When health insurance companies lose money on their investments, how do they recoup their losses?

[Skwmom]

Hmmm.. in 2008, after the crash the talking heads were on television bemoaning the increase in premium rates.

Connect the dots....

I've only seen this talked about a handful of times - once by a guest on CSPAN morning journal.

The insurance companies have a built in bailout system. Don't you LOVE capitalism!

[Kalidurga]

1. They also deny more claims.

I have saw an article on a woman who was denied chemo. You know that treatment that has been around for decades. They called it experimental. They almost got away with it. She won her court case. I don't know if it was a real victory or not though because I don't know if that saved her life or not.

[onecaliberal]

2. They raise premiums.

[global1]

4. Not Only When They Lose Money....

they also deny claims and they raise premiums to push the bottom line each year for the stockholders. You know the drill - every year they have to make more money than they made the past year. Hence the increasing cost spiral we see in healthcare. This is the insurance industry's contribution to our spiraling up healthcare costs. Now couple that with Big Pharma and all the other medical products industry. And one wonders why our healthcare costs are going up. They wouldn't even let us negotiate the costs of pharmaceuticals. Hence people being caught up in the donut hole.

ACA goes a long way in trying to tamp down these spiraling rises - but a single payer - that takes the insurance industry out of our back pockets and the ability to negotiate with drug companies - would go so much further in keeping our healthcare dollar spend tamped down.