The Trump administration’s new policy of expanding the sale of “short-term” insurance plans as a cheaper alternative to ObamaCare is quickly running into opposition from state regulators.

The Department of Health and Human Services is urging states to cooperate with the federal government, but instead, insurance commissioners are panning the new plans as “junk” insurance and state legislatures are putting restrictions on their sales.

State insurance officials argue that, despite being less expensive than ObamaCare plans, the short-term plans are bad for consumers and aren’t an adequate substitute for comprehensive insurance.

“These policies are substandard, don’t cover essential health benefits, and consumers at a minimum don’t understand [what they’re buying], and at worse are misled,” California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones (D) said.

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Sleepers in Hong Kong McDonalds

I have eaten at the McDonalds in Hong Kong over the years. Just smaller portions and only after I grew tired of fish and veggies. I think I told the story of coming off The Wall, making my way down a road with my Chinese associates towards a Chinese restaurant, and turning the corner to eat at a KFC (their choice). It back upped to The Wall. They loved it.

According to a survey, in just five years there has been a six-fold increase in so-called McRefugees in Hong Kong or residents who spend their nights sleeping in the 24-hour McDonald’s outlets across the city.

People Keep Shooting Up the Emmet Till Sign

Hate and bigotry dies hard in some places.

Shot-up Emmett Till Memorial

Kroger To Stop Accepting Visa

A California subsidiary of Kroger will stop accepting Visa credit cards next month in a dispute over swipe fees.

“Foods Co. Supermarkets said it would no longer take Visa credit cards beginning Aug. 14. The ban will cover 21 stores and five fueling centers in central and northern California. Shoppers will still be able to use Visa debit cards, as well as cards from other networks such as Mastercard, Discover and American Express.”

The cost of swiping using a debit card and computerized systems are getting out of hand. In 2014, Walmart filed suit against Visa alleging it cost $350 million in fees from 2004 to 2012.

Trump Admits to Meeting

“President Trump said on Sunday that a Trump Tower meeting between top campaign aides and a Kremlin-connected lawyer was designed to “get information on an opponent” — the starkest acknowledgment yet that a statement he dictated last year about the encounter was misleading.”

Too Little Too Late’: Bankruptcy Booms Among Older Americans

For a growing number of older Americans, traditional ideas about life in retirement are being upended by a dismal reality . . . bankruptcy.
The signs of potential trouble such as vanishing pensions, soaring medical expenses, inadequate savings have been building for years. Now, new research sheds light on the scope of the problem. The study found the rate of people 65 and older filing for bankruptcy is three times what it was in 1991 and the same group accounts for a far greater share of all filers.

Steel Giants With Ties to Trump Officials Block Tariff Relief for Hundreds of Firms

“Charlotte-based Nucor, which financed a documentary film made by a top trade adviser to Mr. Trump and Pittsburgh-based United States Steel which has previously employed several top administration officials have both objected to the 1,600 exemption requests filed with the Commerce Department.

To date, their efforts have not failed and resulted in denials for companies based in the United States but rely on imported pipes, screws, wire and other foreign steel products for their supply chains.

The ability of a single industry to exert so much influence on the exclusion process is striking even in Mr. Trump’s business-friendly White House, given the high stakes for thousands of American companies that depend on foreign metals. The boundaries of trade policy are being tested by the scope of Mr. Trump’s multifront trade war with allies and adversaries alike, which includes tariffs on up to $200 billion worth of goods from China and possible tariffs on automobiles and auto parts.”

Commerce Department: 59% of the denials come in cases where United States Steel, Nucor, or a third large steel maker AK Steel Holding Corporation have filed an objection. Nearly all of the rest were in cases where the company applying for an exclusion erred in its submission.

Economy Adds 157,000 Jobs in July, Little Evidence of Pick-up in Wage Growth Mark Thoma cites Dean Baker’s Report

“In spite of the healthy pace of job growth and the low unemployment rate, there continues to be little evidence of accelerating wage growth. Over the last year, the average hourly wage has risen by 2.7 percent. There is a very small uptick to 2.87 percent if we annualize the rate of wage growth for the last three months (May, June, and July) compared with the prior three months (February, March, and April).

Interestingly, there was a modest fall in hours in July, which led to a decline in the index of aggregate weekly hours from 110.0 to 109.8. As a result, the average weekly wage actually declined slightly in July.

