Mergers, or "non-mergers", are now called "alliances" and are on the rise since the implementation of Obamacare. So what will these "alliances" mean to the patient? That I don't know, yet. But I do know that monopolies, excuse me, alliances, will eventually be bad for the ordinary consumer, or patient, if history has shown us anything. There's power in size, and we as patients are on the bottom of the power totem pole.
But there are some new and different issues cropping up and multiplying in the age of for-profit-healthcare, "drive-by-doctors" and "innovative coding". I can pretty much guarantee that this will continue to raise costs, and aggravation, for patients. So much for the ACA controlling costs and simplifying healthcare.
Wikipedia wrote:The ACA was enacted with the goals of increasing the quality and affordability of health insurance, lowering the uninsured rate by expanding public and private insurance coverage, and reducing the costs of healthcare for individuals and the government. It introduced a number of mechanisms——including mandates, subsidies, and insurance exchanges——meant to increase coverage and affordability.[6][7] The law also requires insurance companies to cover all applicants within new minimum standards and offer the same rates regardless of pre-existing conditions or sex.[8] Additional reforms aimed to reduce costs and improve healthcare outcomes by shifting the system towards quality over quantity through increased competition, regulation, and incentives to streamline the delivery of healthcare. In 2011 the Congressional Budget Office projected that the ACA would lower both future deficits[9] and Medicare spending.[10]
The only thing it's done is put more people on insurance, and even that's a squishy number right now. The way everything is going, the affordable part is only a pipe dream. I don't see how costs will be controlled or quality improved when health care monopolies form and stifle competition, doctors add on charges the patient doesn't know about nor realize they're consenting to until AFTER a procedure is done and that "innovative coding" which is being used solely to make more profits and not benefit patients, all to get around insurance company rules.
The state's progressive vision of universal coverage and the conservative idea of market competition are what formed the blueprint for Obamacare: that everyone should have access to quality, affordable health care, and no one should ever go broke just because they get sick.
Cat (n.) A bipolar creature which would as soon gouge your eyes out as it would cuddle.
Marketing usually over does it a bit. Don't blame anyone though....they really wanted the product to live up to the promises.
And besides, Bush probably screwed it all up so that it wouldn't work. He was in the Whitehouse for years before they ever let Obama in. He probably sabotaged things cause he's white you know.
Okay, guys, we get it. Can we ditch the sarcasm and back-and-forth about race, and get back to the original topic?
There's a really interesting topic here, specifically about how the market is adapting to get around the elements of the ACA which were purportedly supposed to control it. Which begs the question, can controls on a free market ever work in the long term, or will the market always find a way?
Not only is it common for the market to find a way, if they have trouble there are politicians that will sell exemptions to the controls.
Like Spidey said the ACA wasnt ever going to fix the issues it was campaigned on.
It will always find a way, because people will always want to find a way around the rules to give themselves the advantage. It's no different than in any game. Sports personalities find newer and more devious ways to cheat to win, and not get caught. Win by any means possible. Isn't that what Americans want? Survival of the fittest? To heck with the other guy as long as I'm fat and happy?
This is the way it works in ALL human endeavors by the way. Politics and the free market both play the game the same way Will. Cheat or gain control to win. Neither politicians, nor people that run the free market are exempt. They'll both do what it takes to win. You can't trade one for the other and expect a better, or even different, outcome. Get rid of government, sure, the market will go towards a solution. Is that solution what people really want though? I don't think most Americans can envision the harsh reality of a totally free market solution.
Cat (n.) A bipolar creature which would as soon gouge your eyes out as it would cuddle.
agree with that last part, TC........to few people look at the early Industrial Revolution, or overall conditions in the US pre-Teddy Roosevelt to grasp what a largely urban society under free-market without regulation looks like.
"The Party told you to reject all evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command."
George Orwell---"1984"
You watched "The Roosevelts" too huh? Pretty damn good movie Ken Burns did. There was history there I hadn't ever heard of. Most Americans should have watched it just to see the misery caused by the Industrial Revolution, the rise and fall of Wall Street and the big banks and all controlled by the Robber Barons who were aided and abetted by the crooked politicians of the time. I don't know how people survived it. Guess I'm soft.
Cat (n.) A bipolar creature which would as soon gouge your eyes out as it would cuddle.
callmeslick wrote:actually, the ACA addressed precisely those items it was touted to. It was not designed to address ALL issues, such as some mentioned here.
I can recall a lot of ACA items Obama and others campaigned on that have not been addressed. At least if you expected them to be addressed in the positive way they promised...
I dont think your definition of "precisely" is very precise and your narrative doesn't jibe with reality.
