97,000 Uninsured Mass. Taxpayers Get Fined

Under Universal Coverage Law, 5 Percent Of State's Taxpayers Forced To Forfeit $219

(AP)  Nearly 100,000 Massachusetts taxpayers have been fined for failing to obtain health insurance, even as a major survey concludes the effort to create near-universal coverage in the state is meeting key goals.

Five percent of taxpayers failed to obtain health coverage last year, and more than half of those - about 97,000 - were forced to forfeit their personal exemption - worth $219 - after it was determined they could have afforded health care.

Two percent of taxpayers - about 62,000 - were found not to earn enough for health care, avoiding fines. Under the landmark law, taxpayers must show they are insured or face penalties. The numbers were based on a review of 86 percent of expected tax filers for 2007.

The state's first-in-the-nation universal health insurance law required everyone in the state to be insured by July 2007, except for those who secured a waiver proving they couldn't afford insurance.

Gov. Deval Patrick said the fact that 95 percent of filers were insured shows the 2006 law is making progress.

"We continue to put one foot in front of the other," Patrick said Monday.

A total of $9.7 million in fines was deposited into a trust fund to help cover the cost of the law. Monthly penalties for those who can afford health care but refuse will jump and could total as much as $912 for individuals by December.

On Tuesday, researchers released the first major survey of the health care law.

The uninsurance rate for Massachusetts adults dropped by more than half and residents were paying less in out-of-pocket health expenses, according to the report in the journal Health Affairs, which also found that low-income adults were more likely to have regular checkups and dental visits since the law took effect.

Researchers from the Urban Institute, a Washington think tank, interviewed 3,000 Massachusetts residents in the fall of 2006, just before the law took effect, and conducted a second round of interviews a year later.

Among the key findings in the report was the drop in the uninsurance rate among working-age adults from 13 percent to 7 percent. The biggest drop was among poorer residents.

Even among higher-earning residents, there was a smaller but significant decline in the uninsured.

"It's a very positive first year," said economist Sharon Long, the report's author.

Nearly 350,000 residents have been added to the ranks of the insured in Massachusetts under the law, which created a subsidized health care program for those earning less than three times the federal poverty level. It also created the Health Care Connector to help higher wage earners sign up for lower-cost, non-subsidized insurance plans.

The survey also found that people are paying less for health care-related expenses.

The share of adults reporting out-of-pocket expenses of more than $500 dropped by 4 percent, while the number of low-income adults reporting out-of-pocket expenses of more than $3,000 fell 8 percent.

Low-income adults were more likely to have a place to go when they were sick and were more likely to visit a doctor for preventive care.

Despite the increase in the ranks of the insured, the study found little effect on the use of emergency rooms for non-emergency care. And the fear that employers would begin dropping health coverage as the new law took effect hasn't happened.

Long said the study also included good news for policy makers: 71 percent of working-age adults expressed support for the law.

That will come in handy as lawmakers struggle to find ways to cover the soaring costs of the law.

"The continued challenge of health reform requires the continued support of the population and we find support for health care reform among adults in Massachusetts remains high," Long said.

In 2006, a legislative committee estimated the law would cost about $725 million in the fiscal year starting in July. In his budget, Patrick set aside $869 million, but those overseeing the law have already acknowledged costs will rise even higher.

Lawmakers are hoping to close the gap in part with a new dollar-per-pack cigarette tax.

"Our success has created a very big challenge for us," Senate President Therese Murray said.

The report was paid for by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Massachusetts, the Commonwealth Fund and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

[michellem99-2009]

Open yer wallet in yer home in safety and look in there. What ye see is dollar bills. That is if ye carry some cash in yer wallet. Now I am not being a smart asre. nope
Some poster got on me for bringing religion in to it. Romney is a mormon and yes that mormom ASRE forgive me F---ed things up for the people of MA. I know their mind set. That is why I am an x mormom the bs they put people thru. It is far wosre if ye are a female,person of colour,handicap person. They make yer life hell. I know.

[Renegade.Rivers]

Why not draw together am Article V convention to iron all of these issues out? If 2/3 of the states were willing to do it, then there would be nothing that congress or the executive branch could do about it, and many of these issues now lying around as executive orders, Acts; such as the "Patriot Act" could be voted on by the states.

