Kodak asks Judge to cancel retiree medical benefits

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Consider this:

Many Canadians and Europeans come to the US for our expensive health care because it is the best. Clinics in border cities here are busy treating Canadians who cross the border for treatment. Oh, it is also quickly available. You don't have to wait months for treatment.

I went to a doctor at 9, had an MRI at 10 and was back in his office looking at 3D models of the scan on his computer. I have friends in England waiting months to see a doctor. My wife had a bug recently and called her GP at 8:30, and had a 9:30 appointment.

PE

Ron,

Regarding your descriptions of medical care provided, I'm not sure you really understand just how fortunate you and your wife are. For an individual, health care in the US is the best only if that individual has access to it. For the other 50+ million individuals in this country who don't, it's not really very good at all.

Ken
 

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For an individual, health care in the US is the best only if that individual has access to it. For the other 50+ million in this country who don't, it's not really very good at all.

In general I agree, but having had the unfortunate opportunity to spend about 6 days (over the past month) in emergency rooms and urgent care facilities and hospital rooms... the number of uninsured who receive services is quite astounding. I'd guess 33% of everyone there... and I live in an somewhat affluent part of Los Angeles. The uninsured are asked to apply for a grant, and if they do not qualify... then they will get stuck with a bill. I'll bet most default one way or another since there is likely no way to ever pay it off. But at least they get serviced and not turned away.
 

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having had the unfortunate opportunity to spend about 6 days (over the past month) in emergency rooms and urgent care facilities and hospital rooms... the number of uninsured who receive services is quite astounding.

Receiving emergency treatment is not the same as receiving health care.


Steve.
 

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Given the vulnerability to this kind of thing for the vast majority of working people with the exception of the very rich it always amazes me and I suspect most of the people in the U.K. and the rest of Europe why there is such opposition to a form of state/country health service which through taxes is free at the point of use.

pentaxuser

I am certainly not in favor of a government run health care program although Medicare is already a form of government run health program. It is a fact of life that government bureaucrats have a natural knack of messing up just about everything that they try to actually run. On the surface they are quite tempting but there are many underlying problems that can be quite difficult to administer. PE has outlined just a few of those problems.

I do believe that our government should be able to enable and enforce laws requiring companies, municipalities and States to honor their obligations rather than permit them to pass those obligations along through the years like a big Ponzi scheme, financing them as they go, until they get in financial trouble.

I believe that they should all be required to fully fund their obligations at the end of each year, and if they were too conservative with their funding in the previous year then the shortfalls need to be funded as well. I know it is not as simple as it sound but this would help keep things on the square. If that means that they cannot announce a huge profit, or pay monstrous dividends at the end of the year, so be it. Please read this with a certain amount of healthy skepticism because I am sure there are better ideas out there than my own simple ones. :D
 

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Receiving emergency treatment is not the same as receiving health care.

Yes, you are quite right. Many appeared to be there for flu symptoms. I would have felt better to have seen uninsured pregnant women there getting prenatal checkups.
 
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In general I agree, but having had the unfortunate opportunity to spend about 6 days (over the past month) in emergency rooms and urgent care facilities and hospital rooms... the number of uninsured who receive services is quite astounding. I'd guess 33% of everyone there... and I live in an somewhat affluent part of Los Angeles. The uninsured are asked to apply for a grant, and if they do not qualify... then they will get stuck with a bill. I'll bet most default one way or another since there is likely no way to ever pay it off. But at least they get serviced and not turned away.

They get "serviced" only to the point of stabilization. That's the law. Then they get booted unless they have insurance. Or sufficient personal means.

Emergency care is hideously expensive. Orders of magnitude more costly than simple access to a primary care provider for preventative maintenance. But they do not have access to that level. So when their kids get sick, they do what they have to do. As would any parent. And because they have only been stabilized, they'll be be back again very shortly to be restabilized—if they haven't died before then.

It's an upside down system. Sniffles are being treated at regional trauma centers. And don't think for a minute that those unpaid costs are not being met. Look at your hospital invoice. See that line for ibuprofen tablets (Advil) at $80 per tablet? The insurance companies pay for that. That means you and me and employers paying indirectly through outrageous premiums.

My wife recently had a two night stay at a hospital for a broken elbow that required surgery. The room charge alone, nothing else, was $57,800. For two nights. That's the Motel-6 charge only. No doctor costs. No medical test charges. No rehabilitation. Just the room. Or half of the room, since it was shared.

And we still have people saying that the current system is just fine. No need to change a thing.

Lunacy...