The leading sector for job gains in July was manufacturing, which added 37,000 jobs, all but 5,000 of which were in the durable goods sector. Employment in the sector is up by 327,000 over the last year, an increase of 2.6 percent.”

NDD has covered similar in his posts at Angry Bear.

Notes On A Butter Republic

Paul Krugman: Denmark, where tax receipts are 46 percent of GDP compared with 26 percent in the U.S., is arguably the most social-democratic country in the world. According to conservative doctrine, the combination of high taxes and aid to “takers” must really destroy incentives both to create jobs and to take them in any case. So, Denmark must suffer from mass unemployment, right?

Yep, Danish adults are more likely to be employed than their U.S. counterparts. They work somewhat shorter hours, although that may well be a welfare-improving choice. But what Denmark shows is that you can run a welfare state far more generous than we do – beyond the wildest dreams of U.S. progressives – and still have a highly successful economy.

Indeed, while GDP per capita in Denmark is lower than in the U.S. – basically because of shorter work hours – life satisfaction is notably higher.

Short Term Healthcare Policies

Good Discussion at Kaiser on Trump/Republican Compliant Short Term Policies and what they will and will not cover.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) exempted short-term policies from market rules that apply to most major medical health insurance policies sold to individuals in the non-group market: rules that prohibit medical underwriting, pre-existing condition exclusions, and lifetime and annual limits, and that require minimum coverage standards. By contrast, short-term policies:

• are often underwritten with pre-existing medical conditions in mind. Applicants with health conditions can be turned down or charged higher premiums, without limit, based on health status, gender, “age,” and other factors;
• exclude coverage for people with pre-existing conditions – policyholders who get sick may be investigated by the insurer to determine whether the newly-diagnosed condition can be considered pre-existing and excluded from coverage;
• do not have to cover essential health benefits – typical short-term policies do not cover maternity care, prescription drugs, mental health care, preventive care, and other essential benefits, and may limit coverage in other ways;
• can impose lifetime and annual limits – for example, many policies cap covered benefits at $2 million or less;
• are not subject to cost sharing limits – some short term policies may require cost sharing in excess of $20,000 per person per policy period, compared to the ACA-required annual cap on cost sharing of $7,350 in 2018 ; and
• are not subject to other ACA market requirements – such as rate review or minimum medical loss ratios.

In comparison, an ACA Catastrophic plan covers all essential benefits, allows 3 PCP visits per year, and will cover certain preventative services at no cost for people under 30. If your income is that low for either Trump’s plan or the ACA plan, you are better off to get a Bronze or Silver plan as you will be eligible for a subsidy. The new version by Trump and Azar is a ripoff.

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Click this link. Data For Progress decided to ask people about policy proposals which very serious centrists consider way too far left for America. American voters respond differently.

As should already be clear from existing polls (click and search for “fair”), there is strong support for egalitarian populist redistributive public policy. At Data For Progress, they chose to emphasize the positive — four proposals with overwhelming support, but I think it is just as striking that opinion is almost equally split on a top marginal income tax rate of 90% (2% more oppose than support) and universal basic income (2% more oppose than support).

In particular, a (very narrow) plurality of whites without a bachelors degree support a universal basic income. One way to summarize the results is that pundits’ guesses about public opinion match the opinions of college educated whites (surprise surprise). That is the group least enthusiastic about universal basic income (by far) (OK I admit I am white and have university degrees so I should say “we are” but like hell i’m going to be classed with my fellow White American College educated opponents of UBI).

I suppose it is important that an overwhelming majority support a jobs guarantee. The problem of finding useful work for millions of people (and not crowding out unsubsidized private sector employment) doesn’t worry people anything like as much as the risk that one lazy person takes advantage of cash welfare once.

The key question for Democrats (and the USA) is why did most of a group of people more of whom support than oppose UBI vote for Trump ? How can there be such a huge gap between bread and butter big dollar issue polling (where the median US adult is to the left of the mainstream of the Democratic Party) and voting ?

I think the explanation is that the partisan gap is a partisan gap in beliefs about matters of fact (what has happened) not on policy proposals. Do click the link (I can’s summarize all the data) but one of the key patterns is that responses are surprisingly similar for rural and urban voters, the white and non-white working classes, and Trump voters and Clinton voters. It is clear that opinions the polled issues are not key to deciding votes. I’m sure that the authors are sure this is because Democrats are too timid to appeal to the public (at least that’s one of the things I think). But I want to stress another point.

