Well, my health insurance will be about 30% more expensive...

[mjr]

Which effectively means I'm taking a pay cut.

I ran the numbers. Keeping what I had last year, through my workplace, is actually increasing my premium by about 30%.

[s_stabeler]

assuming this is supposed to be about the ACA:
1) The ACA, as it was passed, did not include any provision capping premiums. One major part of how it was supposed to keep costs down ( the "government option"- the idea is that it provides a minimum value for money- private insurers would have to either beat the government option on price, or on coverage. Since there was no government option, a major part of keeping premiums down became impossible) As such, some of the increase may be profiteering by insurance companies.
2) there is considerable uncertainty at the moment- if Trump is elected, he may scrap the ACA entirely (I don't know his policy on it) while Clinton wants to reform it without scrapping it. That uncertainty doesn't help since it's harder to predict payout levels.

[Greenday]

Should have just done universal healthcare and be done with it.

[Kheldarson]

Should have just done universal healthcare and be done with it.

But... but... communism!

[mjr]

But... but... communism!

Which doesn't work, by the way, in a Republic.

[Kheldarson]

Which doesn't work, by the way, in a Republic.

But... but... sarcasm!

Btw, being a republic does not mean we're limited to free market capitalism as our sole economic model.

[mjr]

But... but... sarcasm!

Btw, being a republic does not mean we're limited to free market capitalism as our sole economic model.

True, but more often than not Capitalism is a better economic model than the alternatives.

[Kheldarson]

True, but more often than not Capitalism is a better economic model than the alternatives.

Not necessarily. Monopolies are the tendency in free market capitalism. So we make rules to counteract them. So already we're not in a true capitalistic market. Your utilities are under government subsidy and control in order to make sure all citizens can expect access to them and at decent pricing.

So saying that our system can't take another socialistic style market for our health care is absurd.

[HYHYBT]

Going too far in ANY direction means trouble.

[mjr]

Not necessarily. Monopolies are the tendency in free market capitalism. So we make rules to counteract them. So already we're not in a true capitalistic market. Your utilities are under government subsidy and control in order to make sure all citizens can expect access to them and at decent pricing.

So saying that our system can't take another socialistic style market for our health care is absurd.

Capitalism, by it's very nature, is an "amoral" system (note I did not say immoral, there's a difference).

Look around you at all the things you use on a daily basis. Your car, computers, televisions, smartphones, etc. Know what that is? Capitalism at work.

And I never said "free market" Capitalism. I said Capitalism. Though even in "free market" capitalism, some people will be able to afford Nikes, and some won't. So a company will "capitalize" on that opportunity, and make a more affordable shoe, right? That's usually how it works.

It's why I don't buy $500+ pairs of boots. First, I can't afford it, and second, I can't see myself at this point in my life spending that kind of money on boots.

Car insurance is mandated if you have a car. Yet, there's not one "mega company" for car insurance in a Capitalistic system. Why? Every day I see/hear several commercials about how XYZ insurance company is better/has better rates than ABC Insurance.

They're still competing for business.

[Gravekeeper]

Whether or not you suffer and/or die should not be a matter of business competition.

[mjr]

Whether or not you suffer and/or die should not be a matter of business competition.

Tell that to the people whose premiums have now skyrocketed under the ACA...mostly middle class people whose premiums have increased significantly, and in some cases are thinking of dropping their insurance and/or putting off visiting their physicians.

[Daskinor]

Tell that to the people whose premiums have now skyrocketed under the ACA...mostly middle class people whose premiums have increased significantly, and in some cases are thinking of dropping their insurance and/or putting off visiting their physicians.

This was the way of things before the ACA as well.

[jackfaire]

Tell that to the people whose premiums have now skyrocketed under the ACA...mostly middle class people whose premiums have increased significantly, and in some cases are thinking of dropping their insurance and/or putting off visiting their physicians.

The company I worked for the year ACA was implemented was the first year our rates didn't jump.

Most companies don't lock in like 5 year plans they go shopping for health insurance once a year.

And capitalism is good but only if tempered by government oversight.

Without government oversight you get Luxotica.

Who are they? Well they are the result of capitalism. When businesses compete there are typically in the USA governing what they can and can't do in competition.

Luxotica is a foreign company that has a monopoly on the production and manufacture of eyeglasses. They also own most of the insurance companies and all of the major eyeglass shops.

When they wanted to buy Oakley and were told it's not for sale they refused to carry Oakley until they lost out on so much sales that the company had no choice but to sell.

Auto insurers like telecommunications companies do not actually compete with each other. They merely give the illusion of competition.

They all agree on industry wide standards and practices as well as pricing and then try to convince you that their deal is better than the "competitor's" deal to give the illusion of competing. But they are offering the same shitty product for the same shitty price and paying the same shitty lobbyists to keep from being regulated how they should be.

Do you know the real reason the Landline has been steadily dying out? Because all of the Telecommunications companies decided that they were switching to Digital Phones then they decided this new phone service would go from costing around 20 bucks to 60.

In about 2006 to 2007 my provider called me and told me about the switch. I had been on the fence about a cell phone. It was really just a basic phone with texting and making it easier for people to reach me while on the go but I had an answering machine and my phone.

The new pricing that I found out was Industry wide made getting a cell phone suddenly cheaper than having a phone in my home, this would later be changed when the companies realized people could just use cell phones but the damage had been done.

That's one of the few instances of actual competition. Said competition vanished when many telecommunications providers rushed to buy cell phone companies.

AT&T for example bought out Cingular. Capitalism isn't the best economic system because what we have isn't capitalism. I don't think what we have has ever been given a name unless it's one only used by economists.

We keep things going by stepping in and making rules where we can to limit the amount of businesses that can fuck over people like you and me. They can't touch the De Beers corporation that charge us way too much for some rocks they found on the ground or Luxotica who legitimately charges such insane fucking prices for my eyeglasses that unless my insurance will cover it wearing contacts is cheaper.

[TheHuckster]

AT&T for example bought out Cingular. Capitalism isn't the best economic system because what we have isn't capitalism. I don't think what we have has ever been given a name unless it's one only used by economists.

It's oligarchism, really. Supported by government subsidies and other stuff through cronyism and collusion.

In many industrial sectors right now we're in a place that very much resembles the same "robber baron" anti-trust problems we had in the late 19th century into the early 20th century. Only instead of there being any good enforcement of the Sherman Act, the government is actively encouraging and enabling it. I can say with a lot of confidence that a lot of business structures we have right now would have been done away with during the shake-downs of the anti-trust acts occurring during the turn of the 20th century. But now, we've become complacent in ignoring those rules.