For Trump and GOP, 'Obamacare' repeal is complex and risky

[onthesoi]

8 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

 It's pretty bizarre and depressing how the USA can't get this done. 

 

It's utterly insane how the greatest military power in the world cannot provide adequate healthcare for it's citizens.

 

Maybe priorities needs revising...not checked recently but under Bush 21 cents of every tax dollar was going on weapons.

 

 

On 22/11/2016 at 0:26 AM, ClutchClark said:

The requirement that all Americans have to pay into private corporations with no choice as consumers or be breaking the law goes against American principles.

 

[Scott]

Off-topic posts removed.  

[Jingthing]

President Obama makes an appeal to not trash Obamacare!

Good luck considering trump just picked a HHS secretary dedicated to doing just that.

 

 

 

[Jingthing]

Many people including me are wondering how the trump "terrific" replacement plan for Obamacare will be able to accomplish the MAGIC of trashing the mandate, trashing the penalty for non-compliance, and still cover pre-existing conditions.

It's still very, very, vague but I did hear a few clues recently.

 

One was a statement saying the people currently benefiting from ACA wouldn't lose their coverage immediately, whatever that means, does indicate that they would eventually.

 

More to the point of the magic, another clue I read was that instead of mandate/penalties the exact same dynamic could be achieved by having MUCH HIGHER premiums for people that don't have coverage but join up when they get sick, and need the coverage. It's basically a penalty scheme just designed differently!

 

This seems fairly likely to me as they can say they've killed mandates, which are indeed very unpopular. It may be of concern to EXPATS who plan to repatriate if they aren't given an exclusion from the higher premium class based on living abroad. 

 

The other major magical mystery is what about the SUBSIDIES to buy insurance for the lower income people. The only subsidies I see now with trumpcare are about tax deductions, which are of no or little relevance to lower income people now getting subsidies. 

 

Anyway, changes are coming, some people will benefit, others will get hurt -- BADLY. 

Edited December 5, 2016 by Jingthing

[Jingthing]

A depressingly DARK theory about trump's Obamacare "replacement" plan.

 

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/12/05/republicans-are-actively-helping-trump-weaken-our-democracy-with-his-lies/?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-f%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.b6ee9a219365

Quote

 

GOP WILL REPEAL THE ACA AND BLAME DEMS: Paul Krugman comments on the GOP’s emerging strategy to repeal the ACA on a delayed schedule, to give them time to supposedly replace it later:

By then, G.O.P. leaders promise, they’ll have come up with the replacement they haven’t been able to devise over the past seven years. There will, of course, be no replacement….But the political thinking seems to be that they can find a way to blame Democrats for the debacle. It’s all very Trumpian, if you think about it….his hallmark has been turning a profit on failed business projects, because he finds a way to leave other people holding the bag.

 

 

 

Edited December 5, 2016 by Jingthing

[Ulysses G.]

THEORY is the operative word. Not worth paying attention to at this point.

[Jingthing]

24 minutes ago, Ulysses G. said:

THEORY is the operative word. Not worth paying attention to at this point.

I disagree.

As what the actual people in power intend to do is so muddled, it's worth trying to figure it out.

 

https://twitter.com/PaulKrugman

[Ulysses G.]

12 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

I disagree.

As what the actual people in power intend to do is so muddled, it's worth trying to figure it out.

 

https://twitter.com/PaulKrugman

 

Paul Krugman is a disgrace - not worth listening to either.

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2014/07/14/is-paul-krugman-leaving-princeton-in-quiet-disgrace/#5a1f32f62da7

[ilostmypassword]

On 12/6/2016 at 2:10 AM, Ulysses G. said:

 

Paul Krugman is a disgrace - not worth listening to either.

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2014/07/14/is-paul-krugman-leaving-princeton-in-quiet-disgrace/#5a1f32f62da7

your appetite for fake news is insatiable

[ilostmypassword]

On 12/6/2016 at 1:29 AM, Ulysses G. said:

THEORY is the operative word. Not worth paying attention to at this point.