There are some fact polls — people are asked to answer questions which have a correct answer (where was Barack Obama born — what fraction of the US Federal Budget is spent on foreign aid). On those questions, the answers given by Republicans and Democrats are very very different.

I want to see polling data on 2 dimensions — not the usual equaltiy on the x axis, liberty on the y axis, but values (or priorities or policy preferences) on the x axis and questions of fact on the y axis. Dataforprogress.org makes more convinced than I used to be (which is barely possible) that the Republicans are a coalition of the rich and selfish (college educated white Republicans) and the misinformed (patriotic populist voters who support universal basic income and voted for candidate bone spurs next to his golden toilet).

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Healthcare Insurers Lose in Court Over Risk Corridor Funds

I have written a couple of times about Sessions, Upton, Kingston, and Republicans sabotaging the ACA Risk Corridor Program with the insertion of Section 227 in the CRomnibus Bill signed in December 2014. Not only did Senator Sessions, Representative Upton (MI), and Representative Kingston (CO) block the funding of the Risk Corridor Program; with the insertion of Section 227 by Representative Kington, they blocked any transfer of funding from other programs as well. A rehash of the results of Republican sabotage shows, it caused a rise in premiums for the unsubsidized (others were picked up), Coops to go bankrupt, and insurance companies to withdraw from the healthcare exchanges.

Today a Federal Appeals Court ruled; “the U.S. government does not owe health insurers $billions in unpaid risk-corridor funds meant to offset losses during the early years (3 years) of the Affordable Care Act exchanges.

More than three dozen insurers claimed the federal government owed them more than $8 billion in risk corridor payments. Ruling 2-1 the COA determined the payments were not necessary since Congress deemed the program had to be budget neutral after the legislation was passed.”

In other words, the court decided a different Congress and/or the administration made up of different political interests can change the intent of another Congress or Administration.

A similar Risk Corridor Program exists in the Medicare Part D program for drugs which has no life time limit and was put in place by Republicans and Bush to cover any risk which may occur from getting too many higher cost insured.

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Robert J. Samuelson Also Exaggerates Social Security Problems

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Charles Gaba at ACASignups talks about the three legs of healthcare supporting it, the composition of them, and why each of those legs are necessary for healthcare.

Charles reviews Enrollee Responsibility, Career Responsibility, and Government Responsibly (the three legs) necessary to support Healthcare in the US, explains how each Republican bill has or would have impacted the ACA, and what needs to be changed in the ACA to make it more effective for all people in the US.

It is an excellent summary of the ACA, Politics impacting the ACA, ACA Issues, and many of the things I have talked about since 2008 in one 17 minute clip.

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“The Trump administration wants to effectively pull Title X funding from family planning clinics providing abortion services” as reported in Modern Healthcare.

Planned Parenthood while offering other healthcare services would not receive federal funding if they provided any abortion services or referred patients to other facilities that did perform abortions.

The Washington Post “For Planned Parenthood abortion stats, ‘3 percent’ and ’94 percent’ are both misleading”

Planned Parenthood would say abortions are just 3% of total health services.

The Susan B Anthony would argue abortions are 94% of all Planned Parenthood Pregnancy Services.

I would argue it is better to have an abortion in a controlled medical area rather than in a back alley with a coat hanger.

Of course let us not forget the person signing this rule has paid a $million for one Playboy Bunny to have an abortion and somewhere in the files are probably more hidden payments made. The fact that he would even bring himself to sign such a bill after what he has done and talked about is ludicrous.

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The Detroit News story, January 2018 “What MSU Knew” details when the abuse started. For twenty years, the female athletes who engaged in the Michigan State Gymnastics program complained of Dr. Larry Nassar to university representatives. MSU President Lou Anna Simon was amongst those who were informed and had known of the 2014 Title IX complaint and police report filed against an unnamed physician.

According to university records and victim’s accounts, amongst those who knew of the abuse were athletic trainers, coaches, a university police detective, the local police and an official who is now MSU’s assistant general counsel. Larissa Boyce is believed to be the first to complain in 1997 to the head Gymnastics Coach Kathie Klages at MSU. Klages then told Larry Nasser, no one else, and advised Larissa there could be serious consequences in filing a report. A fellow female Gymnast had also confirmed she had also been touched while being treated by Nasser.

