What fun would we have in the off season then?
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The Great Big Medicare Rip-Off [Medicare Advantage]
- Thread starter sshafran
- Start date
- 16,953
You are making the assumption that government can run a health system as effectively as private companies on the free market. Not many people believe that it can. That’s how they created Medicare Advantage in the first place.
- 16,953
They already did that once. Renewals used to pay the same as first year and then one day right after the season started they go half comp at the stroke of a pen.
I’ve calculated about 80% of mapd sales are people who already have mapd . So on those first yr and renewals the same.
- 10,389
Not many people?? That is a huge assumption.
The current generation of medicare beneficiaries were taught to believe that. And their generation gave healthcare over to the private corporations..... and look what we have now....
Now it has massive waste, fraud, & other issues. And while the government option has those issues to a smaller extent ..... they are not using a corporate middle man and giving them billions a year in profits using tax-payer money to run a system with even more issues than the original system.
The whole "government is inept" argument is null and void when the private corporations are abusing the system and raiding the taxpayer piggy bank in a massively immoral way.
They are not doing it more efficiently.... they are just getting more government subsidies which keeps prices lower than the government run option. Thats not business efficiency, its government welfare!!
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- 16,953
Well I agree that it’s two competing ideologies. The right leaning people think free enterprise can always outperform government entities. The left leaning believe that government run with no profit motivation makes more sense.
So the righties got Medicare Advantage passed under George Bush and it ran too reckless and crazy at first. Then under Obama they reeled it in but put way too many rules and restrictions on it many of which were just to stifle sales not to protect consumers. Then Trump gets in there are neuters a lot of the marketing rules and it gets a little too Wild West again. Now the lefties are in charge and more rules are coming our way again. It’s a political ping pong ball.
But one thing the left has acknowledged is that the base of voters is on Medicare Advantage so they have to tread carefully. One of Obamas very first speech’s was about how Medicare Advantage was hurting Medicare and it helped no one and he was going to do away with it. That’s when Humana sent letters to their insureds to flood congress with letters that if they ended it they would vote them out and the politicians had to re-group. They can’t just end it.
My expectation is that if the Dems are in power long enough they will require the companies to become more standardized (probably a good thing for consumers) and create a direct enrollment system that is easy to use. Once that is in place commissions will go way down. They can also defund it enough to make some of the extras dry up.
I agree that we should go one way or the other. Two systems creates a lot of waste and is overly confusing to the seniors. I think eventually we will get there and likely the government single payer system will win out.
And standardized mapd plans are in the works.....
[EXTERNAL LINK] - Medicare Panel Weighs Standard Benefits for Managed Care Plans
- Thread starter
- #128
My idea for when I'm elected Dictator is to limit the Med Adv offerings to three per carrier.
That's the PDP limit. No reason to have 7 Humana plans, 5 BCBS, 6 UHCs, and 74 WellCare.
And, no subsidiary shenanigans like Medigap to try to bypass the 3 limit. I see what you're trying to do there...
Vote for me.
Just so long as you mandate availability of a Medical Savings Account option in all counties....
- 6,541
First challenge is there are more than three types of Medicare Advantage plans.
Not voting for you. We can adjourn at 3, have some meetings and vote again tomorrow. You can hope I'll change my mind.
