Massive Insurance Hikes In CA Despite Slow Growth of Spendng

Massive Insurance Rate Hike In California Despite Slow Growth in National Health Care Spending
By: Jon Walker Thursday January 6, 2011 8:30 am

This morning is the tale of two headlines. From the New York Times, Health Spending Rose in ’09, but at Low Rate, we learn that “total national health spending grew by 4 percent in 2009, the slowest rate of increase in 50 years.”

From the Los Angeles Times, Blue Shield of California seeks rate hikes of as much as 59% for individuals, We find out that Blue Shield of California seeks massive rate hikes on individual policy holders because BSC claims the cost of health care has risen rapidly.

Another big California health insurer has stunned individual policyholders with huge rate increases — this time it’s Blue Shield of California seeking cumulative hikes of as much as 59% for tens of thousands of customers March 1.

Blue Shield’s action comes less than a year after Anthem Blue Cross tried and failed to raise rates as much as 39% for about 700,000 California customers.

San Francisco-based Blue Shield said the increases were the result of fast-rising healthcare costs and other expenses resulting from new healthcare laws.

These two articles just don’t add up; they’re completely at odds with each other.

Of course some have argued a key benefit of private health insurance companies is their use of the concentrated purchasing power of their aggregated customer base, applied in negotiations with health care providers to yield lower rates and costs to consumers. If Blue Shield of California is “forced” to raise premiums because of growing health care costs, it means that BSC is doing a lousy job of wielding its purchasing power.

http://firedoglake.com/

I guess this is another "The Democrats made us do it" story... :Snooze

Our trust (non profit) had large increases as well. This is due to the mandates in the new bill they must cover, and build up reserves for.

RenegadeCJ wrote: Our trust (non profit) had large increases as well. This is due to the mandates in the new bill they must cover, and build up reserves for.

I'm not so sure on that....my individual policy went up over 30%/year BEFORE the health bill was even considered. I don't think you can blame the health bill for the totality of rate increases.....they have been rising astronomically for years. When I first got my individual policy it was $540/month, 3 years later it was $868/month, thank God I was able to switch to medicare this year.

archer wrote:

RenegadeCJ wrote: Our trust (non profit) had large increases as well. This is due to the mandates in the new bill they must cover, and build up reserves for.

I'm not so sure on that....my individual policy went up over 30%/year BEFORE the health bill was even considered. I don't think you can blame the health bill for the totality of rate increases.....they have been rising astronomically for years. When I first got my individual policy it was $540/month, 3 years later it was $868/month, thank God I was able to switch to medicare this year.

Well, in our case, it was specific to the mandates. They broke down exactly what things increased the costs. We're a trust after all, we elect our own people to the board to run it for us.

Raising coverage age to 26 yrs old
Lifetime maximum removed
Free preventative care

We also had increases due to just cost increases in healthcare. As of yet, we aren't seeing a penny of savings from the healthcare bill.

RenegadeCJ wrote: As of yet, we aren't seeing a penny of savings from the healthcare bill.

Not surprising, most of it doesn't go into effect till 2014, and if the Republicans remove the mandate for coverage, your insurance premium will definitly increase.

According to the Colorado Department of Insurance, the health care provisions kicking in have little effect on the rate hikes.

The insurance companies agreed that the provisions had little effect on the rate hikes.

"Overall, we expect the costs of implementing the first provisions ... to have a very modest impact for most of our members in 2011," said C.J. Moore, spokeswoman for Kaiser Permanente in Southern Colorado."

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_q ... n56311757/

Actually, ours won't be affected by any mandate. All companies with our trust are required to insure everyone. That is what keeps our costs down overall, but increases the costs to the companies.

What will happen with the healthcare bill is this. 80% of the companies polled will drop their insurance completely, and just pay the fine the govt will institute. Bad for all of us in the plan....the plan will cease to exist, and we'll be dumped into the govt plans.