A runner, Christie Achenbach told her coach Kelli Bert about Nassar’s behavior in 1999 while seeking treatment for a hamstring injury. Christie recalled coach Kelli Bert words; “he is an Olympic doctor and he should know what he is doing.” According to Kelli Bert, she does not remember the conversation and did not know Nasser was an Olympic doctor.

Spartan softball player Tiffany Thomas Lopez went to Nassar to be treated for lower back pain. She later told MSU Trainer Lianna Hadden of Nassar’s treatment regime. Hadden advised Tiffany to talk to MSU trainer Destiny Teachnor-Hauk. Destiny told Tiffany she could file a report if she was uncomfortable; but, there may be consequences.

Two years after Tiffany’s abuse, Jennifer Rood Bedford complained to Destiny Teachnor-Hauk about being uncomfortable with Nasser’s treatment. As told by Jennifer, Hauk said “that filing a report would involve an investigation, making an accusation against Nassar, and requires a statement that I felt what Nassar did was unprofessional or criminally wrong.” Rood could not say with certainty the treatment was wrong or unprofessional.

The stories being told by female athletes stopped with those who should have been advocating for them. Larissa Boyce had hoped this would come from a female coach. Over seventeen years, Destiny Teachnor-Hauk claims she never heard a complaint about Larry Nasser. The system failed, it failed at the coach/teaching level and not with the athletes who sounded the alarm of sexual abuse at the hands of a doctor. The abuse also happened outside of the MSU system.

The first to publicly testify against Nassar about abuse outside of MSU, Kyle Stephens said he began molesting her in 1998 by exposing himself in the basement of his home. She was 6. In 2004, she told her parents who told MSU Clinical Psychologist Dr. Gary Stollak. The parents met with Nassar and Stollak. Nassar denied everything and her parents believed the doctors. A retired Dr. Stollak testified he had a stroke in 2016 and could not remember any details of the meeting.

Upon leaving the second visit for back pain with Nassar in the Spring of 2004, Brianne Randall-Gay went to local police. She told them he had touched her bare breast and put his hand between her legs. A few weeks later, police asked Randall-Gay and her parents to meet with Nassar. Randall-Gay‘s parents went without her. Nassar said and the police confirmed what she experienced was a legitimate treatment.

Doctors and the police did not believe the young women and girl’s complaints.

Lindsey Lemke is a “Sister Survivor,” the name taken by the 256 survivors of Larry Nassar’s physical sexual assault. She and the others spent the last 18 months fighting “not just for justice for Nassar;” but, they also fought for accountability, “the accountability of Michigan State University who enabled Nassar’s continued abuse” by not reacting.

April of this year found Lindsey attending a dinner at Michigan State, an Athletic Gala sponsored by the university hosts and meant to honor student athletes having a GPA of 3.0 or higher. Lindsey was happy to have a night out celebrating her athletic accomplishments. It turned to a night of frustration and anger as the host talked about the disappointment the Michigan Spartans experienced over the last 16 months because of one man. And no, they were not going to let him bring it down for the University and the remaining Sister Survivors at the university.

Lindsey grew angry as she listened to the comparison being made by the speaker about the hard time MSU was having answering questions and explaining for 16 months about Nasser’s physical sexual abuse of Lindsey and the other female athletes. As explained in The Detroit News, the abuse continued over 20 years. It continued even though Lindsey and the other athletes went to their coaches and others . . . nothing was done.

A false equivalency was being made by the speaker as if the spotlight on Michigan State was the equivalent of the sexual abuse, or worse, then what the women athletes experienced, and endured again as they told their stories in public. The speaker spoke as if there could be an equivalency to each experience endured . . . making the University’s reputation more important than the sexual abuse at the hands of a MSU employee. There was no apology being made to Lindsey Lemke or her Sister Survivors.

In the same week as the dinner and in a Jane Doe investigation, Michigan State University allowed a female witness to be identified as a complainant. This can be a violation of federal law in response to a Title IX lawsuit.

A federal lawsuit filed Monday alleges a former female student was raped by three unnamed members of the school’s basketball team in April 2015. Following that alleged assault, the woman said the school’s counseling center discouraged her from reporting, telling her to “just get yourself better.”

