Comments on: Two Things

By: misstwist

misstwist — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 09:46:23 +0000

Oh god, that’s an awful set up.

I knew the health cover over there wasn’t great but that’s just messy beyond belief. Doubly so as I know minimum wage over there sucks beyond measure compared with here :(

I hope, beyond all else, that that is one bill that doesn’t get through.

By: Lynne

Lynne — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 13:03:55 +0000

misstwist, here the public system is only available to those with very low incomes or who are past retirement age, more or less. oh and people with children who would otherwise be uninsured. there are some other people eligible, too.

but to make it extra stupid, private insurance is usually provided to your workplace. workplaces buy into insurance plans for large numbers of people as a group because it lowers the premiums, and then employees can opt into the insurance. usually they still pay some percentage of the premium. at some places that’s on a sliding scale with income, at others it’s a flat percentage. usually you have a few private plan options (e.g. an hmo, a ppo, etc.). sometimes if you opt out there is a rebate that gets added back into your paycheck, but it’s generally small. if you’re unemployed, or your workplace doesn’t provide insurance (increasingly common, since it’s gotten so expensive), you can buy insurance yourself individually. that usually runs many thousands of dollars a year.

sometimes a workplace has a large enough number of workers and/or enouh funds to cover basic insurance entirely; the only people who pay, then, are the ones who pay for extra coverage (this often includes coverage for spouses and/or children, or maybe a better plan for yourself – often the “free” plan is crap). this surcharge is a fee added on top of what is otherwise “free” insurance for state workers in Alabama. that may sound like a ridiculous thing to protest if you have to pay for your premium up front, but when its covered the cost of healthcare is basically coming out of people’s paychecks inviisibly here. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who barely saw a raise in the past few years, even to match inflation, because the health insurance costs were skyrocketing.

does that help at all?

By: misstwist

misstwist — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 07:36:01 +0000

Ummm, can someone explain the American health system to this Australian girl?

We have medicare which give us a rebate on health services and occasional free services depending on what doc you’re seeing and why. Then we also have private cover which seems to be what you guys are talking about here. If you don’t have private you pay a medicare rebate that comes out of your tax. If you do, which I do, it costs a shit load more than $25 a month.

Other than that I find the idea wrong. I can understand what they’re aiming for but it would be far better achieved via incentives. Your average teacher could have told them that. Offer free gym use, and extra day or two leave a year for hitting goals. Penalising only makes people dig their heals in.

I’d actually like to see the full policy for this.

By: didee

didee — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 23:34:44 +0000

Here’s an interesting editorial that counters the Alabama health care surcharge story with a little sanity. It originally appeared in the Miami Herald but was oddly picked up by the Akron Beacon Journal in Ohio. http://www.ohio.com/editorial/commentary/27730074.html

By: Amy

Amy — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 21:26:39 +0000

I am an employee with the State of Alabama. I received the news about this just a few weeks before it made MSN’s Money page. I was just livid.

Right now, my BMI is something around 35. However, my BP averages around 110/65, my overall cholesterol level was 138 when checked back in May, and although I have PCOS, I am not diabetic.

Some of the departments have gyms, but they are very limited, and the equipment is quite outdated. My department is about to start another WW program. At the beginning of the year, a program called Scaleback Alabama runs, and it monetarily rewards the group who loses the highest percentage of weight.

There are wellness checks, but they are not currently mandatory. I suppose if they’re going to go through with this, they’re going to make them mandatory. 1984, anyone?

I just really don’t see how they are going to be able to get away with this. They did it to the smokers, but I haven’t noticed it causing a decrease in the number of smokers standing around the building outside during the lunch hour.

By: BigGirlBlue

BigGirlBlue — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 08:13:36 +0000

2. It’s cute but not as cute as the cow/chick. I broke down and bought one. And I’m not going to wear it to the gym. :) But I will think of you at the gym when I’m wearing it.

By: Laurakeet

Laurakeet — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 04:19:55 +0000

Okay, brief review FWIW/YMMV:

Not all the tees from Threadless are American Apparel – it all depends on the design, and I’m not sure what the logic is behind which brand is chosen. They have their own label t-shirts, as well as Fruit of the Loom (unisex fit). http://www.threadless.com/sizechart

Regarding the men’s shirts, I got my husband a large Threadless brand men’s tee. As a 12-14 on top myself, and a hippy 16-18 on bottom, it fit me funny. Definitely baggy sleeves, which are probably 14-16 size up top.

