Your troubles have not started yet:
"21-year-olds will see a 58 percent rise in the price for premiums because they’re a year older. An age-adjustment factor used to compute premiums jumps substantially when a person turns 21. A 20-year-old whose premium was $130 per month in 2014 will see the premium rise to $205 a month in 2015, solely because of that year’s difference."
Are you ready for enrollment, kids?
"Health sign-up deadline is today" by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, Associated Press December 15, 2014
WASHINGTON — President Obama’s push to cover America’s uninsured faces another big test Monday.
This time, it is not only how the website functions, but how well the program itself works for millions who are starting to count on it.
Midnight Monday, Pacific time, is the deadline for new customers to pick a health plan that will take effect Jan. 1, and for current enrollees to make changes that could reduce premium increases ahead of the new year.
HealthCare.gov and state insurance websites are preparing for heavy online traffic before the deadline, which gives consumers in the East three hours into Tuesday to enroll.
Wait times at the federal call center started creeping up around the middle of last week, mainly because of a surge of current customers with questions about their coverage for next year. Many will face higher premiums, but they could ease the hit by shopping online for a better deal. Counselors reported hold times of 20 minutes or longer for the phone help line.
About 6.7 million people now have coverage through Obama’s signature law, which offers subsidized private insurance. The administration wants to increase that to 9.1 million in 2015. To do that, the program must keep most of its current enrollees and add more than 2 million new paying clients.
People no longer can be turned down because of health problems, but picking insurance still is daunting for many consumers. They also have to navigate the process of applying for or updating federal subsidies, which can be complex for certain people, including immigrants. Many returning customers are contending with premium increases generally in the mid-to-high single digits, but much more in some cases.
There is nothing complex about that to most people.
Consumers ‘‘understand it’s complicated but they appreciate the ability to get health insurance,’’ said Elizabeth Colvin of Foundation Communities, an Austin, Texas, nonprofit that is helping low-income residents. ‘‘People who haven’t gone through the process don’t understand how complicated it is.’’
Last year’s open enrollment season turned into a race to salvage the reputation of the White House by fixing technical bugs that crippled HealthCare.gov from its first day. With the website now working fairly well, sign-up season this year is a test of whether the program itself is practical for the people it is intended to serve.
Fairly well? After all that money spent?
New wrinkles have kept popping up, even with seemingly simple features of the Affordable Care Act.
That's why it wasn't really covered during the campaign.
For example, most current customers who do nothing will be automatically renewed Jan. 1 in the plan they now are in.
With a higher premium and lower subsidy.
While that may sound straightforward, it’s not.
Nothing ever is with this government or its mouthpiece media.
By staying in their current plans, people can get locked into a premium jump and miss lower-priced plans. Not only that, they also will keep their 2014 subsidies, which may be less than what they legally would be entitled to for next year.
Doing nothing appears to be a particularly bad idea for people who turned 21 this year, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a Washington group that advocates for low-income people.
OMG! Obama is supposed to be their friend!
Researchers estimate that 21-year-olds will see a 58 percent rise in the price for premiums because they’re a year older. An age-adjustment factor used to compute premiums jumps substantially when a person turns 21. A 20-year-old whose premium was $130 per month in 2014 will see the premium rise to $205 a month in 2015, solely because of that year’s difference.
The kids won't notice, right?
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Related:
"Good news now doesn’t mean good news forever. But at a time when conservative congressional critics will soon be looking for every available brickbat to toss at the federal health care law, it’s important to realize that recent developments in health care spending are reasonably encouraging."
Tell it to the students and public servants, Globe.
"Government reports surge in health law signups" by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, Associated Press December 17, 2014
WASHINGTON — ‘‘It’s been a strong start,’’ said Andy Slavitt, overseeing the second-year rollout. ‘‘Our call center and our technology have done their jobs — so far.’’
Tuesday’s numbers were partial, really just a subtotal.
Meaning this means nothing and is pure propaganda and public relations from the pre$$.
**********
The administration has set an overall goal of 9.1 million people signed up for 2015. That includes new customers plus roughly 6.7 million current customers, most of whom will be renewed automatically.
That goal could well be exceeded after this year’s promising start.
OMG!
Indeed, Avalere Health, a private market analysis firm, estimated Tuesday that enrollment will total 10.5 million people by the end of 2015. That’s still lower than the 13 million congressional budget analysts have projected.
Obama’s law offers subsidized private insurance to people who don’t have access to coverage through their jobs. Sign-up season runs through Feb. 15, but Monday was the deadline for most people to pick a new plan, or switch existing coverage, in time for the start of 2015.
The federal call center experienced long telephone hold times this weekend under the deadline crunch. About 500,000 people left their phone numbers for callbacks. HealthCare.gov had to deploy its online waiting room for some customers on Monday, but it had no major problems. Last year, the website was prone to crashing.