The university responded by posting a detailed response online, raising concerns about student privacy.

Again, MSU failed to take into regard the importance of a student’s safety, their privacy, and the care required to protect them while answering various questions and reports. MSU acts according to its own best interest at the expense of its students.

Between 1997 and 2015, young women, girls, and older women alike raised concerns about Nassar’s treatments. It started to come to a head when Amanda Thomashow filed a formal Title IX complaint about Nassar in 2014. The complaint still did not result in the removal of Nassar.

Over 20 years, Nassar abused hundreds of women while at MSU. The University, its athletic department, and it’s president would continue to deflect responsibility for not taking action. In her letter of resignation, Lou Anna K. Simon the President in charge 13 of the 20 years in her letter of resignation stated:

“I have been told it is virtually impossible to stop a determined sexual predator and pedophile, that they will go to incomprehensible lengths to keep what they do in the shadows. As tragedies are politicized, blame is inevitable. As president, it is only natural that I am the focus of this anger.”

The State of Michigan appointed former Governor John Engler as the interim president after former President Lou Anna K. Simon was asked to resign by the Board of Trustees. She is still being paid a $750,000 salary for one year and will return to teaching at $500,000 annually. The same Board of Trustees failed to take action in an earlier 2014 Title IX investigation complaint about Nassar is still in place. The abuse was allowed to continue. MSU maintains it did nothing wrong during that investigation the 2014 filing.

John Engler was the political choice;

“I will move forward as though my own daughters were on this campus.”

were the words Engler used to help build trust with the MSU Sister Survivors and the public.

Instead of helping to provide greater protection for MSU women and Nassar’s victims, Engler personally campaigned in the legislature against bills meant to increase the statute of limitations for victims of sex abuse and make more authority figures mandatory reporters of child sex abuse. The 15 public universities in Michigan also opposed the bills. Engler claimed Nassar’s victims were only interested in leveraging MSU and were not interested in mediation.

Engler comment raises the question of how does the one responsible for taking action mediate the results of their failure with the victim? The outcome will always be in the mediator’s best intersts.

Engler argued publicly with Rachael Denhollander, the first woman to come forward publicly with allegations against Nassar. At a Trustee’s meeting early in April, “Engler publicly threatened Kaylee Lorincz when she shared the story about his attempt to buy her silence. Kaylee Lorincz also revealed during that meeting Engler lied to her about his settlement talks with other survivors, and downplayed the sexual harassment charges against Nassar’s boss, Dean William Strampel, calling them merely a ‘slap on the butt.’”

The Board of Trustees remains in place and reiterated their support for John Engler.

It is a pattern and a practice for MSU. As Think Progress points out “sexual assault allegations against football and basketball players have been ignored or mishandled by the athletic department and administration at MSU. Investigations into allegations have been shoddy and well hidden (if they happen at all). Victims have been encouraged not to come forward with allegations against high-profile players or coaches on campus due to potential backlash or retaliation.”

The same pattern and practice was experienced by the Sister Survivors as told by them about Nassar experienced by them with the Board of Trustees and the interim President John Engler. The Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights investigation confirmed MSU had not met multiple Title IX requirements, including notifying students of the name of the Title IX coordinator, conducting investigations within appropriate time frames, and following proper grievance procedures.

Jerry Sandusky’s sexual abuse case at Penn State received around-the-clock attention for weeks. The Sister Survivor’s case has disappeared from the public eye since MSU’s Nassar was sentenced. Attorney John Manly believes he knows why:

“I think it’s sexism, misogyny, and you know, it’s not college football, it’s gymnastics. And the audience for gymnastics doesn’t generate hundreds of millions or billions of dollars.”

Think Progress updated its initial report on Michigan State University. The law firm representing MSU sent a letter to the NCAA on May 4. The letter acknowledges Nassar, “under the guise of medical treatment, sexually assaulted at least 25 MSU student-athletes between 1997-2016, including six student-athletes since 2014, when MSU botched its Title IX investigation into Nasser’s abuse.”

The letter was sent to clarify and despite the sexual assaults that,

“no violations of NCAA rules occurred with regard to the criminal conduct of Dr. Larry Nassar, a former employee at the University.”

