ACA ‘horror stories’ keep crumbling

[glowing]

12. Our insurance went down, either because of some of these mandatory modificatios OR because the hotel

management group that just took over my husband's hotel has a larger pool of workers? No matter what, for the first time in probably 4 yrs, we are paying under $6000.00/ yr for coverage (the last two years it was $7500.00/yr and now down to $5800.00 plus better co-pays and lower deductibles).

My mother in law is divorcing for the 2nd time in her life, and after 23yrs of marriage to a man who has a good income, pension plan, and insurance benefits, is having to price out insurance rates for herself in NC. She was asking her daughter, who actually does work processing tri-care benefits for blue cross and blue shield, to help her price out her insurance costs for the allimony payment as her lawyer asked her to do. She went into healthcare.gov and was getting, what I think, are too high of quotes for someone who will be living on a monthly allimony income (and if she starts working any type of part-time or low wage job for the first time ever in her life, the payments will decrease - not exactly fair when she was the one expected to stay home and raise children and he decides after 21 yrs he can't stand her anymore and must leave). So, she isn't expecting to have to take on a job at this late point in her life. She expects to be living the type of life she was promised all these years when he was near "retirement" years (he works as an airtraffic controller and has for many years). SO, who do they call, me.. LOL Of course, I'll know the information she's passing onto me better than most people who have been hearing lies flung around in the great, red state of North Carolina.

I told her, keep the rate high now to put into the formula for expenses so he has to pay. She's losing really good benefits with this divorce. (We are quite sure this man has slunk off and created a new family with a younger woman - let the bastard pay). But when the divorce decree is signed, and they are legally separated, then she needs to play with her income level. Let's face it, her allimony payment is going to look a bit different on paper as "income" than most people's take home pay will look. At the moment, she's puting in an amount akin to minimum wage pay like her lawyer told her to do as an expected income if she was working (which is another issue I told her to fix, should she have been in the work force for the last 20yrs working at a career instead of working in the home as was their life expected set up, then she would have likely been taking home much more than min wage, but I digress). I told her, because she's in NC and NC refused to opt into the ACA plan and expand medicaid and build a website for its people, she was stuck on the .gov site. If she was inputting a min wage yearly compensation, she was more than likely qualifying for the "expanded medicaid" portion of what states who opted in had for their residents. When she is pricing out healthcare, she is more than likely going to have to overestimate her income to activate the subsidies portion of insurance benefits. It should be much lower for her by hereself to price out than nearly $500.00/ month (that's about $50.00 more than we are paying). I don't think the subsidies are kicking in because her income portion is too low (she's not taking into account the "living expenses" portion added to "work compensation" portion). Needless to say, its quite evident this is a woman who has never held an outside job or has ever worried about how to pay a bill or what insurance looks like when one is not employed with a benefit provider. I definately would encourage any daughter I ever had to make sure she could work and never depend/ rely on someone else as a provider. At nearly 60yrs old, my mother in law is in new territory that is more than frightening to her. She's lucky she married well off, otherwise, the rest of us would be at a loss as to how we could even begin to help her out.. we struggle ourselves.

Oh, and her comment was, thank goodness someone did do something about insurance. If I was having to divorce and try and buy insurance on the open market as it was before, I wouldn't be able to afford it... She had major kidney issues and she's an older woman, over the age of 50. It's a blesssing she will still be able to find quality insurance like she's been on her married life, on her own and without having an employer provide it. So, for all those who knock it down, eventually they will have an issue, have a job drop their coverage, have a health problem, and they, too, will be grateful that someone finally made some regulations and mandates on how these greedy insurance companies would treat their customers. And when I explained to her that it could have been easier on her if NC had opted in and put up a NC insurance exchange like the original intention of the ACA outlined, then the model could have been easier to navigate, her state insurance rates would be there for her to see, and if she qualified for the new expanded medicaid, then she would have been even better off. (I think she's going to have to play with her income level to initiate the subsidies, currently she's in expanded medicaid territory with her income estimation). And I haven't heard enough about different state sign ups that tell the actual income # that people would input and # of people, for the lowest insurance premium offerings. I told her, once more people are signed up and calling relatives in a state that opted in, the people of the "opt out" state would start vocally insisting on their state opt in. And a few may gravitate toward single payer like VT is in 2017 once people see it work and see the costs/ savings.

Seeing these teaparty people gripe so much over insurance is just crazy. You know these are the same people who were before bitching about not having insurance or the costs going up so high every year... It's just amazing for these people to all of a sudden act as if insurance companies, before these newly enacted guidelines, were the epitomy of corporate sainthood. LOL.