Some of you know the feeling of not having health insurance all too well. It sucks and our buddy below is finding out the hard way. Watch, and send to everyone who cares about reforming a broken system.
Also, it’s a big day in the long fight for health care reform…the Senate Finance Committee is voting on various ‘public option’ amendments. Right now the bill is in that committee but in general ALL of our Senators need to hear from us on why health care reform is so important.
Will you call your Senators and tell them you care about reform? Just call 1-888-743-4385 and you’ll be connected to their office. All you have to say is, ‘Hi, my name is _______ and as a young person I wanted to let the Senator know that I care about creating a health care system that gives me quality care and is affordable’.
Every call counts. So, to recap, two actions today:
1) Watch the video and send it on
2) Call your Senator.
Thanks,
Mary
Tags: college students, Congress, health care, politics, surgery
So let me get this straight, your video is making the charge that young people don’t have health insurance because insurance companies are denying them coverage? Really? You think the youth of this country is that dumb?
[...] Rock the Vote and watch their video, posted today after the votes [...]
dude sean dumb is using your own real name and picture to call other people on the internet dumb. that’s dumb.
here’s yr facebook: http://www.facebook.com/sfoushee?_fb_noscript=1
you’re a fan of sarah palin that’s rad I like her best when someone asks her a question about government and she looks like cattle
you work at combined arts media you publish playbills — do the theater groups who are your customers know that you spend your time trolling RTV? they will pretty soon: Sean Foushee Sean Foushee come and get me google
it is absolutely true that insurance companies can deny you drop you undercover you or flat out lie to you. every time the health care bill gets weaker, their stocks go up
and college graduates are dying of swine flu because they can’t afford insurance and can’t afford the doctor
public option now now now
piznim, I don’t hide behind a nom de plume because I have no problem expressing my principles. Now, back to the topic, I think this new position RTV has come up with that young people don’t have insurance because insurance companies won’t cover them is interesting. Perhaps you can help out by citing your sources and data that explains the rates at which insurance companies are turing down perfectly healthy, young Americans for insurance (I’d like to see RTV’s data on this as well, pardon me for not trusting someone in a political ad trying to operate on himself). It seems rather odd that a company that profits from premiums would turn away the one segment of the population that would pay more in premiums annually than it would take to actually cover their medical expenses for the year; considering that the vast majority of anyone’s medical bills happen much later in life – with the exception of a major medical emergency.
So how about it? Can either you or RTV back up the claim that young Americans don’t have insurance, not because they’d rather have iPhones, internet, et al, but because insurance companies won’t cover them?
i didn’t finish college but i think you mean ‘etc.’ instead of et al
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Et_al#et_alii
i am so impressed that you’re willing to stand by your ‘you guys are dumb’ beliefs you sir are a true american hero
didn’t hear anything in the video about the insurance companies turning down ‘perfectly healthy’ clients they prefer to sell useless insurance or really really expensive real insurance
that’s ‘denying care’ which is different than ‘denying insurance’ they only deny insurance to the sick they deny care to everyone else
i have this weird feeling you’ve never seen an industry pursue maximum profit before naiiiiiive
Hey piznim, Sean Foushee makes a good point. Let’s see some sources. Just because you don’t have a good rebuttal, you pick on his use of grammar. How about the fact that you used no punctuation at all. Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones. By the way “et al” means “and others” and Sean used the expression correctly.
you and sean et al. are still wrong et al. about et al et al. because it’s for people et al but i’m the first to admit i’m no model i just thought it was pompous. (i threw that period in just for you Shane)
i’ll give you some statistics i’ve got this google majig it’s great
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/health/july-dec09/uninsured_09-17.html
one third of all americans between 19-29 are uninsured
http://www.campusprogress.org/opinions/4597/the-myth-of-the-young-invincible
47% of people between 19-29 don’t qualify for any employer plan and have to buy expensive skeezy individual insurance
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/03/07/young.uninsured/index.html
young people are the fastest growing part of the uninsured population
ooo did i just drop sum science et al on you et al
So of the three articles you posted, the first one outlined a woman’s plight because she can’t afford a Cadillac level policy (less than $1000 deductible with a co-pay) and won’t buy a plan with a higher deductible. And why not? Because she doesn’t want to have to pay out of pocket for preventative care and doctor visits, which she rightly points out, would be as much as the cost of the insurance she can afford. So, here is someone who doesn’t understand the point of health insurance. You don’t have insurance to see the doctor when you get an annual check up or need a flu shot, you need insurance for those instances when you have an unexpected incident in your life which might require hospitalization or extensive treatment. She even mentions the plans she can afford might be fine for issues like Cancer – exactly.
