From Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wendell-potter/the-usual-suspects-who-wi_b_2158649.html
Wendell Potter
11/19/2012
Disruption.
Get ready to hear that word many times in the coming weeks, especially if you hang out inside the Washington beltway.
“Disruption” will be the new buzzword in an upcoming advertising campaign aimed at scaring us. The campaign is selling the idea that millions of Americans will face higher premiums and possibly be forced into health plans with skimpier benefits — i.e., disrupted — if Congress doesn’t repeal a provision of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that raises money to pay for expanding coverage for the uninsured.
The greed of the health insurance industry knows no bounds. Insurance companies will get billions of dollars in new revenue every year as a result of the health act’s requirement that, starting in 2014, we will have to buy coverage from private insurers if we’re not eligible for Medicare or Medicaid.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 32 million uninsured Americans will finally get coverage as a result of the law. While many will be newly eligible for the Medicaid program, millions of others will get subsidies from the federal government to help them buy private insurance. So insurance companies will get new premium revenue not only from individuals and families but also from the government.
To help finance this expanded coverage, the ACA includes a premium fee on insurers and their business customers that provide the highest level of coverage (like the so-called Cadillac plans). The fee, which is estimated to raise $87 billion over 10 years, will go into effect simultaneously with the individual mandate.
Even though insurers will get a huge infusion of cash from us and the government over that period, they are claiming it’s not fair for them have to foot any of the bill. They insist they’ll have no choice but to pass the fee — which they call a tax — on to their policyholders. In other words, they’re not happy enough with the cake the government is giving them. They want to eat every crumb of it, too.
Continue reading at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wendell-potter/the-usual-suspects-who-wi_b_2158649.html
