From last Thursday's Council meeting, an exchange revealing an unfunded mandate to Northampton County as a result of the health care overhaul. Your property taxes will pay for it:
John Stoffa: "I want to alert you to a concern I have, which is 1/1/11, the caps come off, the major medical for our retirees with a new plan., its a $12,500 cap. That comes off. We have roughly 700 [retired] employees. We don't know what that's going to mean but it's going to mean more money. ..."
Ron Angle: "This was part of the Obama health care plan, am I correct?"
Stoffa: "Yes."
Angle: "Is the federal government furnishing money for their plan?"
Ann McHale: "Yeah, yeah, they are."
Stoffa: "Interestingly enough, they do have a piece, and we have people applying for that for a certain age range, but it's not going to cover the full cost in no way, shape or form."
Angle: "Another unfunded mandate."
Today's one-liner: "The shortest way to the distinguishing excellence of any writer is through his hostile critics." Richard LeGallienne
Local Government TV
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Tuesday, September 21, 2010
16 comments:
You own views are appreciated, especially if they differ from mine. But remember, commenting is a privilege, not a right. I will delete personal attacks or off-topic remarks at my discretion. Comments that play into the tribalism that has consumed this nation will be declined. So will comments alleging voter fraud unless backed up by concrete evidence. If you attack someone personally, I expect you to identify yourself. I will delete criticisms of my comment policy, vulgarities, cut-and-paste jobs from other sources and any suggestion of violence towards anyone. I will also delete sweeping generalizations about mainstream parties or ideologies, i.e. identity politics. My decisions on these matters are made on a case by case basis, and may be affected by my mood that day, my access to the blog at the time the comment was made or other information that isn’t readily apparent.
Americans getting real healthcare coverage. Damn that Obama.
ReplyDeleteStoffa the supreme hypocrite, with more public healthcare plans in his household than people who live there, loves to piss on others. Of course with Stoffa it has always been do as I say not as I live.
Now we know why you love him so much O'Hare. He is even more hypocritical than you.
Wait, what? I thought Obamacare was free?
ReplyDeletequit your bitchin you greedy buggers and be thankful that your Washington masters have decided what you should do with your earnings; you clearly were doing the wrong thing making your own decisions and trying to take care of yourself
ReplyDeleteIf you want to defend lifetime caps, you're welcome to do it. I think it's wrong, and so do most people.
ReplyDeleteThe real question NorCo government needs to be asking is, why are they in the insurance business in the first place?
Jonathan, They are not in the insurance business. They are a government. But it makes no fiscal sense for a larger government or big corporation to but insurance. They are almost all self-insured. So this is just one of the changes that will put pressure on Stoffa for a tax hike. Another is the ridiculous provision requiring insurance for the adult children of county workers, even when they no longer live at home.
ReplyDeleteI said it before. I think people are generally in favor of national healthcare. If it's better and cheaper. That is not what we got! What happened instead it got mucked up in Congress. The current administration would have passed anything just to say they did it. If Obama wanted to blame the other side of the aisle for Congress's failure to get a "good' package and refused to sign it, that would have been the right thing to do. To sign an obviously flawed piece of legislation as a result of partisan bickering just to claim victory served no one. Plain and simple this was a great idea, but a bad bill.
ReplyDeleteWhere's Angle on the unfunded war?
ReplyDeleteOur unfunded currency?
LVCI said...
ReplyDeleteI said it before. I think people are generally in favor of national healthcare. If it's better and cheaper. That is not what we got!... Plain and simple this was a great idea, but a bad bill.
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LVCI -
This was a horrible idea, pure and simple. Anyone with half a brain can see that the government does little to nothing efficiently or cost effectively. The more government is involved, the further we will move from "better and cheaper" healthcare.
It doesn't matter how you try it, spin it, or sell it, THE NUMBERS WILL NEVER, EVER ADD UP.
It is truly sad that it took this bill to give many Americans a basic lesson in math and government.
"But it makes no fiscal sense for a larger government or big corporation to but(y) insurance. They are almost all self-insured."
ReplyDeleteWhich is what bit Northampton County in the ass. They gambled by self-insuring. One year they may be in the black, the next year they may be in the red. That's why you buy insurance. You know what you will be paying, can budget for it, and premiums can be negotiated. If you are self-insured, then you're stuck with the bill. And this past year was apparently quite a hefty bill.
@Annonymous 4:30
ReplyDelete"That's why you buy insurance. You know what you will be paying, can budget for it, and premiums can be negotiated"
That is a bunch of utter nonsense. Most companies are seeing anywhere from a 10% to 20% increase raise in their rates this year that are purchasing insurance and are passing it on to their employees.