Also, the 2X AA tee and the 1X threadless tee – both “girly” – fit me about the same. 2X was barely larger. Both are too long, I think – lots of bunching around hips.

First time I ordered and was quite satisfied with customer service. Wish I’d thought twice about AA size-wise and company-anti-feminism-wise, though.

By: DayGlow

DayGlow — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 04:07:55 +0000

Agreement with Cindy. In addition to the fact that this is blatent fat discrimination, the people in charge of these programs have obviously never opened a textbook or taken a class on anything having to do with motivation.

It has been proven, time and time again, that punishments do not work. If anything, they make people fearful and intimidated, but overall only work to decrease the overall mental well-being of the people involved. On the other hand, positive reinforcement like rewards or other incentives works much better.

By: scotlyn

scotlyn — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 13:06:36 +0000

HERA On topic: As long as health care is a private for-profit industry, we’ll be looking at nonsense like this. Not that the government would automatically be better (wasn’t it one of them who said something like ‘obesity is a greater threat to our country than terrorism’?), but if the profit motive was removed, there *might* be less of this kind of crap.

I would like to think that as an Irish citizen, I am lucky enough to have a free state-sponsored health-care plan, but this is being increasingly buggered up by a few real world facts, which I have been reflecting on lately.

I couldn’t believe more strongly that the profit motive/free market philosophy has no place in healthcare. And this for a very simple reason. While most of us can exercise at least some choice when it comes to buying, say, a T-shirt, a restaurant meal, a gym membership (and all of these include the choice NOT to buy it at all), we DO NOT CHOOSE to get ill. Therefore, if we are ill we are immediately at the mercy of those who can supply the treatment or cure. This is not a “free market” situation. NOT buying the treatment isn’t an option (at least it isn’t an option for anyone who values human life over profit).

However, since healthcare is being supplied to us on the free market commodity model (and I’ll get to how this affects a public health system in a minute), we are being sold the idea that we, the consumers are, in fact, choosers. We are told we can “choose” whether we become ill, therefore it is appropriate that we “choose” the level of coverage we need, and we “choose” the level of care we receive. All of these levels of “choice” are an illusion. We are simply a flock of geese and our illnesses their golden eggs – they have but to lay in wait and gather them in.

But the carefully tended illusion of “choice” does allow insurance companies and other stakeholders to avoid noticing how immoral their nakedly greedy profiteering from our illness and distress is. So how does this affect a public health system? Well, a public health system has to buy medicines from private drug companies, doesn’t it. It has to buy medical equipment from private suppliers. And, these suppliers, with their profiteering views, can easily get access to the ear of the health minister. And because our own health service has now come under the sway of a health minister who is a real “free market” idealogue, our tax euros may increasingly have to purchase hospital management, cancer diagnostic and other services from private suppliers too. (We recently signed a contract with an American company, which has admitted to fraudulent reporting, to screen all Irish cervical smears).

So, it is all part of a piece, we are being taken for all we’ve got when we are most vulnerable, and our public health services are also being taken for all they’ve got on behalf of their most vulnerable. We are all grist to the health profit mill.

Phew – sorry, that was a bit of a mouthful.

By: rhonwyyn

rhonwyyn — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 02:06:40 +0000

Cindy – on-site gym FTW! With only 30 minutes for lunch, there’s not enough time to change, go to the gym, cool down, shower, and change even though the gym is only about .25 mile away.

My husband and I applied for life insurance through Primerica. He had a seizure disorder for 14 years, but has been seizure-free for 6 and med-free for 4. (Or something like that.) Primerica kept calling us to ask for more info about his disorder. We kept telling him that his neurologist went out of business several years ago, and we don’t know what they did with the medical records.

We recently received a letter rejecting coverage. Him for a neurological condition within the past 10 years and no medical documentation. Me for my height and weight. For which they made ZERO phone calls and asked for ZERO medical records (not that they would have helped much, but most of my issues haven’t been weight-related!). This world is sooo messed up!