LIES, LIES AND OMG, MORE LIES
James Quinn
TheBurningPlatform.com
29th April 2016
It’s that time of year again. It’s open enrollment for health plans at my employer. They are biggest employer in Philly and have the most leverage possible with the insurance companies. They have such good leverage that my premiums are going up “only” 9.8% this year for a basic HMO plan. Based on what I hear from others, I should be thankful for just a 9.8% increase.
This isn’t a new development. Since I’ve been tracking all my expenditures using Quicken since 1991, I know exactly what my annual health insurance costs have been every year. Obamacare was passed in 2009 and began to be implemented in 2010. Obama declared that families could expect $2,500 of savings per year. I know for a fact my annual medical expenses were $2,000 higher in 2015 than they were in 2010.
The lies of the government and their minions at the BLS are revealed to anyone who cares to open their eyes. The BLS reported inflation rates for health insurance since 2010 is beyond laughable. They must have triple seasonally adjusted, massaged, and tweaked these figures to arrive at the absurdly false inflation figures they are feeding to the sheeple. These are the reported inflation figures for health insurance since 2010:
2010 – (4.0%)
2011 – 5.6%
2012 – 10.6%
2013 – 0.9%
2014 – (0.8%)
2015 – 3.7%
According to the BLS, and built into their CPI calculation, your health insurance premiums have gone up by about 16% over the last six years. Now for the smell test. I have worked for a large employer with excellent healthcare benefits over that entire time span. My health insurance premiums have risen by 65% since Obamacare was passed. And that doesn’t capture the whole picture.
I had no deductible in 2010. I now have an individual deductible of $1,200 and a family deductible of $2,400. My co-pay back in 2010 was $15. Today it is $25. So my out of pocket expenses have risen too. I estimate I can add another 15% of increase due to these changes. Therefore, I’ve experienced 80% inflation in my health insurance expenses versus the BLS lie of 16%.
In case you weren’t paying attention, the BEA reported the latest GDP lie yesterday. According to these government drones, the economy grew by a whopping 0.5% in the first quarter. As you may or may not know, this figure is adjusted for inflation. Our beloved BLS propagandists assure us that inflation has been running at a microscopic 0.9% over the last twelve months. Does anyone who is not a halfwit or Ivy League educated economist actually believe that tripe?
The Rest…HERE
