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[Baffler]

Oh make no mistake, there's literally nowhere on Earth you can consistently get treatment as good as you can get here. It's just way too fucking expensive.

Yeah, "small" fine, sure. Now that the bills are coming it in it doesn't look that fucking small at all, I'm afraid. My mother, whom I was just getting to come around from a right-wing party line, is being smacked with a $2000 fine come tax day, and she makes almost nothing to begin with. Not only that, but what the insurance companies have offered her has about doubled in cost, so that fine might actually be preferable. Suffice it to say we're back to square one on how Obama is evil.

Obamacare is fucked legislation that managed to do more harm than good at this point. A more comprehensive reform that didn't seek a GOP approval stamp on every provision might have had a better outcome, but I'm convinced this is just going to ensure we never see any real healthcare legislation in the US. Next time the Republicans get the chance the ACA will be repealed and we'll have another 20 years where talking about healthcare law is verboten.

That was the plan all along though, wasn't it? Make health care reform so odious to the public that nobody will ever touch it again.

[smeeprocket]

all of this would have been manageable if medicaid has survived. If it was expanded everyone would be covered.

The dems never agree on anything though, they don't march in lockstep like the cons, so a ridiculous amount of compromise had to be done.

Also, the requirements for what bare bone insurance plans cover is greater, so the base costs went up.

Single payer would have solved the entire problem.Obama also promised to raise taxes on the rich, and then didn't because of the economy, even though the rich were actually rolling in more money.

[Antsan]

I don't know what kind of absurd horror stories have to be told in America that some Americans actually believe health care is worse in Europe than there.

Oh make no mistake, there's literally nowhere on Earth you can consistently get treatment as good as you can get here. It's just way too fucking expensive.

How can it be considered "being able to get treatment" when you cannot get it because you cannot pay?

[Frumple]

Yeah, "small" fine, sure. Now that the bills are coming it in it doesn't look that fucking small at all, I'm afraid. My mother, whom I was just getting to come around from a right-wing party line, is being smacked with a $2000 fine come tax day, and she makes almost nothing to begin with.

That's... odd. First year fine's just... $319, iirc (at least that's what I was informed of by the healthcare.gov folks), or thereabouts, and waived entirely for folks under a certain income level. If she makes almost nothing already -- specifically, if her income's low enough she isn't legally required to file taxes -- there's no fine. Or shouldn't be, anyway.

If it's 2k, either something else is going on or things are substantially different in NC.

Though a 2k fine is still cheaper than the monthly costs of most insurance policies they're offering down here in FL, bleh.

[MonkeyHead]

I don't know what kind of absurd horror stories have to be told in America that some Americans actually believe health care is worse in Europe than there.

Oh make no mistake, there's literally nowhere on Earth you can consistently get treatment as good as you can get here. It's just way too fucking expensive.

How can it be considered "being able to get treatment" when you cannot get it because you cannot pay?

God Bless the Not-USA.

I would haaate to live there, holy crap.

I remember an anecdote, but I am not sure who told it. Basically, it was an American politician who was speaking out either against the reform of healthcare in the USA< or in favour of thier current model - I forget which. Scrub that, a little research reveals it was a right-wing editorial in "Investors Business Daily". Basically, this person said that "if Stephen Hawking had been born in the UK, he would be dead thanks to the NHS". Feel free to palm your face in the hardest of ways at this.

[smeeprocket]

Yeah, "small" fine, sure. Now that the bills are coming it in it doesn't look that fucking small at all, I'm afraid. My mother, whom I was just getting to come around from a right-wing party line, is being smacked with a $2000 fine come tax day, and she makes almost nothing to begin with.

That's... odd. First year fine's just... $319, iirc (at least that's what I was informed of by the healthcare.gov folks), or thereabouts, and waived entirely for folks under a certain income level. If she makes almost nothing already -- specifically, if her income's low enough she isn't legally required to file taxes -- there's no fine. Or shouldn't be, anyway.

If it's 2k, either something else is going on or things are substantially different in NC.

Though a 2k fine is still cheaper than the monthly costs of most insurance policies they're offering down here in FL, bleh.

yea that doesn't sound right at all. The costs are suppose to go up each year, but it definitely doesn't start at 2k, even if you have the income to pay the fine. (in which case, with the tax deductible, it should be cheaper to get the insurance.)

[UXLZ]

Oh make no mistake, there's literally nowhere on Earth you can consistently get treatment as good as you can get here. It's just way too fucking expensive.

Yeah, "small" fine, sure. Now that the bills are coming it in it doesn't look that fucking small at all, I'm afraid. My mother, whom I was just getting to come around from a right-wing party line, is being smacked with a $2000 fine come tax day, and she makes almost nothing to begin with. Not only that, but what the insurance companies have offered her has about doubled in cost, so that fine might actually be preferable. Suffice it to say we're back to square one on how Obama is evil.

