Great news! The health care bill passes! Although trying to get a copy or real summary to see the changes.

Hopefully this brings some real change to the industry! One of our companies just got hit with 20% to 30% raises on rates this year, and they also had the audacity to tell us the insurance company says they are working hard to sell us on what they call “educating” consumers to buy plans with higher deductibles and so on (ie make more money). I don’t blame them as they are businesses, which is why the government needs to run their own health care, health care needs to be a right or it will continue to hurt our nation and our economic growth. My personal health care rates increased about 20% this year and I have a pretty low end plan meant for emergencies.

Here is a nice dueling paragraph:

Health insurer WellPoint blames the Great Recession and rising medical costs for its planned 39 percent rate increase for some California customers. To President Barack Obama, however, it’s Exhibit A in his campaign to revive the health care overhaul.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who received the company’s explanation in a letter Thursday, said “it remains difficult to understand” how premium increases of that size by can be justified when WellPoint Inc. reported a $2.7 billion profit in the last quarter of 2009.

Read more here.

Of course their CA subsidiary could be loosing money but the MAIN POINT HERE should be that insurance companies are good businesses in that they are TRYING TO MAKE MONEY. I don’t blame them for that, I blame our government because they either need to slap some draconian laws down or they need to take over the health care industry. Health care is a right not a profit making industry.

Man I am so tired of hearing this bullshit, it sounds like Obama is being forced to drop the government health care plan and that fucking sucks. Health care is a right not something to make a profit off of. If there is any reason why our country is entering a decline and eventual demise it is because of the right wing’s ability to spread disinformation and not to enter any debate with facts. Who the hell wants to kill old people? Nobody, but if you can extend someone’s life by a week yet that procedure and similar are costing everyone in the country 40% than fuck old people, they can pay for that out of their pockets. I’m all for denying reality (friends will attest) but death is not something to be afraid of, and I’m tired of the right / christian right thinking you have to keep people alive no matter what. It is such a deeply ethical and personal question but as a society its going to come down to cost, insurance companies right now screw you so how the hell can the government do once. Not a glowing endorsement but I trust our government a lot more than private insurance companies who screw everyone I know over pricing and options.

As a small business owner whose team works remote it is ridiculous to think American can compete with the Aussies/NZ/UK/Rest of the world if we don’t provide health care to our citizens, espicially when our health care industry is 100% profit driven. I can hire quality people in Aussie and Europe and don’t have to worry about paying for their health care. America still has the biggest pool of quality labor but that is going to change as salaries have to compensate for health care that is going through the roof. Eventually it will make more sense for us to higher a full time doctor than buy health care (just half kidding).

On a personal level I see my dad screwed by the lack of affordable health care in that he can’t retire until he can get on a government plan at X age. And I personally have been at the hospital, asked how much something was by someone who does that procedure 20x times a day, and been told he has no idea as they outsource pricing. Crazy? Yes that is crazy. If you hook up someone to check their heart you should know what it costs for everyone. Instead some other agency checks your background and insurance and makes up some price.

This country is going to shit, luckily countries don’t matter any more and smart people are going to go to nations that provide them with what they need. I’m just waiting for Singapore or another smart country to start giving citizenship and free health care to people that are smart or making above X a year. Watch for a mass exodus of Americans over the next 100 years, I’m all for being a free agent citizen. Being American is a set of core values and beliefs, it is not tied to a government or geographic location.

/rant,
Ben