Some of you may have a received a letter in your email today from the Department of Health & Human Services. The letter is probably specific to the state you live in. I live in Pennsylvania, so my letter has statistics for Pennsylvania.
Today, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced that 576,000 Pennsylvania residents will benefit from $51.6 million in rebates from insurance companies this summer, because of the Affordable Care Act’s 80/20 rule. These rebates will average $165 for the 312,000 Pennsylvania families covered by a policy.
The health care law generally requires insurance companies to spend at least 80 percent of consumers’ premium dollars on medical care and quality improvement. Insurers can spend the remaining 20 percent on administrative costs, such as salaries, sales and advertising. Beginning this year, insurers must notify customers how much of their premiums have been spent on medical care and quality improvement.
Insurance companies that do not meet the 80/20 standard are required to provide their customers a rebate for the difference no later than August 1, 2012. The 80/20 rule is also known as the Medical Loss Ratio (MLR) standard.
“The 80/20 rule helps ensure consumers get fair value for their health care dollar,” Secretary Sebelius said.
The letter goes on to detail several different ways that families might receive this money, but the main point is that a lot of people will be getting checks or direct deposits or lower future premiums by August 1st.
Unless, of course, the five radicals on the Supreme Court decide to strike down the entire law. Are the conservative Justices really so petty that they’d screw over a half a million Pennsylvanians and countless other families across the country just to deny the president a deserved bump in popularity?
I guess we will find out soon. Probably on Monday.
This is the number one reason why I think it will be 5-4 to strike the entire law down. If just the mandate dies, the 80/20 rule lives and insurance companies will have to fork over more than a billion in rebates nationwide within six weeks.
That won’t be allowed to happen, because that number will only grow each year. The insurance companies know it. Their lobbyists know it. SCOTUS has been made aware of it.
The law will die over this. Watch.
Well, yes. This, and Sxalia’s unwillingness to read any bill more than five pages long. He wants to strike the whole thing because striking just the mandate would require him to do some work.
Why blame Scalia? We all know what that clown will do. The blame should squarely rest on Kennedy. He’s considered “moderate,” even though he’s clearly not(see CU).
because I don’t know how Kennedy ruled yet.
Yes .. but look how he ruled on C.U. .. and look at his opinion .. talk about something a 6th grade English teacher would fail .. how an older, supposedly educated, man could think anyone believes the bull crap he wrote .. is mind boggling
BTW .. is Twitter down .. or is it just me?
Twitter is down. Not you.
Thought it was me.
America: where the right to be poor, powerless and pissed off prevails.
You’re not allowed to be pissed off.
The Roberts’ Court could easily be characterized as an overreaching bench. As I understand it, just today they’ve added to that legacy with the ruling against Unions.
It would be one thing to see their decisions follow the arguments, but Roberts seems perfectly comfortable even adjusting those to expand the Court’s ability to crush. And so, yes SCOTUS will steal the rebates and if we were to have marked bills to track where the rebate funds ended up, I would expect the Rove’s coffers to be the recipients.
A corporation can do political work without the approval of its shareholders, but unions, well …
Damn good point
Gosh, both Boo’s post and every comment so far takes as a given that the SCOTUS ruling will be politically motivated rather than a fair-minded hearing of the constitutional issues involved.
Why, that’s just cynical.
And based on past performance by the court. But I assume you;re cynical comment was pure snark.
I get the distinct impression that a lot of these decisions depend solely on whether Justice Kennedy feels aligning himself with his conservative brethren will tarnish his image.
Nothing for profit?
it has to be in that 20% also, basically the law says that 80-85% (depending on the size of the plan) of premiums must be used for patient care
Insurance companies won’t like that. They want new customers but they want to earn a bundle on them.
Another thought is “too bad there isn’t a law like this for banks”.
right, it’s good idea for banks too
“Are the conservative Justices really so petty that they’d screw over a half a million Pennsylvanians and countless other families across the country just to deny the president a deserved bump in popularity? “
Yes. Sure as Tony Scalia duck hunts with Dick Cheney.
They can’t steal mine, I already got it. Matter of fact, here in Massachusetts my insurer did meet the federal 80/20, but the Bay State has stricter standards, so I got a check for almost 90 bucks a couple of days ago. Mm-mm-mmm, loves me that socialist oppression, so I do.