The second story outlines a similar issue, young people expecting to find inexpensive comprehensive coverage, only to discover that they can’t afford it because they don’t make enough. Well, once again, if you want to buy a $40,000 Lexus but only make $16,000 a year, buy a Kia. Of course with state mandates, no chance of any Democratic bill allowing insurance companies to sell across state lines, or the ability of employees to take their health plan with them when they leave a job what can one expect if no such plans are offered in the state you live in? Is that the insurance company’s fault if they have to abide by the mandates set forth by your state legislature? I would argue no.
The third story posted does its best to spin a similar story, but fails miserably. Here we meet a young gym employee who has to pay for her depression medication out of pocket and can’t then afford her needed pain medicine. We learn that she’s too old to be covered by her parent’s plan, but makes too much to be considered for public coverage. Only after pointing out those two horrible positions does the article quickly gloss over an important fact, “she can’t afford private insurance — and doesn’t yet qualify for coverage at her new job.” Oh, so she can get insurance, in fact she will, but doesn’t yet meet the employment qualifications. When I started my last job – a government one no less – they had a 90 day waiting period for employees to become eligible as well. Did I have medical expenses in those 90 days, yes, did I expect someone else to pay for them, no.
A few interesting points brought up in the articles you posted that I thought would be good to post for discussion:
1. Most of the young adults in this country say they can’t afford insurance, which is the reason they aren’t covered. None of the articles said they were denied coverage because of age (we can debate pre-existing conditions later), just that we have a problem with young Americans not being able to afford insurance.
2. In each story the individuals are looking for comprehensive coverage, and expect it to be affordable.
3. One of the stories said the average young person makes $16,000 a year, often works part time (no benefits) or for a small employer whom can’t afford to offer health insurance to their employees.
4. It was also mentioned that many young adults often leave their jobs at a higher rate than their older counterparts, thus loosing their coverage (again portability would help with this, but Democrats have said no to that proposal).
So, based on the articles you linked above, we can assume that either young adults are being denied the health care they think they deserve because of evil insurance companies, or because most young adults are looking to buy plans they can’t afford because they think health insurance should be comprehensive, they often work part-time and/or they don’t stay at their job long enough to utilize their benefits. Of course you can argue that the high unemployment rate among young adults should come into play here; and I agree we should have a debate on the effect the new minimum wage rate has had on that increased rate. But, any adult unemployed in this country should qualify for basic public assistance – even for a little while – so, we’re back to arguing between evil corporations or individuals with unrealistic expectations and little personal responsibility.
Piznim your links didn’t support your assertions at all. Maybe you should go back to college.
“any adult unemployed in this country should qualify for basic public assistance”
you’ve never been unemployed, dog
welfare/medicaid/whatever if you can even get it takes like months. crap jobs don’t give unemployment benefits plus if you are fresh out of college you can’t get unemployment anyway
you are just blaming the victim it is not unrealistic to expect real health insurance you get it and i know you don’t work harder than i do old people get it and they don’t work at all
and before you say greatest generation etc etc medicare pays out to everyone regardless of whether they ever had a job or not that’s because we care about the elderly we should who cared about the girl who died from the freaking flu
crap insurance hurts as much as it helps $100 a month is a huge cost when you’re barely making your $300 rent
your weird examples about the price of brand new cars only shows how rich you are and how unable you are to understand how young people like me actually live
you are literally saying stop whining about cake, let them eat bread
but there’s still no fucking bread
and shane if you want to send me $10K ill happily go back to college you entitlement bitch not everybody gets to choose like you probably did
maybe both of you should stop pretending like you deserve your wealth and start realizing how lucky you are
piznim said, “maybe both of you should stop pretending like you deserve your wealth and start realizing how lucky you are”
——-
Regarding luck, I will defer to a better man, Mr. Thomas Jefferson: “I’m a great believer in luck and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it.”
