
ck2 wrote: post #30

Best wishes to Molly for a speedy recovery and to feel better soon. Thank goodness she is famous, even if lesser known by the mainstream and friends can appeal to help her. For those that think the ACA (obamacare) will solve this after January, nope. A full half of the states [1] have denied medicaid expansion (because the supreme court ruled they could turn it down) which means if you fall into the gap where you "ma…

> Thank goodness she is famous, even if lesser known by the mainstream and friends can appeal to help her. Healthcare in the US sucks, no doubt. But I'd say she's not getting support just because she's famous, which sounds cynical to me. Personally, I feel a great deal of gratitude toward her. Like others in the thread, her books helped me start my career. So it's not just about being famous - she's spent her life he…

You are right, that is definitely a better way to put it and what I actually meant.

I didn't mean famous like just because her name is recognizable, I meant famous for good reasons (like the word "famous" is actually supposed to mean, vs infamous).

Re: Help Us Help Molly Holzschlag

#50

Post by moocowduckquack »

oijaf888 wrote: post #34
DanBC wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jun2009/... > Medical problems caused 62% of all personal bankruptcies filed in the U.S. in 2007, according to a study by Harvard researchers. And in a finding that surprised even the researchers, 78% of those filers had medical insurance at the start of their illness, including 60.3% who had private coverage, not Medicare or Medicaid. EDIT: Insurance is a scam and…

How is insurance a scam? You are lowering the impact an extreme event has on you in return for the payment of monthly amount.

How is insurance a scam?

Insurance is a bet and for an insurer to make money you have to bet that your luck is going to be considerably worse than the average.

People should just get together in large groups and pool their money, it would be much cheaper.

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