Ken
 
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BrianShaw

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Please read this with a certain amount of healthy skepticism because I am sure there are better ideas out there than my own simple ones. :D

I don't know too many "normal working people" who would disagree with your simple and straight-forward approach. I thought there already were government protections on defined-benefit pensions. But now I'm learning that there are protected parts of the defined benefits, and parts they can weasel out of. And even the protected parts aren't fully protected it seems.
 

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And we still have people saying that the current system is just fine. No need to change a thing.

Lunacy...

Lunacy is right. But I hate to admit... I haven't a clue how to make things better. I went to college, got a good job, make more money than God himself... yet I'm struggling... and only to be insulted at the grocery store when I'm buying ground meat of questionable origins and seeing steaks getting paid with government food cards (formerly "food stamps"). I'm not bitter, but I sure am frustrated... about health care, about job security, about getting the short end of every stick. Yet I'm blessed to be int he status I am becuase I know there are many,many who are not. What's worse... I don't think I trust ANY of the folks who say they think they know the way to a better life for all (or most. or many. or even just a few more).
 

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Oh.. sorry about that. What I meant is: good luck to the folks at Kodak.
 
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RattyMouse

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Yes... If you consider rated 37th in the world by the World Health Organisation to mean best!

I don't know of anyone who has travelled from here to the US for health care.


Steve.

That stat is unmitigated nonsense. The US as THE BEST health care technology in the world PERIOD. We do NOT have the healthiest people due to lack of access, hideous lifestyles, etc. But when it comes to doctor's, nurses, hospitals, and technology, no one even comes close.
 
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RattyMouse

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They get "serviced" only to the point of stabilization. That's the law. Then they get booted unless they have insurance. Or sufficient personal means.

Emergency care is hideously expensive. Orders of magnitude more costly than simple access to a primary care provider for preventative maintenance. But they do not have access to that level. So when their kids get sick, they do what they have to do. As would any parent. And because they have only been stabilized, they'll be be back again very shortly to be restabilized—if they haven't died before then.

It's an upside down system. Sniffles are being treated at regional trauma centers. And don't think for a minute that those unpaid costs are not being met. Look at your hospital invoice. See that line for ibuprofen tablets (Advil) at $80 per tablet? The insurance companies pay for that. That means you and me and employers paying indirectly through outrageous premiums.

My wife recently had a two night stay at a hospital for a broken elbow that required surgery. The room charge alone, nothing else, was $57,800. For two nights. That's the Motel-6 charge only. No doctor costs. No medical test charges. No rehabilitation. Just the room. Or half of the room, since it was shared.

And we still have people saying that the current system is just fine. No need to change a thing.

Lunacy...

Ken

My daughter was born with an emergency C-section. I brought my wife into the ER as she was in MASSIVE pain. The ER treatment, the C-section and all other exploratory surgery and recovery costs totaled 40,000 dollars. This is in Chicago, a very expensive city.

You were ripped off big time.
 
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OK, I'll succumb to temptation and lay everything out once again for non-US members, even though this entire thread flirts heavily with APUG's ban on politics outside the soapbox.

First, pensions. If a US corporation offers a defined-benefit pension (one where a certain number of dollars per month will be provided at retirement, usually based on a formula that includes age, wages and years of service), it must pay premiums to the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation (PBGC). Employees' pensions are referred to as "vested benefits," with vesting sometimes happening after a several year delay and sometimes happening immediately after each year of service. That is, the employee is entitled to those pension payments regardless of whether the employer discontinues the pension plan or not. In return for employer premiums and meeting a minimum plan funding level by the employer, PBGC will continue payment of a retiree's pension benefits in the event the employer goes bankrupt. There are some limitations, based on how old a retiree is at time of company bankruptcy and how large their monthly benefit was, but a substantial portion -- many times all -- of the monthly pension check continues to be delivered, from the PBGC rather than the former employer's plan.

Next, medical benefits. There may be a small number of exceptions that actually pre-fund and vest this coverage, but most US private sector employers who "promise" retiree medical make very clear, through regular disclosures during employees' working years, that said medical coverage is not a vested benefit and is subject to discontinuation or modification at the employer's whim at any time. Most employees don't bother to read the mandated disclosures; even those who do usually fail to grasp their meaning. Note that almost everyone in the US is eligible for Medicare coverage at age 65. It does require a monthly contribution, carries a deductible and doesn't cover everything, but is infinitely better than the situation those under 65 find themselves in -- i.e. no coverage outside employment or prohibitively expensive individual insurance policies. This is scheduled to change with the phased implementation of the Affordable Care Act

Dead Link Removed

but, even after all Affordable Care Act provisions take effect, Medicare remains a much less expensive option for those who qualify. There are private supplemental insurance plans available for those who wish to mitigate the risk of Medicare's deductible and co-pays.