And yet the GOP has been proposing repeal for 6 years and still doesn't have a plan.

[Ulysses G.]

4 minutes ago, ilostmypassword said:

And yet the GOP has been proposing repeal for 6 years and still doesn't have a plan.

 

Doesn't make fake theories real. 

[cdnvic]

Off topic blind link removed.

[Jingthing]

A voice of reason ... will be ignored of course in this time of "populist" madness:

Quote

Repealing Obamacare without replacing it would be a disaster

President Trump would sign such a measure — yet the 2016 election may have made the replacement part of the effort harder. As a candidate and president-elect, Donald Trump made promises that will be very hard to keep about what his health policy would accomplish. He vowed to sustain or broaden coverage, make health care more affordable, improve quality of care and cut government health-care spending.

Achieving these goals simultaneously may be impossible. Over the past six years, Republicans have come up with several replacement plans. But none has consensus support even among Republicans — and none has been evaluated to determine whether it meets the incoming president’s goals, including his promise to retain protections for those with preexisting conditions.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/repealing-obamacare-without-replacing-it-would-be-a-disaster/2016/12/06/74ce1fc2-bbf5-11e6-91ee-1adddfe36cbe_story.html?utm_term=.7781ee87b7fb

 

 

Edited December 7, 2016 by Jingthing

[ilostmypassword]

13 hours ago, Ulysses G. said:

 

Doesn't make fake theories real. 

And yet you cited an article based on ridiculous speculation about Paul Krugman.

[Ulysses G.]

30 minutes ago, ilostmypassword said:

And yet you cited an article based on ridiculous speculation about Paul Krugman.

 

An editorial from Forbes magazine - only "ridiculous" to those of the far left ilk.

[Jingthing]

A ray of HOPE that the democrats (CHAMPIONS of health care access, weak as they are) will FIGHT this horrible attempt to trash Obamacare!

Quote

 

Schumer: If Republicans destroy our health system, we won’t throw them a lifeline“
We’re not going to do a replacement,” Schumer said of the Senate Democratic caucus. “If they repeal without a replacement, they will own it. Democrats will not then step up to the plate and come up with a half-baked solution that we will partially own. It’s all theirs.”

 

 

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/12/07/schumer-if-republicans-destroy-our-health-system-we-wont-throw-them-a-lifeline/?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-f%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.b01e31ff242b

 

Edited December 7, 2016 by Jingthing

[lannarebirth]

3 hours ago, ilostmypassword said:

And yet you cited an article based on ridiculous speculation about Paul Krugman.

 

No one need speculate about Paul Krugman, one need only read him, if you've the stomach for it. He's a narcissistic idiot. He's like the Left's version of Trump.

[ilostmypassword]

3 hours ago, lannarebirth said:

 

No one need speculate about Paul Krugman, one need only read him, if you've the stomach for it. He's a narcissistic idiot. He's like the Left's version of Trump.

Not only is he the guy who won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics, but he did even more important work later. He's the first one who showed how in modern times serious a threat low inflation or deflation could be. And when conservative economists were asserting that hyperinflation was right around the corner due to the budget deficit and QE, Krugman's was the most prominent voice pointing out that this was nonsense. Some idiot!

ANd what makes Krugman even better is that unlike the most prominent conservative economists, he actually admits to his errors. Some narcissist!

[Ulysses G.]

Paul Krugman is a far left, partisan hack. He was wrong about Obamacare and he has been wrong over and over again.

 

http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2016/06/14/paul-krugman-is-nearly-always-wrong/

[ilostmypassword]

2 hours ago, Ulysses G. said:

Paul Krugman is a far left, partisan hack. He was wrong about Obamacare and he has been wrong over and over again.

 

http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2016/06/14/paul-krugman-is-nearly-always-wrong/

Wow. Now you are using Breitbart.com to back up your arguments. This article is typical of Breitbard, It consists mainly of insults and falsehood. Unlike you, I won't simply invoke their name to discredit this article, I'll look at a few falsehoods.

