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Aetna CEO Threatened Obamacare Pullout If Feds Opposed Humana Merger

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142 points helloworld | 2 comments | 17 Aug 16 17:52 UTC | HN request time: 1.459s | source
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saosebastiao ◴[17 Aug 16 18:09 UTC] No.12306836[source]▶
Good. Block their deal, let them drop out of obamacare, and then give us the Single Payer that we've always deserved and watch those fuckers go bankrupt like they've always deserved.
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danielweber ◴[17 Aug 16 18:14 UTC] No.12306899[source]▶
Anyone who thinks this is leading to single-payer is dreaming. Whether you think it's a good idea or not, the political will wasn't there for in 6 years ago, and there is much less political will for it now.
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1. twblalock ◴[17 Aug 16 21:03 UTC] No.12308455[source]▶
The most likely outcome is a public option in the exchanges. I don't expect that many private insurers will continue to participate in the exchanges if they have to compete with a public option, so the public option will end up being a de-facto single-payer system for poor people who have to use the exchanges.
replies(1): >>12313136 #
2. danielweber ◴[18 Aug 16 15:19 UTC] No.12313136[source]▶
The public option isn't supposed to be government supported. It's run by the government, but with a private budget, taking all their operating fees from users. A lot of people on the right are skeptical that it will become either de jure or de facto government supported, and comments like "I don't expect that many private insurers will continue to participate in the exchanges if they have to compete with a public option" are the reason.

I'm skeptical of that the public option will work as well as its proponents say it will. We already have non-profit health insurance companies, and they haven't completely eaten everyone else's lunch. But it's worth a shot, as long as it really truly sticks to that mandate of not being government supported. The argument would need to be really convincing given how many of its backers think it ought to be government supported any way.