Piznim, I pray someday you come to realize that hating others for their successes through hard work and sacrifice is a horrible negative pressure on yourself.
Some folks prefer to just feel sorry for themselves. Go ahead a waller in your pity…I prefer to get off my ass and do something about it. I grew up in poverty and I don’t need some college dropout preaching to me about entitlement. Who has the greater sense on entitlement? The guy who doesn’t accept his position in life and works hard to change it or piznim who sits on his ass and waits for the handout. You should have taken COBRA along with your unemployment when you got fired.
My name is piznim and I work so hard…er, except when I quit college cuz it ws too much work.
chortle chortle
go head sir, quote a slave owner at me
“I am a great believer in luck and I find that by purchasing women, I can get some right good tail. Lucky me!”
my negative pressures are $300 premiums and 20% coinsurance, please to pray a while about relieving me of that
i’ll take of the psychological end
enjoy your Kia
take CARE of the psychological end
daggit where’s my secretary
shane are you a fricking idiot you can’t get cobra if your employer didn’t give benefits in the first place
you are a person who can’t even imagine why someone would leave school for financial reasons
grew up poor did you
had a hard time did you
i can put my finger on you you’re small town middle class who thinks he’s got it hard because people in big cities have nicer stuff
you count all your stuff and you look at other people’s stuff and you think man that’s nice stuff i wish i had that stuff
and you have a sense of superiority over people who have less stuff you think they deserve less stuff even though you’re kind of a cream puff really
did you do good in college did you work your way through without a dime from mommy and daddy or the govt or the bank are you a selfmade man
other people looking up to you is different from looking down on other people
wrap your BA around that for a while
Well you got part of it right…I did work my way through college. Worked 40 hours a week and went to college full time. Never got a dime of help from my parents. Actually I still have student loans.
The rest you pretty much blew. Wasn’t even close.
I feel like I know you though. Actually I think I just saw you down at the corner. Were you the guy begging for my change?
so you got a loan eh bank or federal?
went to school with someone else’s money bank money federal money
i’m sure your argument is that you deadon deserved that because you are great
and that nobody who didn’t get federal money deserved it they are all bums and you should look down on them
but that’s not true
some people can’t just say ‘i didn’t get a dime from my parents’ some of us have to send money to our parents while we’re in college
some people get denied that bank loan some people have a parent with a high EFC who won’t contribute, so we don’t get federal aid either
and some people just plain old went to a crap-ass high school
i can tell you didn’t grow up poor because its obvious that you’ve never seen anyone you liked get turned out of their apartment for no good reason
maybe i’ve got you wrong, though, maybe you just don’t have any friends so you’ve got nobody to empathize with
because if you think that everybody in America gets a fair shake then you don’t get out much
You would get a lot more done if you wouldn’t spend so much time feeling sorry for yourself.
so it WAS a federal loan, was it
you know i work, right
i pay taxes
you’re welcome for that education, son
you pay us back when you can
anybody else too good to get help from the government
anybody else think that working together means ‘feeling sorry for yourself’
anybody else happy that young people are sick in the street
sean foushee sean foushee you got any more wisdom from the slave masters for us maybe something about how you got to put your back into making other people work the field for you
shane you want to list some more kinds of people that helped send you to college who you actually think are lazy and stupid
you guys been silent for a few days, hmmm hmmm
does this mean all us inferior beings get our public option now
did you consent to letting us pay fair prices for insurance oh please oh please?
You really shouldn’t post so much gibberish on here. Every time you post something it makes you look even more stupid. Are you drunk when you are posting these ignorant comments?
ignorance is calling people who didn’t get the federally funded loans that sent you to college lazy and stupid
i’m just a cut-up
still don’t hear you thanking me or your other fellow citizens for all that college, though
waiting on some gratitude
waiting on it
You won’t be getting a thank you from me at all. My college loans aren’t federally funded. You should add a guitar to your begging act on the corner. Maybe you will make more pity money.
if you don’t have federally funded loans then how the heck did you grow up poor
hate to point out but they don’t just hand poor folk bank loans without some collateral
that means stuff, son
your bit smells funny to me