Bacon's Rebellion

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Brace Yourself: Health Insurance Shock to Slam Virginia

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by

James A. Bacon
in ,

And you thought Hurricane Sandy was bad?

Hey, does anyone remember President Obama’s promise that health insurance premiums would fall by $2,500 a year for a family if Congress passed Obamacare? Probably not, because that prognostication is going so woefully wrong that the mainstream media has not dropped it into the memory hole.

But Virginians will have reason to recall the president’s words soon enough if the forecast of Merrill Matthews and Mark Litow is correct. Virginia is one of a dozen low-cost states where they expect health care premiums to skyrocket in 2014 when the full impact of Obamacare is felt. How bad will the increases be? Between 65% and 100%, with the sharpest rise in the individual market and more moderate rises for employees of self-insured companies.

Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Matthews and Litow expect the dirigists in Washington to blame everyone but themselves — greedy doctors, greedy hospitals, greedy insurance companies. Funny, isn’t it, how greed seems to run so rampant in industries where the geniuses in our Imperial Capital think they can do a better job of running things than the people in the industry themselves.

— JAB

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3 responses to “Brace Yourself: Health Insurance Shock to Slam Virginia”

  1. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    more propaganda from the “sky if falling” crew.

    ObamaCare is not even fully implemented.

    it was intended to bend the cost curve OVER TIME – not the instant the law was passed or even conceived.

    Merrill Matthews is a long-time anti-govt health care advocate who is associated with Conservative think tanks that are opposed to any/all govt health care except of course the govt-operated VA and govt-provided health care for the Military and their dependents.

    ” The Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI) is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy “think tank” based in Lewisville, Texas and founded in 1987 by Congressman Dick Armey ”

    why do we cite long-established opponents of govt-sponsored health care as credible commentators on ObamaCare?

    shame on you Jim Bacon. these sly tomes posts about supposedly “legitimate” studies are beneath your usual standards…..

    time will tell on ObamaCare – there will likely be good and bad. More changes will likely be needed – like they have been over time with Medicare, MedicAid, AND the VA AND TRICARE…. etc…

    so this constant drumbeat of opposition coming from longtime critics who were and are opposed to the CONCEPT of things like Medicare – from the beginning – is just more GRADE A BLATHER!

    Take THAT!

  2. Hydra Avatar
    Hydra

    If insurance costs double, many won’t even come close to being able to pay for it.

  3. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    Those who have been staunchly opposed to govt-sponsored health care – from the beginning – they opposed not only Medicare but Social Security – have spent the last 4 years trotting out every canard they could in an effort to undermine support for ObamaCare.

    Before ObamaCare was ever mentioned, it was known that health care costs were escalating at a horrendous rate and there were credible predictions that unless something was done – that health care costs would take about 30% of our economy.

    Now that ObamaCare has been determined to be Constitutional – the tactic is to claim that increases in health care costs – already expected prior to the establishment of ObamaCare are now, all of a sudden, …because of ObamaCare . Now mind you, ObamaCare has not even taken full effect yet but all the increases in costs are now due to ObamaCare –

    …if you listen to the propaganda being spewed by the very same folks who have ALWAYS been opposed to the CONCEPT of govt-sponsored health care – unless of course it’s for the military – then it’s fine.

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