Glitch in health care law allows employers to offer substandard insurance

[alp227]

A flaw in the federal calculator for certifying that insurance meets the health-care law’s toughest standard is leading dozens of large employers to offer plans that lack basic benefits, such as hospitalization coverage, according to brokers and consultants.

The calculator appears to allow companies enrolling workers for 2015 to offer inexpensive, substandard medical insurance while avoiding the Affordable Care Act’s penalties, consumer advocates said.

Insurance pros are also surprised such plans are permitted.

Employer insurance without hospital coverage “flies in the face of Obamacare,” said Liz Smith, president of employee benefits for Assurance, an Illinois-based insurance brokerage.

full: http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/glitch-in-health-care-law-allows-employers-to-offer-substandard-insurance/2014/09/12/27af2a24-39f7-11e4-bdfb-de4104544a37_story.html

[merrily]

1. Same glitch as the tax on so-called cadillac plans provided by employers?

My second job in the private sector was in a company that offered a so-called cadillac (Mercedes?) health insurance plan.

Sure, the owners of the company wanted a cadillac plan for themselves, and on a tax deductible basis, too. But, tax laws at the time penalized the owners for having a better plan than the lower-paid employees. As a result, the supply clerk who handed us paper and pens was covered was when she breast cancer in her twenties.

Sadly, the supply clerk did not make it, despite some of the best medical care available in this country, maybe the world. It was caught too late. However, at least she did not die in bankruptcy court. Not that the poor thing had accumulated much that a bankruptcy court could have taken, but she had won, in a City of Boston lottery, the right to buy a low cost condo and her family had helped her with the down payment.

BTW, before ACA, medical costs were the leading cause of personal bankruptcy and in the majority of those cases, both spouses had health insurance. The deductibles and co-pays alone caused people to lose everything, unless state law protected at least their homes.

But, to have been able keep your home despite personal bankruptyc, you also have to have the money to pay your mortgage and real estate taxes. Oh, and you probably had to have qualified and filed for protection before you got into debt. Not to mention that you had to have bought a home instead of renting.

[FlatStanley]

5. Did you know you can no longer bankruptcy out if health costs now?

[merrily]

6. Another glitch?

You can't get student loans or medical expenses discharged in bankruptcy. See any pattern there?

ETA: Per posters downthread, you can still get debt that consists of medical expenses discharged in bankruptcy. Shame on me for not googling before posting.

[FlatStanley]

8. People need to be corporations, my friend.

[merrily]

9. Apparently, corporations also need to be people, my friend.

[FlatStanley]

10. With the aches and pains and potential jail time that sometimes comes along

[merrily]

11. Let's not get carried away my friend. Unlike flesh and bone people, corporations

do not got to jail, a characteristic they apparently share with most of their directors and officers, and they can live for hundreds of years.

[FlatStanley]

12. I've always imagined the the death of a corporation as follows:

Like a person, a corporation is pronounced dead when it is brain dead. Brain dead for the corporation is epitomized by the death of the "brains of the outfit", eg, the executive board.

All the workers represent organ doners that are placed in other corporate persons to maintain those corporate persons.

Creepy, I know, but when you become a person you get the whole package.

[merrily]

13. Actually, it's just a messenger handing corporate dissolution papers to someone

in the Office of the Secretary of State, usually when the corporation ceases to enrich enough people to justify its existence. Or, involuntary dissolution (execution?) by someone in the Office of the Secretary of State, usually because someone forgot to pay the annual fee due. In the latter case, of course, resurrection is possible by filing back fees plus a revival fee.

No wonder corporations need religious freedom!

[FlatStanley]

18. That process is for the Corporate Classic.

I'm talking about the new and improved Corporate Citizen

[merrily]

19. So am I. Corporate Classic never got capital punishment or resurrection.

[kcr]

16. Not for medical debt.

You can discharge medical debt.

[Progressive dog]

17. No I didn't know because

it is not rue.

[etherealtruth]

20. What .... where did you obtain this info?

[sendero]

24. Please provide a link..

... because I'm 99% sure you are flat wrong.

[leftstreet]

25. There was never any such thing as 'medical bankruptcy' n/t

[FlatStanley]

26. I stand corrected on this piece of misinformation I have carelessly propagated.

It seems I did not do my due diligence when I first came by this assertion.

This is why I can't have nice things

[PoliticAverse]

2. Similar to the 'glitch' that delayed the employer mandate I guess... n/t

[merrily]

7. The individual mandate was glitchless?

[BlindTiresias]

3. ACA GOOD

ACA GOOD. WILL LEAD TO UHC BECAUSE MAGIC. PERFECT ENEMY GOOD.

[FlatStanley]

4. Glitch, feature, tomayto, tomahto

[RandiFan1290]

14. Yeah, a glitch

[Doctor_J]

15. seems like these glitches always favor the corporations

Wait. You think maybe they aren't really glitches????

[VanillaRhapsody]

27. because the corporations pay people to scour the document to find loopholes...

that's their job....Corporate Loophole Detectors!

[Doctor_J]

28. Maybe "our" representatives, most of whom are lawyers, should have scoured it

themselves and taken the loopholes out before they made it the law of the land.

Like I said. These are NOT glitches. They were built in to make it even more corporation-friendly.

[VanillaRhapsody]

29. Maybe you shouldn't let the good be the enemy of the perfect.....

[Doctor_J]

32. And maybe you shouldn't claim that the awful is actually the good

You need to try to work past your love for the president. He's supposed to be our employee, not an infant we have to protect. When he makes big insurance part of the government, or approves off shore fracking, he should be criticized.

[VanillaRhapsody]

33. Awful? Why would I claim that....during a brief episode of unemployment...I HAD Obamacares...

Silver plan for $61 a month....$10 copays!

I have been unemployed without it in the recent past...I can tell YOU it sure is less stressful when you have Healthcare available...so ...

WTF are YOU talking about?

YOU are crazy to call THAT something awful....it may not be perfect...but CERTAINLY isn't awful. Awful is unemployment and NO healthcare available I can tell your ass that!

[SammyWinstonJack]

21. Glitch Smitch.....It's the best we could HOPE for. The best we could do!

[leftstreet]

22. 'Glitch' newspeak for 'design' n/t

[Ron Green]

23. Support your state's single-payer movement.

Give your money, your time, start a new chapter. Or visit http://mvhca.org to donate.

[Skittles]

30. well isn't that special

[woo me with science]

31. Oh how ACCIDENTALLY ACCIDENTAL!!!!111!1!

[Tuesday Afternoon]

34. DU Rec.