In spite of the many sexual abuse over 20 years, the assaults mostly occurring on the MSU campus, the deaf ear by MSU employees to female athletes, the condemnation by the Michigan state legislature of MSU for its failure to protect female athletes, and the Gymnastics Coach Kathy asking her team (including survivors of Nassar’s abuse) to sign a card of support for him after he was fired due to the allegations of sexual abuse in 2016; Michigan State University is more concerned about violations of NCAA rules and its image rather than Nassar’s female victims. There is no sympathy, morose, embarrassment when confronted with what was allowed to happen over the years. Business as usual.

The NCAA has not responded to the victims or Michigan State University.

References:

Michigan State still doesn’t care about victims of sexual assault Lindsay Gibbs, Think Progress, March 23, 2018

Michigan State is finding new ways to victimize the survivors of Larry Nassar’s abuse Lindsay Gibbs, Think Progress, April 18, 2018

Michigan State admits Nassar sexually abused student-athletes, but says he didn’t break NCAA bylaws? Think Progress, Lindsay Gibbs, May 4, 2018

What MSU knew: 14 were warned of Nassar abuse Kim Kozlowski, The Detroit News 2018

Michigan State ‘regrets’ providing an ‘unnecessary amount of detail’ in response to Title IX lawsuit‘ MLive, April 13, 2018

run75441 @ Angry Bear Blog

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The State of Michigan Legislature is applying for an ACA Waiver as I pointed out in my post Why States Should Not Be Allowed to Alter the ACA with Waviers

This is a relief valve for “counties” with high unemployment. In effect if Michigan counties have a high unemployment rate (8.5% or above), the unemployed workers in that county can have Medicaid until such time as the Unemployment Rate drops to 5%. Then the workers are expected to seek employment to be eligible for Medicaid. Ok, that should cover Detroit, Flint, Saginaw, Muskegon, etc. high unemployment rate. which exceeds 8.5%. Or does it qualify them?

The issue with SEC 107B is the word “Counties.” By using solely the word counties, SEC 107B does not make an exception for townships, villages, or cities. For example, Wayne County has an unemployment rate of 5.5% and not 8.5% or greater. As a result, Detroit which does have an unemployment rate greater than 8.5% and sits in Wayne County does not qualify for a Medicaid exemption because it is not a county. Neither would the other Michigan cities in other counties with low unemployment rates qualify. Set this aside for a moment.

The waiver strips predominantly Black populated Michigan cities of Medicaid if the county in which the city resides has an unemployment rate lower than 8.5% even though the city has an unemployment rate higher than 8.5%. Additionally and besides a work requirement of 29 hours per week, the bill will end Medicaid and expanded eligibility for residents after they’ve been on Medicaid for 48 months for those earning between 100% and 133% FPL and eliminate the option to extend coverage by completing healthy behaviors.

To force the issue with lame duck governor Rick Snyder, the Senate on Thursday (May 7th) approved a $56.6 billion budget which includes a suspension of the salaries of Health and Human Services Director Nick Lyon and other top officials in the department if Governor Snyder does not request and secure a federal waiver to implement the Republican legislation passed Medicaid work requirement, and other proposed parts of the legislation. The CMS has already blocked a lifetime limitation on healthcare in Kentucky’s waiver request. When the legislature includes a particular mandate on a budgetary piece of legislation, it can not be overturned by a vote. Both the House and the Senate are controlled by Repubs.

It is unlikely the CMS will approve Michigan’s waiver as they have already blocked Kansas and I believe Kentucky.

Sponsor of the Legislation Sentaor Shirkey:

“This is personal for me, because I laid a lot of political capital on the line to try to get this done,” (Shirkey coaxed fellow Republicans to support the Medicaid expansion in 2013 but is now leading the reform effort).

I still believe it was the right thing to do, but I’m not going to go back on the promises that were made to get those votes.”

Republican Michigan State Senators Shirkey and Joseph Hune have lifetime healthcare benefits which they passed for themselves in 2012.

run75441 @ Angry Bear Blog

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Having talked about the proposed state High Risk Pools and why they are bad; Charles Gaba at ACASignups.net turns his attention to the proposed Short Term Plans and why they are also bad. Keep in mind the proposed Short Term Plans are not the same as the ACA Catastrophic plans.

Most of the protection found in the ACA plans are not in the proposed short term plans. This would include insurability, rates, pre-exiting conditions, essential benefits, etc.

run75441 @ Angry Bear Blog

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