Quote Originally Posted by BanginJimmy View Post
Many of those people that are currently uninsured are not covered because they are high risk and an existing condition makes the rates too high for them, or they are denied coverage. Add those people to the roles of insurance companies and forcing insurance companies to charge them the same rate as everyone else in that demographic will lead to rise in rates.

OK, so we have the inevitable rise in taxes on insurance companies. Then you want to add even more risk to those companies? I thought this bill was about lowering health care costs, not raising them. Oh yea, the people pushing this hardest have already said they want a single payer system.

I missed the article, but makes my point even stronger. You have the so called "doctor fix", then an additional 500B in cuts to medicare. How many more docs are going to just quit accepting it? 3 years after benefits start on this bill, I see Congress coming out with a bill that requires all docs to accept medicare because so many will drop it to keep their prices lower and profits higher.
Many that are currently not insured are those who choose not to purchase insurance, due to the cost vs the perceived amount of risk. Young people tend to opt out of spending on insurance as much. That is fact. Adding these will lower the risk, allowing insurance companies to balance out the higher risk insured that you mentioned. This could allow insurance companies to have the ability not to raise rates on a whole.

The reason that rates will rise has nothing to do with insurance claims. It has to do with profit. Private insurance companies are typically publically traded, and funded through their stockholders. These stockholders expect a postive return on their investment, so the company must show growth and profit. Rates will continue to rise to show increase in profit driven by revenue. As soon as your company stops growing, your investors will leave you for another company.

Medicare is broken, that cannot be denied. I am not a fan of government run healthcare, but I am able to look at the problem outside of the partisan lines.