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Re:Health insurance companies are useless by dv_dt on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @12:12PM (#20626509)
Medicare is strongly supported by the seniors who receive it - surviving against decades of attempted rollbacks. I don’t know how one ends up thinking people are unhappy with government administered billing and payments in healthcare.
Re:Health insurance companies are useless by merpnderp on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @12:21PM (#20626617)
Strongly supported because they love it, or strongly supported because they have exactly zero other options?
Re:Health insurance companies are useless by dv_dt on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @12:35PM (#20626773)
They have Medicare Advantage private options. Anecdotally I think people vastly prefer the public Medicare over the more complex private versions.
Re:Health insurance companies are useless by howard941 on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @12:43PM (#20626882)
The MA programs typically offer better benefits than 80/20 Medicare part B because they selectively market to groups of seniors in relatively good health but mostly because they get one hell of a taxpayer subsidy.

To the surprise of no one the promised efficiencies never materialized.

Re:Health insurance companies are useless by dragonwriter on Wednesday August 07, 2019 @10:33AM (#20635024)
> The MA programs typically offer better benefits than 80/20 Medicare part B

...because the coverage of Medicare Part A + Part B is the legal minimum for Medicare Advantage, so they are necessarily on average greater coverage.

Re:Health insurance companies are useless by fucking_tragedy on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @01:23PM (#20627359)
> strongly supported because they have exactly zero other options?

Like all Americans, they're free to buy private health insurance.

Re:Health insurance companies are useless by mikeash on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @12:39PM (#20626823)
Seniors vote in large numbers. A politician with a good plan for giving seniors a better option would have a huge advantage. That nobody had used this tactic to attain high office suggests that better options are hard to come up with.
Re:Health insurance companies are useless by astura on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @12:40PM (#20626830)
Can't they get health insurance through the Obamacare marketplace now?
Re:Health insurance companies are useless by dragonwriter on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @03:43PM (#20628762)
No, eligibility for marketplace plans ends when Medicare eligibility starts.
Re:Health insurance companies are useless by refurb on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @03:42PM (#20628742)
Medicare Part D (which covers all Medicare patients) and Medicare Advantage are run by private insurers.