[quote=ucodegen]Do a little better(more accurate) math. ACA pays a sliding scale for more people than you think, not just 100% for a small group of people – and subsidies are much larger than $300/mo in most cases. I averaged the aid to a ‘per person’ approx rate(one person with full aid at $1000/month and one person without aid = 2 people with aid at $500/month, one person with full aid at $1000/month and two people without aid at $1000 a month = 3 people with aid of $333/month). NOTE: I did NOT use full cost. Did you check what the threshold on aid is? Threshold on aid ‘was’ $54,000 in California about 2 years ago. Additional dependents can increase the threshold. The amount of relief was inverse proportional to income (not a fixed amount). Aid can rise up to nearly 100% of coverage cost. I am underestimating the actual numbers.
The ACA was done with two types of government ‘aid’.. one direct to insurance companies to keep the rates low(Cost Sharing) (Have you ever had to get individual or family COBRA insurance? = more realistic cost, no company contributing/covering cost) The other based upon family income and number of dependents. The plan was to artificially keep the payments low through the money going to the insurance company as well as aid for ‘lower’ income, so that people get used to the ‘ACA’. If the full rates (which it is currently getting close to) were applied in 2010, there would have been a revolt, outcry.. etc. It was built to be similar to putting a frog in a pan with water and slowly bringing up the heat to cook it without it recognizing what is happening. This is also why the insurance rates were increasing surprising fast. In about 4 years I went from low $300/mo to just under $1000/mo.
NOTE: of more than 10.6 million people who had added coverage through the exchanges early 2019 – 87% qualified for premium subsidies, and 52% of current exchange enrollees are receiving subsidies in 2019. Subsidies are for incomes up to 250% of poverty level (SD = $24,036 – threshold = $60,090 – 2 parents, 2 children). In San Diego County, 13.8% of population is below the poverty level.
Question: What percentage of population is below 2.5 times the poverty level?
Answer: Much more than you think. Median income El Cajon=$46K, Escondido=$49K, La Mesa=$55K… Median => 50% of population above median, 50% of population below median – definition of statistical median).
@spdrun – you way under-guestimated the cost of the subsidies. Where are the refs for your numbers?[/quote]
There is nothing in that mishmash of statistics or anything in those links that supports your initial claim that ACA is a $1 trillion annual unfunded liability. The first link was about the overall national debt and had nothing specific to ACA. None of the links addresses the total cost of ACA or any debt created by it.
The overall national debt is a more interesting topic in these times. Why are deficits growing even with a strong economy? Because we have a president that is running the country like he ran all of his failed businesses.