[cfin5]

Either you have a comprehension problem,or you never read what I said at all. I never said i agreed with anything, in fact my point was just the opposite. I was trying to point out, that if there was a more even distribution, of wealth, that everyone could afford insurance and health care, and it would not be a burden on anyone. better take a reading comprehension course, or else at least read something before you comment on it.

Posted by SteelMonkey5 at 10:12 AM : Jun 04, 2008------- What part of SOCIALISM don''t you understand? You have an ideology incomprehension deficiency.

[steelmonkey5]

Thats a lot of words to say you agree with what Massachusetts is doing to its citizens through socialist policy, not constitutional law.

Posted by cfin5

Either you have a comprehension problem,or you never read what I said at all. I never said i agreed with anything, in fact my point was just the opposite. I was trying to point out, that if there was a more even distribution, of wealth, that everyone could afford insurance and health care, and it would not be a burden on anyone. better take a reading comprehension course, or else at least read something before you comment on it.

[cfin5]

Our countries problems are the result of executive, legislative, and judicial DISOBEDIENCE to the "literal" wording of the Constitution and Bill of Rights,.....not from obeying them. Our government has slowly boiled us frogs in the pot in violating the 9th. Amendment which says,.....The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people........Doesn''t this mean in "modern day" American that it is UNCONSTITUTIONAL for anyone to misinterpret the literal wording of our incontestable rights as citizens in order to confiscate or lessen any of our other rights?........Massachusetts taxpayers need to challenge this ruling with some good CONSTITUTIONAL LAWYERS.

[cfin5]

Posted by SteelMonkey5 at 02:54 AM : Jun 04, 2008-----Thats a lot of words to say you agree with what Massachusetts is doing to its citizens through socialist policy, not constitutional law.

[stupidrules3]

It looks like the government of Massachusetts has learned a thing or two about unfunded mandates from the federal government. This is about the most unconstitutional law I think I''ve ever heard of. The state has no right at all to tell citizens how to spend their money. If we allow these kinds of laws to spread, the government will work out how to spend all our money because they will say we are not capable of managing our own finances. The people of Massachusetts should have revolted at the passage of this law from the beginning. Their failure to act will embolden their government to make more of their decisions for them, resulting in disaster.

[tootall10142]

The uninsured make can afford insurance folks richer/so i hope and pray that the whole state pulls togeter.Once these fined people realize you cant bum your way into the hospital in mass.they will buy ins. or move thier lazy ***** ouy of mass.

[steelmonkey5]

Part 4
Yet, they proclaimed that the system they were establishing was one of fairness and equality, when it was in fact it neither fair, nor equal, because they were unwilling to distribute a part of their wealth to others, or to give the slaves they owned the freedom, they so richly claimed to embrace.

These grave mistakes will in the end be the downfall of America, because in the end, just like in the game of Monopoly, a few will have it all, and the rest will have nothing. A few will have all the water and the buckets, and the food, and the tables, and the rest will have nothing, because that is how capitalism really works."

This was told to me over 50 years ago by that friend, and it now looks like he had more foresight than most.

I apologize for the length.

[steelmonkey5]

Part 3
Should one man be allowed to have a warehouse full of food, while another has an empty table? What is fair and equal about that? Yet, that is the system we tout so loudly, and call it capitalism. Wouldn''t we better of as a nation if everyone was able to have a full bucket for his horse, and a table of food? What is fair and equal about one man having five buckets, and another man none? What is fair about one man have ten rooms in a home he never uses, while another man has not even one for a bed on which to lay his head?

We can tout how great our system is but in the end it will not work, because it isn''t set on fair and equal standards. I have no problem with a man having full bucket, I have no problem with him keeping it full, but when he has five, while another man has none, and then there is a problem. I wonder how much better off the world would be, if we all had full buckets? I wonder how much better off our nation would be if after we filled our own buckets we were willing got help fill another''s bucket. Would we not all be better off for it?

Of course in order for that to happen, the rich much must willing to relinquish a portion of their riches, and that is where the rub comes in. Those who are rich and greedy will never willing give up a portion of their riches so that other may have some, no more than Washington and Jefferson were willing to give up a portion of theirs.
Continued

[steelmonkey5]

Part 2
From the very beginning our government was not based on the true idealism that all men are created equal, because they weren%u2019t. Because while some were fed from the silver spoon, others were fed from the wooden spoon. There was never anything fair and equal about it, it was a system where the rich could get richer, and the poor be damned.