 He actually served in a junior position briefly on the Reagan Council of Economic Advisors — something he often hides.

I know that Krugman worked for Reagan because he has mentioned it several times. What does it even mean to say the he "often hides" it? Really, explain that to me.

"The numbers show that wages were flat in the 1990s for the bottom 90 percent of the US population and the whole thing died in 2001 in the dotcom crash, wiping out the supposed investment boom. "

This is simply a lie. http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2000/03/art2full.pdf  And of course it doesn't address the huge increase in employment during that time.

"His solution for every problem is the same, raise taxes and have the federal government borrow yet more debt. "

Another lie. Krugman, like most Keynesians. advocates increased spending in the bust and saving in the boom. And he has written this repeatedly.  http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/05/24/how-end-depression/

As for Obamacare, any of its problems could easily have been fixed by Congress. And lots of states made the problems a lot worse by opting out of Medicaid and forcing poor people to go on exchanges instead, which helped to dramatically raise rates.  http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/10/27/how_states_have_sabotaged_obamacare.html

And despite the rate rises, most people who actually use Obamacare like it.http://www.cnbc.com/2016/05/24/high-satisfaction-levels-with-obamacare-as-2017-prices-emerge.html

I think someone would have to be entirely without shame to invoke an article like this as evidence of anything.

 

 

 

 

[lannarebirth]

5 hours ago, ilostmypassword said:

Not only is he the guy who won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics, but he did even more important work later. He's the first one who showed how in modern times serious a threat low inflation or deflation could be. And when conservative economists were asserting that hyperinflation was right around the corner due to the budget deficit and QE, Krugman's was the most prominent voice pointing out that this was nonsense. Some idiot!

ANd what makes Krugman even better is that unlike the most prominent conservative economists, he actually admits to his errors. Some narcissist!

 

I believe the first commenter in the Comments section sums up Krugman very well. He is a political opinion writer masquerading as a writer of economics.

 

https://mises.org/library/fact-checking-paul-krugmans-claim-be-right-about-everything

[Jingthing]

Explaining how Republicans sabotaged Obamacare and killed many poor Americans in the process --


http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/12/06/magazine/life-in-obamacares-dead-zone.html?referer=http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2016/12/america-is-failing-the-bad-break-test-and-people-are-dying.html
.

[ilostmypassword]

On 12/8/2016 at 10:25 AM, lannarebirth said:

 

I believe the first commenter in the Comments section sums up Krugman very well. He is a political opinion writer masquerading as a writer of economics.

 

https://mises.org/library/fact-checking-paul-krugmans-claim-be-right-about-everything

Well, the far right Mises organization. The ones who kept on claiming that hyperinflation was the inevitable consquence of QE.  How did that work out? And we know that this article is based on a lie since Krugman has always been very open about things he got wrong.

And we can see the stupidity or dishonesty of the author of this article from the way he uses this Krugman quote:

" To fight this recession the Fed needs more than a snapback; it needs soaring household spending to offset moribund business investment. And to do that, as Paul McCulley of Pimco put it, Alan Greenspan needs to create a housing bubble to replace the Nasdaq bubble. "

It's clear that by using the pejorative term of "bubble" as a policy recommendation, Krugman was being ironic. Moreover he called the rapid rise in housing prices a bubble.  Right up until that bubble burst with disastrous consequences for the economy, Republicans and conservative economists were denying that there was a bubble. In fact, you may not believe this but there are conservative economists who still deny that there was a housing price bubble.

 

[lannarebirth]

3 hours ago, ilostmypassword said:

Well, the far right Mises organization. The ones who kept on claiming that hyperinflation was the inevitable consquence of QE.  How did that work out? And we know that this article is based on a lie since Krugman has always been very open about things he got wrong.

