I heard something really infuriating in passing on the News Hour a couple nights ago. The good folks at PBS did an interview with a cross section of Americans who had lost their jobs and were now receiving some form of government assistance (I know, depressing as fuck). Lots of common themes between all of them, but the one that really stuck out was that all of them had to ditch their health insurance because it was too expensive.
COBRA is supposed to assist with this. If you lose your job, you can sign up for the same health care you had before, but you now have to pay for total premium that your employer used to pay. Actually, you could be paying more, from the costs the interviewees were reporting, I suspect that you get a more expensive individual rate as opposed to a group rate (but this is unconfirmed). One woman said she had to pay $1100/mo just for herself and others were in the rage of $900-1300 for them and their children. Most were ineligible for medicaid because their made too much money (more than like 23k) from unemployment and other supplemental income to help them get by.
The loss of health benefits was a hardship for these folks, many of whom had to choose between medicine or food, and slightly more depressing: treatment for themselves or their kids. All of them had the potential looming disaster of serious illness which could financially ruin them for the rest of their lives. Much worse, the inability to afford the best care could mean a terrible health outcome should they become ill. It’s scary, because this could be anyone. If I lost my job, I wouldn’t be able to afford health insurance for very long.
At the end of the segment, the reporter threw in something to the effect of “the stimulus bill before congress addresses the cost of COBRA plans by subsidizing the cost for those who have lost their jobs, but the subsidy in the current bill is much lower than initially proposed.” At that point I almost threw my PBR at the TV in anger. Maybe I’m over assuming but that means one thing: The Republicans, while grandstanding about pork and “finding their voice,” actively negotiated to cut the size of this benefit.
To sum it up: Fuck the Republicans
Their behavior over the stimulus bill has been laughable at best. Nevermind their complete lack of credibility on the topic of spending (multi-trillion dollar deficits to fund a deceitfully pitched war). But rather than producing cogent arguments as to the efficacy of such a bill, the Republicans have limited themselves to simply excerpting spending programs from the bill and reading their names and costs with overly dramatic umbrage in our houses of government: “XX billion dollars for Children’s Health Care!? YY Billion dollars for infrastructure spending!? Who do these tax and spend libruuls think they are?”
Well, this health care thing takes it to a new low. The Wonk Room has a post with the details from the House/Senate negotiated bill:
[The compromise bill] Adopted the House’s higher 65% subsidy for COBRA (the Senate had a 50% subsidy) but agreed in turn to drop its proposal to increase Medicaid coverage to help lower income individuals face the same insurance dilemma and can’t afford to pay even a subsidized COBRA payment.
So in my uninformed interpretation of how this works: in the house version, a $1000/mo premium becomes $350 (still damned expensive) and the Republicans stood up against “pork” and fought to raise that to $500/mo. Thankfully, it looks like the higher subsidy will stick because of Nancy Pelosi and her crew.
But how degenerate is Mitch McConnell and the Senate Republicans? Thanks a lot you jackasses! In these tough times, I’m glad you’re standing up for your principles and preserving the potential of life long financial ruin for those of us unfortunate enough to lose our jobs. Nevermind that if I were to lose my job and then get sick, I probably wouldn’t be able to afford the treatment that might save my life.
The Republicans claim they’ve found their voice in this stimulus debate. I’d claim they’ve lost their minds.
Idiots.
As someone who has navigated the wily waters of being independently insured, I can tell you that $350 a month sounds like a deal and a half for a great health plan…all of which reaffirms my once and current outlook: health insurance is one giant scam. The whole system is a giant mess and it becomes completely apparent (as you’ve discovered) when you look at how tough it is to have insurance when you don’t have a job that provides it. I hope there’s something in the near future that’s going to alleviate all of this because, for now, it’s looking like we’re all on little canoes with a single paddle out in the middle of the ocean, you know?
1 | Maggie February 13th, 2009 at 6:37 pmYeah, health care is totally screwed up right now. I’ve heard just awful stories from my dad of people navigating the health care system without insurance. It’s dreadful what happens to them financially. Tear your ACL? That could easily be a 50k medical bill. No shit.
2 | Ocu-Master February 13th, 2009 at 7:59 pmRobert, I’ve been dealing with this for nearly two decades now. I pay divorced-lady COBRA; $450/mo for single health/dental.
The thing about the stimulus wuddayacall is that it works only for a very narrow band of COBRA-payers. Only those laid off within certain dates from jobs where the employer covered their insurance. Doesn’t help those laid off before, those in my situation, or those who’re on a spouse’s policy and paying sizeable bucks for that. I’ve heard no estimate of how many laid-off workers this effort covers, but I bet it’s not more than a sizeable minority.
3 | amy March 2nd, 2009 at 6:45 pmYeah, I’d read a lot about how this is a temporary provision targeted at the current economic crisis which cuts a lot of folks out of this, but don’t worry, soon mother government will give health care to all of us! :p
This is such a complicated domain of public policy that I don’t claim to have any answers. I do know that I can’t stand the current opposition party falling on the crutch of ideology rather than recognize and deal in good faith with the suffering that’s in our healthcare system for those who don’t have cushy insurance. Drill-baby-drill I guess, that is, unless you’re in the dentist’s office.
4 | Ocu-Master March 2nd, 2009 at 7:53 pm