‘‘If we put last year and this year together, they have done an amazing job at ramping up their systems,’’ said Mehdi Daoudi, chief executive of Catchpoint Systems, which monitors website performance. ‘‘The fact is they have been able to adapt.’’
Catchpoint analyzed HealthCare.gov’s performance from Nov. 26 through noon Monday at the request of The Associated Press. The study was conducted with a mix of computers, using a cross-section of Internet providers, at locations around the country.
It found that HealthCare.gov’s overall availability and user response time were good, and that the website improved notably in some areas.
For example, logging in and logging out is much faster. Last year the median, or midpoint, time for logging in was 18.46 seconds.
For logging out, it was 4.61 seconds. This year the median login time was 3.21 seconds, and 1.91 seconds to log out. The log-in page was available more than 95 percent of the time this year, compared to 84 percent last year.
But it’s too soon for a victory lap at the White House.
The next big logistical challenge is making sure that millions of current customers will have a smooth transition to 2015.
Existing coverage is supposed to renew seamlessly, but it’s the first time the government has attempted the transition.
Uh-huh.
Wait until they get the premium payment.
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At least in Massachusetts:
Dueling deadlines send flood of calls Connector’s way
Health Connector reaches out about enrollment deadline
Mass. Health Connector extends billing deadline
The wait time was how long?
I'm sure you kids have better things to do:
"Their budgets strained, students turn to campus food pantries; Trend growing in state, nation" by Matt Rocheleau, Globe Correspondent December 15, 2014
UMass Boston senior Elizabeth Dennis receives financial aid to help cover tuition, shares an off-campus apartment to save on rent, and has a part-time job to pay her bills.
Still, the 21-year-old regularly does not have enough money to buy meals. So, once a week, she stops at her school’s food bank, one of the dozen that have sprung up on the campuses of Massachusetts public colleges and universities.
Related: Pay climbs for private colleges’ presidents
Just think about the golden Caret at the end of the trail, kids.
So what grade would you give him?
Experts say the pantries cater to an increasingly visible number of off-campus students faced with a wrenching but all-too-real choice: paying for college or keeping themselves fed.
“At the end of the day I know I have something to eat and I don’t have to stress out over that,” Dennis said after picking up pasta, peanut butter, fresh produce, and other items at the University of Massachusetts Boston pantry.
In Massachusetts, 12 of the state’s 29 public campuses operate pantries.
*************
The experience in Massachusetts is part of a national trend, with more than 100 higher education institutions overall offering pantries.
All while the rich get richer.
The Massachusetts Department of Higher Education launched an effort last month to study food insecurity among students more closely.
They can't hear the growling stomach?
The department’s deputy commissioner, Carlos Santiago, said he was shocked to learn how pervasive the problem is, and he applauded schools for establishing food banks and taking other efforts to help ensure their students don’t go hungry.
“In some respects, it’s a very sad commentary on the difficult lives students face,” Santiago said.
Some?
Experts blame a confluence of factors. As more young people from low- and middle-income families have enrolled in college as a way to improve their odds of financial success, the costs of tuition and textbooks have risen sharply.
Meanwhile wages have stagnated, costs of other goods and services have risen, and the 2008-2009 recession left many parents struggling to help pay for their children’s education.
$ick of the excu$es from on high yet?
Lack of food often hinders student performance. North Shore Community College established a cafeteria voucher system after hearing reports of students fainting from not eating because they didn’t have enough money to buy food, officials said.
“How can they achieve their potential if they’re hungry and can’t concentrate and pay attention in class,” said Jane Doherty, a staff associate in Bridgewater State’s chemistry department who started a food bank for students at the school.
At UMass Boston, more than 140 students are signed up to collect food from the campus pantry, which last year received and distributed an estimated 12,000 pounds of food donated by students, faculty, and administrators. Still, school officials believe there are many more students who could benefit but don’t ask for help because of the stigma associated with doing so.
“Many students are embarrassed and ashamed to use the food pantry,” said Shirley Fan-Chan, who started the pantry in 2013 and oversees it as director of a university office that also assists students coping with homelessness, poverty, and domestic violence.
To protect students’ privacy, the UMass Boston pantry is run in a discreet, low-traffic area of the Campus Center, and students pick up their food in staggered appointments. Staff say they try to make students feel welcome and comfortable.
“We ask about how their classes are going, how their kids are, how’s work,” said Alli Greenberg, a 24-year-old senior who works at the pantry. “A lot of times they’ll stay and eat a slice of pizza and talk to us.”
UMass Boston senior Neshel Willis receives student aid and works on campus and her family gets $30 a month in food stamps. But she has to help care for her 16-year-old sister and her 45-year-old mother, who has lupus and cannot work.
“I just do the best I can, but this has been a big help for us,” said Willis, while picking up her weekly allotment of food, which is estimated to be enough to feed an individual for about a week and a half.
College students can face unique barriers trying to get help off campus. For example, some don’t work enough hours to qualify for food stamps or they are ineligible because they are still considered dependents of their parents, Fan-Chan said.