Obamacare is fucked legislation that managed to do more harm than good at this point. A more comprehensive reform that didn't seek a GOP approval stamp on every provision might have had a better outcome, but I'm convinced this is just going to ensure we never see any real healthcare legislation in the US. Next time the Republicans get the chance the ACA will be repealed and we'll have another 20 years where talking about healthcare law is verboten.

That was the plan all along though, wasn't it? Make health care reform so odious to the public that nobody will ever touch it again.

I meant for practical purposes, not bleeding edge tech ones. xD

[smeeprocket]

I don't know what kind of absurd horror stories have to be told in America that some Americans actually believe health care is worse in Europe than there.

Oh make no mistake, there's literally nowhere on Earth you can consistently get treatment as good as you can get here. It's just way too fucking expensive.

How can it be considered "being able to get treatment" when you cannot get it because you cannot pay?

God Bless the Not-USA.

I would haaate to live there, holy crap.

I remember an anecdote, but I am not sure who told it. Basically, it was an American politician who was speaking out either against the reform of healthcare in the USA< or in favour of thier current model - I forget which. Scrub that, a little research reveals it was a right-wing editorial in "Investors Business Daily". Basically, this person said that "if Stephen Hawking had been born in the UK, he would be dead thanks to the NHS". Feel free to palm your face in the hardest of ways at this.

we should require a certain score on the SATs for our politicians. And some sort of science credentials. Really anything to stop people from electing whoever the village idiot is to office.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

you know it's weird because the poor, not covered by medicaid, are supposed to be exempt from the taxes. But now you are scaring me. What kind of income does your mother make (general estimate if it is not too nosey)

Nothing. But counting her husband, about the usual for working middle class, I don't know the exact figure.

Oh make no mistake, there's literally nowhere on Earth you can consistently get treatment as good as you can't get here.

Fixed.

That was the plan all along though, wasn't it? Make health care reform so odious to the public that nobody will ever touch it again.

Yep, in the end Obamacare has become a massive Republican victory. I am starting to believe that we've reached the upper end of the current paradigm.

I don't know what kind of absurd horror stories have to be told in America that some Americans actually believe health care is worse in Europe than there.

The typical demagogue's picture of European healthcare is a bureaucratic haze that makes the DMV look lively, where patients have zero choice regarding their health and are told by the state when and what medical treatment is available to them (and that it isn't much, gotta save those tax dollars). Doctors are either apathatic untrained minimum wage scrubs or harsh government overseers who dish out healthcare on political grounds. New medical technology is not allowed because its too expensive for socialism and constitutes blue sky research.

Ironically, about half of that is closer to the US reality than the European one, not that I'm much a fan of either system.

we should require a certain score on the SATs for our politicians. And some sort of science credentials. Really anything to stop people from electing whoever the village idiot is to office.

Who watches the watchers? Systems like that inherently favor the establishment, and what people proposing them never think of is that it won't block the ones they want it to block. Rather, you and people who think like you will be the village idiots. It's the same logic as the literacy and poll taxes of the pre-civil rights South. Don't you want only productive and intelligent people to vote?

[smeeprocket]

I know but I mean, nvm I'll just say it's the tea party. That describes what I mean.

Or reinstate the Voter's Rights Act, but for the entire country.

As it stands, we are putting people on the science committees that believe global warming is a hoax and how humans came to be is a "great unsolvable mystery"

[Angle]

Yeah, the real problem is that our education system sucks. There's no shortcut to fixing that, you just need to take it head on.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

I know but I mean, it's the white southern dudes that are the idiots. We should be able to make an exception for them

I'm going to try to be polite here and say you should be more careful and less sure of yourself when talking about things like this.

[Angle]

Yeah, watch out, that's a good way to alienate people.

[smeeprocket]

I know but I mean, it's the white southern dudes that are the idiots. We should be able to make an exception for them

I'm going to try to be polite here and say you should be more careful and less sure of yourself when talking about things like this.

I live in the south, I am under the watch of these people. I am speaking from experience.

[Frumple]

Nothing. But counting her husband, about the usual for working middle class, I don't know the exact figure.

Thaaat might do it, bringing her over the minimum. If they've got the time and capability, your parents might consider crunching some numbers and seeing if they'd be better off filing taxes separately or somethin'. Forget if there's a way to finagle things so one or both would get off the hook for the penalty (it's been a few weeks since I last saw the numbers and process), but it's likely worth looking in to.

Still shouldn't even remotely be 2k, though. Especially not specifically against your mother, if she's filing jointly with her husband.