And we can see the stupidity or dishonesty of the author of this article from the way he uses this Krugman quote:

" To fight this recession the Fed needs more than a snapback; it needs soaring household spending to offset moribund business investment. And to do that, as Paul McCulley of Pimco put it, Alan Greenspan needs to create a housing bubble to replace the Nasdaq bubble. "

It's clear that by using the pejorative term of "bubble" as a policy recommendation, Krugman was being ironic. Moreover he called the rapid rise in housing prices a bubble.  Right up until that bubble burst with disastrous consequences for the economy, Republicans and conservative economists were denying that there was a bubble. In fact, you may not believe this but there are conservative economists who still deny that there was a housing price bubble.

 

 

Yeah, the Mises group is a purveyor of the Austriain Economics school. It's just one of the mainstream economics schools of thought of which there are many. It advocates a laissez faire style of economics which is hardly far right.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_economic_thought#Austrian_school

 

What is it with labeling everything one doesn't agree with hard right? It's silly. Anyway...

 

If you're an economics major you're supposed to study several schools of economic thought because none are right all the time or even most of the time. More often than not a plan from one school of economic thought will get you out of the jam that a different school of economic thought got you into. Try to keep an open mind.

Edited December 11, 2016 by lannarebirth

[ilostmypassword]

15 minutes ago, lannarebirth said:

 

Yeah, the Mises group is a purveyor of the Austriain Economics school. It's just one of the mainstream economics schools of thought of which there are many. It advocates a laissez faire style of economics which is hardly far right.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_economic_thought#Austrian_school

 

What is it with labeling everything one doesn't agree with hard right? It's silly. Anyway...

 

If you're an economics major you're supposed to study several schools of economic thought because none are right all the time or even most of the time. More often than not a plan from one school of economic thought will get you out of the jam that a different school of economic thought got you into. Try to keep an open mind.

I noticed you completely ignored my specific challenge to the article in question. You might want to address that.

And you'r'e quite wrong about economics. Keynesianism has been vastly superior in its economic predictions than any other school of economics.  The Austrian school keeps on getting it wrong but since it appeals to a substantial portion of the very wealthy, it has no problems in funding its fumbling.

[lannarebirth]

7 minutes ago, ilostmypassword said:

I noticed you completely ignored my specific challenge to the article in question. You might want to address that.

And you'r'e quite wrong about economics. Keynesianism has been vastly superior in its economic predictions than any other school of economics.  The Austrian school keeps on getting it wrong but since it appeals to a substantial portion of the very wealthy, it has no problems in funding its fumbling.

 

I am not an advocate of the Austrian school. Just as I think a singular devotion to Keynesianism is misguided I would think the same about any other school of economic thought . I am an advocate of learning however and I think it is wise to learn all the areas of thought on the matter, because tools can be borrowed between schools and of course more breadth of knowledge helps one to defend an economic plan or argument.

[ilostmypassword]

3 minutes ago, lannarebirth said:

 

I am not an advocate of the Austrian school. Just as I think a singular devotion to Keynesianism is misguided I would think the same about any other school of economic thought . I am an advocate of learning however and I think it is wise to learn all the areas of thought on the matter, because tools can be borrowed between schools and of course more breadth of knowledge helps one to defend an economic plan or argument.

That's how I feel about evolution. On the one hand I know I can learn from Darwin. But on the other hand the Bible has much to teach me about the matter, too.

[lannarebirth]

3 minutes ago, ilostmypassword said:

That's how I feel about evolution. On the one hand I know I can learn from Darwin. But on the other hand the Bible has much to teach me about the matter, too.

 

I don't see any parallels there. That you do tells me a lot about how I should regard your opinion on economic matters.

[ilostmypassword]

5 hours ago, lannarebirth said:

 

I don't see any parallels there. That you do tells me a lot about how I should regard your opinion on economic matters.

Let me put it another way: you think openmindedness is the same thing as mushymindedness.

[lannarebirth]

18 minutes ago, ilostmypassword said:

Let me put it another way: you think openmindedness is the same thing as mushymindedness.

 

No I don't. Not at all. In fact I approve of a classic Keynesian approach to managing the economy. I think the government and the FED have drifted far from that however, and I think Keynes would be aghast at what has been done in his name. But it'll work till it stops working.