all Americans would have health-care coverage by the end of his first term. another of his lies...but Billy Boy slipped and told the truth:
finance.yahoo.com
Bill Clinton managed to get himself into hot water this week by stating the obvious about outcomes for many enrollees of the Affordable Care Act. “It’s the craziest thing in the world,” the former president told a Flint, Michigan audience at a rally for his wife, who plans to keep and expand Obamacare.
People in the government-controlled individual markets gained access to health insurance Clinton said, but “wind up with their premiums doubled and their coverage cut in half.” Many of them, he noted, “are small business people and individuals who make just a little too much to get any of these subsidies.”
That just covers the premiums, which will skyrocket again in 2017. Clinton neglected to mention the other part of the equation that squeezes everyone regardless of whether they qualify for premium subsidies or not – deductibles. Except for an annual wellness check, any health care provided to consumers has to come out of pocket until the annual deductible has been met. In 2016, the average bronze plan deductible was $5,731 for individuals and $11,601 for families.
For a 40-year-old individual in 2016, the cost of this care would be $3,479 in premiums plus the deductible before the first benefit could be covered – a total of $9,210 out of pocket. Even if subsidies pared premiums all the way down to Barack Obama’s promised $75 per month, it would still require the consumer to spend over $6600 for anything but a basic wellness check, a service that would cost a few hundred dollars at most, before having the first benefit covered. And that situation will only get worse in 2017, as insurers use increases in deductibles to buffer the premium hikes that have already been signaled. |