For some students, it means they put a higher priority on paying bills necessary to stay in school ahead of eating regularly, a choice that highlights how strongly they believe that a college education will lead to a better life.
Are you sure you are not being $cammed?
Dennis said she took a semester off last year and worked as a cashier in a convenience store. That experience motivated her to go back to school.
“I don’t want to be doing the kind of work I’d have to do without a degree,” she said.
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Even a pet is fed better than you kids.
Maybe you can find something in the insurance industry, kids. If not, you lazy kids can always go back to babysitting.
Maybe some faculty will soon be joining you at the food bank:
"Full-time faculty at Boston-area colleges take steps to unionize" by Matt Rocheleau, Globe Correspondent December 16, 2014
Full-time professors at several Boston-area private colleges are taking steps to unionize, joining a growing number of their part-time colleagues who have organized to seek higher pay and better work conditions.
The latest effort involves instructors and lecturers who are not on track to receive tenure, which is generally considered a permanent position, and represents the latest development in the national faculty-unionization movement launched a year and a half ago.
While average annual pay nationally for tenured and tenure-track faculty is in the $85,000 range and can climb to more than twice that amount, the median salary for full-time nontenure-track faculty falls around $50,000, according to surveys by the American Association of University Professors.
Unlike part-time or adjunct teachers, full-time faculty who are not on the path to tenure typically are eligible for employer benefits, including health and retirement insurance, and they often receive better pay than adjuncts.
Like part-timers, however, most full-time faculty who are not on the tenure track do not have long-term job security. They say they have little influence in decisions made by their colleges, including ones that directly affect their working conditions.
As full-timers join the movement, part-time faculty are continuing their push. About 960 Northeastern University adjuncts organized in May and are now in contract negotiations. Some 800 adjuncts at Boston University are scheduled to vote next month on whether to unionize. At Bentley University, a push to organize 200 adjuncts fell two votes short in fall 2013, but some faculty there want to try again. A campaign to unionize part-timers is also underway at Simmons College and other area colleges....
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At least our high school kids are being taken care of:
"Partners fail so far to raise test scores at key schools; Seven threatened with takeovers still underperforming" by James Vaznis, Globe Staff December 15, 2014
Two years ago, Massachusetts Education Commissioner Mitchell Chester delivered an ultimatum to seven underperforming schools in Boston, Holyoke, and Springfield: If you want to avoid a state takeover, hire an outside partner to rapidly turn around student performance.
The schools took the commissioner up on his offer and enacted partnerships last fall, but all have failed to achieve dramatic, across-the-board gains in MCAS scores so far, according to a Globe review of testing data.
The results are raising questions about the efficacy of the partnerships and fueling tensions in local school systems, especially among teacher unions and some grass-roots organizations that resent bringing in private nonprofits to run public schools. The state has devoted more than $1 million in federal school-improvement grants to support the partnerships.
That's all?
“I’m not surprised they added very little value,” said Richard Stutman, president of the Boston Teachers Union. “I think the only meaningful way to improve these schools is by mobilizing the resources and skills we have in the school system and not to rely on outside vendors who seek to sell their wares.”
I $O AGREE!
Chester said he remains committed to seeing the remaining partnerships through. He spoke optimistically about Springfield’s new partnership with Empower Schools, a Boston-based organization co-founded by former gubernatorial candidate Chris Gabrieli.
“I’m not ready to judge success or failure based on this first-year experience,” Chester said.
In fact, Chester just pressured Boston into hiring a partner to work with the Dearborn STEM Academy in order to avoid a state takeover.
High expectations have surrounded these partnerships, raising hopes among some education advocates that outside groups can bring fresh perspectives and practices — such as intensive tutoring and longer school days — that have shown success at charter schools.
Districts such as Boston and Lawrence have been proactive on this front in recent years, handing over some of their schools entirely to an outside operator....
Zzzzzzzzzz (fell asleep in class again!)
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At least we take care of our seniors here in Mass:
"New rules to protect elderly opposed; Critics assert rules may limit choices" by Kay Lazar, Globe Staff December 10, 2014
A push to strengthen protections for elderly residents of assisted living facilities may instead end up limiting their choices, industry leaders warned Tuesday.
The proposed rules, issued by Massachusetts officials, may also curtail future public input in the regulatory process governing the residences, industry leaders said.
Many elders who once would have moved to nursing homes when their health declined are instead choosing to remain in assisted living, often because the cost is significantly less than what nursing homes charge.
Yeah, stay out of the nursing homes.
As a result, these loosely regulated, apartment-like facilities have undergone a profound transformation, with more and more residents who are increasingly frail....
They are assisting you to death.
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Related(?):
"Testing has become to the United States’ medical system what liquor is to the hospitality industry: a profit center with large and often arbitrary markups and unnecessary tests."
Speaking of healthy appetites....
