What do you think of Obamacare?
Having worked in the Canadian single payer system and our own for profit hospitals, I greatly admire and prefer the Canadian. From the point of view as a critical care nurse, I loved being focussed on treatment first. The second the patient hit the triage desk we were about treatment only. The bureaucracy came later. In the USA nurses and doctors are expected to count each individual gauze, every tube of lotion, and every second spent on billing is time spent away from providing care. In Canada we just do our nursing duties and let stores and accounting count the costs. Accounting is a place a single payer system saves Canadians a fortune. In the USA we have entire towers filled with bookkeepers and accountants, not to mention the required collections department. Canadian hospitals have accounting departments that take up less room than most nursing units, which leaves the towers available for more patient beds. Fewer accountants means more nurses. People who argue that their system costs more fail to take this efficiency into account. Obamacare is a small step towards that superior Canadian system, where every citizen is covered through the general revenues of the tax system. In Canada there has not been a medical bankruptcy in the last half century, and no person has been denied treatment because of a pre existing condition. I never worked in Europe, but nurses and doctors have assured me that this is true in every industrialized democracy but ours. In terms of access to health care we are number thirty seven! The Canadian system is great for doctors as well, although the younger ones do not realize it because they do not remember how they used to need five clerks for the single one they employ today. They also do not need bill collection agencies and lawyers to track down their patients. Seriously, the Canadian system save so much on bureaucracy that can then be spent on parient care! I admit this is more about private care, including the Obama version, versus single payer universal coverage, but my point is that I think Obamacare is a very small but significant step towards equality with Canada and the European Union. That's why I will vote for a Democrat who supports single payer before any other candidate in the upcoming primaries. We deserve to be at least as good as Portugal, don't we?
Will 'Trumpcare' be better than the ACA (Obamacare)?
There is no such thing as “Trumpcare”. He has no plan - If there was one it would have been put forward in the last two years, while the Republicans controlled all three Houses.I mean, if I’ve missed something by all means link me to something that describes the details of his proposal, like how it would be funded and so on. I’d love to read about it - Sounds like universal health insurance, which would be great for the US!
Who names the aca Obamacare?
The Republicans were the ones that began to call the Affordable Care Act by the name “Obamacare” as a sign of contempt and to indicate that they wanted nothing to do with it. Obama always said that if the plan was effective that the Republicans would quickly change the name to something else. Unfortunately the ACA has proved to be a mixed bag of successes and failures.
Which one do you prefer, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) or Obamacare? Why?
Umm… Is this question a joke? the ACA is the same thing as Obamacare. The correct name is the The Patient and Affordable Care Act… or ACA for short. Republicans wanting to blame Obama for it began calling it Obamacare. President Obama had no problem with that and did not take it as the insult the GOP intended it to be.If you recall the news… it was found that millions of people had no idea that Obamacare and the ACA were the same thing until Trump and the current GOP leaders tried to end it. When those millions of people realized the actually were receiving health insurance through “Obamacare” they had a fit and bogged the phone lines and sent emails and letters, forcing Congress to drop their attempts to end Obamacare. By the way… it’s now called ACA more often because in fact, after adjustments and attempts to sabotage it… it’s Trumpcare.
Who wants to see obamacare go away?
It has been such a mess for my family. The premiums are high and we get no coverage. Each year, the open enrollment always presents a problem for us and there is always a roadblock. I miss the old days of going to a building with a person in it to talk with and who sells you insurance and that's it. How does everyone else feel?
When did the Affordable Care Act start being called 'ObamaCare'?
The ACA started being called Obamacare in 2007. Jeanne Schulte Scott was the first person to use the term in Healthcare Financial Management in March 2007.This article has a good timeline of when it was first used in print.Who Coined 'Obamacare'?
Do you agree with abolishing the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare)?
Yes! The ACA was a huge mistake from the beginning. The Democrats knew this which is why Pelosi said, “We have to pass the bill in order to find out what [is] in it.” They wanted to look like they were helping the little guy by providing health insurance to people that did not have any. This completely ignored the fact that if uninsured people were poor, Medicaid already existed and Medicare was in place for those people over 65. The end result was a program that had catastrophic results for all Americans that were insured already!People that had health insurance for many years at reasonable premiums had their premiums tripled and even quadrupled after they were required to change to an “ACA compliant” policy. So a 60-year-old man now had maternity coverage! This basically left many of us uninsured because the premiums were now too high. In addition, after the ACA was put in place if a health insurance company was not on the “Exchange” in your given area they could not sell you a policy (on or off the Exchange)! So if you had Blue Cross for 25 years and had to cancel the policy because the premiums were raised, then you wait a couple of years to see if the premiums are any better, it does not matter! If Cigna is the only option on the Exchange, that is the only company where you can get coverage (as an example).The solution is to return to an open market where insurance companies can compete for your business. The consumer should be able to shop for a policy from anywhere in the United States. This would not take away health care from people that need it, but rather allow more people to receive health care coverage again.The ACA cannot sustain itself financially because it does not have a sound financial structure. It will collapse on itself if left as is. Getting ahead of this is the best option for all Americans.Once the Un-affordable ACA is abolished or at least radically changed, maybe I will be able to afford health insurance again….if I am not dead already.
How does the obamacare mandate affect my mixed status family?
As a US citizen, you are required to have health insurance as of 1/1/2014, so over a year ago. To establish your eligibility for subsidies under the ACA, your family income is what counts. That means your husband's income counts as well, but he is not eligible for taxpayer subsidized health care. It's pretty much the same as if you were to apply for food stamps: the entire household income is counted for income purpose, but your husband would not be eligible for benefits. Now . . . the idea of affordable health care is not that you pay a few dollars in penalty, but to make sure you are covered if you get run over by a bus or all of a sudden experience a serious illness. We, the American People, do not want you to get bankrupt, and we do not want you to have to live in a card board box because of an illness or accident. If your household income is near the poverty level, you would be covered under Medicare for free, with zero premium, zero co-payment, and that even includes dental care. If your household income is about $30K annually, you'd have to pay about $150 per month for a great Silver Plan with low co-payments and low deductibles.