Here is a letter sent to the editor of the Louisville Courier-Journal that was never published:
To the Editor:
Buried deep inside your Sunday article “Kentucky Gets Ready For Health Exchange” are some disturbing facts which you overlook in your haste to put the best spin on Obamacare.
A family of four, earning $70,000 yearly, could be obligated to pay $17,436.00 for the Bronze plan ($4,836 in premiums, and $12,600 in deductibles) while the insurance agent who sells them the plan will get a commission from the state and the insurance company will get, in addition to the $4,836 premium, almost $1,200 in a government subsidy.
The Bronze Plan is the cheapest plan and will pay only 60% of medical costs.
Thus, a family of four with a gross income of $70,000 could be obligated to pay 24.9 per cent of its gross income for medical care. If you do the same calculation for the same family based on their after tax disposable income, the percentage gets obscenely higher.
The figures you gave for a young single 22 year old with a $20,000 gross yearly income are even more alarming as the youngster could end up paying 34.56 per cent of gross income for medical expenses.
The figures you cite for the cheapest (read poor quality) insurance in the exchange will do nothing to change the fact that most people “getting insurance” under Obamacare will remain one serious illness or accident away from financial ruin and bankruptcy while insurance companies get richer.
Only a single payer system, like Medicare or the Veterans Administration, can provide all our citizens with the best medical care.
A healthcare system that is based on, and allows private for profit insurance companies, hospitals and other medical providers, to make huge profits from the illness, disease, death and misery of others is not only inhumane, it cannot work.
Walter Tillow
Louisville, 40203