It has been called the land of opportunity, but opportunity is a misunderstood term. Opportunity is only available at the leisure of the rich, and the expense of the poor. If the rich man is unwilling to give the poor man a stake, then what opportunity is there really? Even if the rich man is willing to give the poor man a stake, at what expense is it? For not only does the poor man have to pay back the stake, but he has to pay the stake back with interest. Interest is another misunderstood term. In whose interest is that paid? It is not in the interest of the poor man who is struggling to get a leg up to pay back the interest, but it is in the interest of the rich man who had more money than he needed to begin with.
This brings us back to the point I began with. Is it not in the interest of all Americans that we set limits on the amount of wealth any one man or family should be able to acquire? A horse can only drink so much water, a man can only eat so much food. Should it be that one horse should have a whole pond to drink from, while another has only an empty bucket?
Continued

[steelmonkey5]

An old friend of mine, who is now deceased, told me some years ago, "Any system that is based on money alone, will someday go broke. Money has no spirit, no soul, and no heart. We Americans want to point to our capitalistic society, and tell everyone how great it is. Yet, we haven''t prepared ourselves for the problems it will create. Any child that has ever played Monopoly realizes that over time, the money all ends up in the hands of one person. So it is with our capitalistic system, over time all of the money will end up in the hands of a few, and the rest will be left out."

He went on, "What we have failed to do in our system is set limits on just how much riches any one man or family can have. By failing to do that, we have failed everyone but the very rich and prosperous. There is no doubt that we could have a good system, if we were to make it fair for all, but that has never been done. What we have done is build a system that is based on the haves and the have not%u2019s, when we could all have a decent living if it was based on fair and equal limits. Of course, the rich and the powerful will never willing allow such a system to be formed, no more than the rich and powerful were willing to do it in colonial times. We glorify me like Washington, and Jefferson, but both were slave owners, and very rich men. Yet, when they worked to form a fair and equal system, they were neither fair, nor equal. They were rich and powerful, and unwilling to part with either.
(Continued)

[michellem99-2009]

I FORGOT YE PUT A PERSON OF COLOUR IN. He and the former mormon gov messed MA up. I WAS A MORMON FOR YEARS AND AN NOT now. The poor is always hated.

[killface7]

For a complete review of Massachusetts Health Insurance guidelines for Massachusetts Individual Health Insurance, Massachusetts Group Health Insurance, Cobra guidelines and more you can go to the Georgetown University publication for Massachusetts. The publication is titled "A Consumers Guide to Getting and Keeping Health Insurance in Massachusetts" and can be seen at http://www.healthinsuranceinfo.net/ma.pdf

[middleman8]

devicar;

If u can''t stand up for your self and get fair treatment and care don''t attack some one that has found the proper place. As I say I was raised under that phony system and discovered the truth. What an A$$ hole you appear to be. You would probably spend your lfe in a dark room too dumb to turn on a lite.
I would say you do not know where Canada is let alone how to SPELL..CANADA..CANADA..GOT IT??

[cfin5]

Thomas Jefferson said,....."If we run into such debts, as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our callings and our creeds, as the people of England are, our people, like them, must come to labor sixteen hours in the twenty-four, give the earnings of of fifteen of these to the government for their debts and daily expenses; and the sixteenth being insufficient to afford us bread, we must live, as they do now, on oatmeal and potatoes; have no time to think, no means of calling the mismanagers to account; but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow sufferers."

[Netterz]

Just another step as far as I am concerned, showing that we do not live freely, in a free country, that we live in a veiled communistic state, where Big Brother wants all the control of the people, and that Corp America''s Insurance Companies are stuffing not only there own pockets, but that of the lobbyists, and Gov''t, to make sure they are maing huge $, can charge what ever they want. Treatment here in the US, is 3 times more expensive than in any other country. They have allowed Insurance to become a neccesary evil, in ever aspect of the American life. Since they have designed such a fantastic medical and retirement program for themselves, they dont care what the poor american has to deal with or pay. Its all just another way that they have, and will gain control over your life and well being.

[cfin5]

ToolMangler,.....I don''t understand everything, but seeing how things are these days, I/we need all the blessings we can get.....Revelation 1:3--- Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.

[toolmangler-2009]

I have read, and hold onto the Book of Revelation.
Posted by cfin5 at 07:57 PM : Jun 03, 2008


Good. it won''t happen ''letter by letter'' but every letter will be fulfilled

[payasyougo]

Did I miss the part of the story where everyone on the plan was experiencing a drop in total annual medical costs?