The entire health care debate in 2009 was a travesty. We are using a system thats underlying assumptions were made in the 1950s of employers paying for health insurance which was a result of wage controls set by the government to prevent inflation.
Obama in his second biggest failure of leadership and vision went about trying to address coverage, when during the campaign he was focused on cost.
The fact remains, every industrialized nation of the world pays less for care with better results (infant mortality, life expectancy, quality of care) than the United States.
and for the USA we are number one chanting nuts out there sure a lot of wealthy people come here to see our doctors just as they go to other nations depending on the specialist. Japan also makes Lexus and Toyotas. Most people are more likely to get the Corolla than the GS so we should probably spend our time checking the quality of the corolla and not a system 95% of our population would never dream of having access to.
"That is a bunch of utter nonsense..."
ReplyDeleteReally? Why don't you ask Northampton County, what would have been cheaper the past year, self-insurance or having paid insurance. I don't think they'll make that mistake again. They'll pass on the increases to their employees. Your diatribe about the government doesn't amount to any fact of what happened in Northampton County.
Self-insurance is cheaper for the County. If it had a policy, it would be experiencing a rate hike right now.
ReplyDeleteGood post 7:46, problem is this is a nation of frightened lemmings. They are screaming about government takeovers. Government takeovers of what? Certainly not health care.
ReplyDeleteObama's problem was not what he passed but what he didn't get passed.
You are on point with the modern American health care system created in the 50"s. The problem with employer based plans was always there hidden just under the surface. With folks working at the same job for 20-30 years and low medical costs it was a great system. It was practically a socialized system as anyone who had a full-time job had health care for themselves and family members.
Doctor visits were $10 dollars and that included the medicine.
Fast Forward to 2010, America is not the 1950's anymore. People rarely work more than 5 to 6 years on a job. Doctor visits start at over $100 and medicine? go to one of the one billion Drugstores and hand over your paycheck and you may get three or four pills. The same pills they sell in Canada and Germany for a few bucks All the Fox claptrap won't change the fact that the nations that had health care systems independent of employment are in better shape than Americans employer based health care.
We had a great shot at fundamental health cost containment in 2009 but the Republicans devised a strategy of sit on your hands and pray for failure. Many Republicans initially were ready to move but then Limbaugh, Beck and other Republican Party leaders rallied the base with visions of Joe Stalin and Pol Pot. The infamous "Town meetings" resulted as did the resulting Republican strategy.
So here we are with a plan that is flawed but still much better than what we had before.
The idea that Republicans want to repeal provisions to cover pre-existing conditions and limit coverage so at an arbitrary point determined by an Insurance Company accountant your cancer treatment or your Heart rehabilitation is stopped.
Good Luck with that. I am sure you will get the Fox 30%, the rest of America does not plan on going backwards.
@12:17
ReplyDeleteWe went down hill in this country when we started to respect people's opinions over facts.
Fact is most companies and municipalities are seeing a health care cost increase in 2010. I'd blame the bill but they've seen a health care cost increase that has been over inflation for the past 30 years.
Attacking Stoffa for self insuring the county is stupid. Whether he self insured or used and Insurance company he'd be dealing with a similar cost increase to the county.
Obama has failed his party and his country by attacking coverage and not cost.
To quote the candidate "The reason people aren't covered is it cost to much." Weird how in 2008 he seemed to understand somethings and in 2009 and 2010 he has become dumber than a box of rocks.
Jacob said:
ReplyDelete"Weird how in 2008 he seemed to understand somethings and in 2009 and 2010 he has become dumber than a box of rocks."
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Wrong - he was always dumber than a box of rocks!
You talk about the "ridiculous provision requiring insurance for adult children of county employees". Ok...first of all, let's be clear. It's not just Northampton County... It's the entire Country. This is no special "benefit" only for county employees. You want ridiculous?.....here are some examples....WELFARE!!! DAYCARE CENTERS IN THE SCHOOLS!!! ILLEGAL ALIENS!! Get rid of that shit.
ReplyDeleteOh and lets get this out there too.... If you are a county employee you get PAID to opt out of healthcare benefits. BULLSHIT...you don't want them..then don't take them. Why should you get paid off? Oh and if both spouses work for the county..one spouse opts out and get's paid for it and then they piggyback on the other spouses county healthcare....DOUBLE DIPPING!!! IT'S UTTER BULLSHIT!!
JUST SO YA KNOW!!!