In summary, the important points are:
  • Pensions, when offered, are guaranteed vested benefits
  • Retiree medical benefits are provided at employers' whims

I should point out that private sector defined benefit pension plans are going the way of the dinosaur in the US. Most companies have ended them completely for new employees and many are placing a "hard freeze" on their plans for even long-term current employees. That is to say, "your monthly pension benefit is frozen based on your salary and length of service today; no matter how many more years you work from this point on it won't increase." Also, the number of private sector employers who even "promise" retiree medical coverage is rapidly approaching zero. In the case of my former employer, probably the country's largest exporter, there wasn't much need for me to speculate. It terminated all such coverage, including for then-current retirees, in 1994. Medical insurance expenses had to be part of my retirement planning for a long, long time.

One last thing. Some will undoubtedly pile on now to complain about public-sector employees who continue to receive defined-benefit pensions and retiree medical coverage. My preemptive response is: why not work toward requiring those benefits for private-sector employees rather than dragging public-sector workers down too? Why not recognize the reality that employer/employee relationships are inherently adversarial and once again support labor organization rather than working/voting against public sector unions who never lost sight of the fact? Why let "divide and conquer" succeed?
 
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Thanks Sal.
You're welcome Brian. Even though my career was spent in engineering, managers up through the VP level frequently referred to me as "HR" with a wink when questions arose on these matters. For some reason I always paid close attention to the details; real HR people occasionally visited my office for consultations. :D
 
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My daughter was born with an emergency C-section. I brought my wife into the ER as she was in MASSIVE pain. The ER treatment, the C-section and all other exploratory surgery and recovery costs totaled 40,000 dollars. This is in Chicago, a very expensive city.

You were ripped off big time.

The total overall cost for that broken elbow, including eventual rehabilitation, came to just over $100,000. It did include entry into the system via emergency trauma care.

Payable costs between providers and insurance companies are tightly negotiated and controlled. Generally, providers bill at one level, but agree to accept negotiated fee settlements that limit out-of-pocket costs to the insured at a much lower level. So you actually pay the costs via higher insurance premiums and not direct provider reimbursement. Our out-of-pocket was about $4,000. That was a 96% reduction for us. Not too bad. However, to cover the shortfall my employer's cost of his employee's medical insurance premiums are insanely high. This limits his ability to expand and hire.

And because insured patients pay so little out-of-pocket—and uninsured patients almost nothing—there is no visibility of the problem. And no incentive, when feasibile, to shop around for lower costs. It's always somebody else's (the insurance company's) money, so why worry? Except that the insurance companies get that money from us.

It's not a ripoff. In the absence of reform, this is how the system has evolved and works. We deny access to millions, thus forcing them into the most expensive levels of emergency care possible, then spread that unneccesary extra expense to those who do have insurance via insurance company premium structures. In other words, we all pay far more than is necessary to get much lower levels of care (stabilization only) than are actually required.

Something has got to change before we bankrupt this entire country.

Ken
 

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It would appear that most of the money changing hands in the US medical system ends up with the insurance companies.

I think you to remove the insurance companies from the system.


Steve.
 

arpinum

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Found the original thread of PE discussing retirement plans, and I misquoted him as saying most had chosen the cash out option. Reading that old thread made me realize Kodak is either doing very well protecting the employee pensions, or we haven't begun to hear the worst of it.
 
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It would appear that most of the money changing hands in the US medical system ends up with the insurance companies.

"Capitalism is savagery."

:sad:

Ken
 

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Steve ... nearly every hospital in this area is going broke because of the cost of emergency services
to the uninsured, and this is one of the most affluent parts of the country. More payroll is spent in
the office haggling with insurance companies than payroll for doctors and nurses. Some surgeons aren't even getting paid. It's even worse in private practice. A private insurance plan for a family
can be double per month of a home mortgage - and then they can dump you when you real need it.
But to be fair to the ins co's - they need all that money so they can pay their buddies in congress
to prevent change. (My wife is in medicine and we're right in the middle of the mess!)
 

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Ain't life grand!

Nobody seems to be making any money. Not the Companies providing the benefits. Not the Insurance Companies who insure the benefits. Not the hospitals who are providing the services. Not the Government who oversees the entire mess.

So tell me...where is all the damn money going??? I sure ain't getting any of it!! All I get are the bills and the taxes.
 

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I said nothing in my last post about uninsured. I merely stated that we have the best (and fastest responding) medical care system in the world, and that is obvious when we get "guests" from everywhere world-wide that take advantage of it.

For those who think insurance companies are getting the lion's share, remember that Medicare is low overhead and pays for a lot of our medical care over 65.

PE
 
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I said nothing in my last post about uninsured.

No, you didn't. But those 50+ million uninsured really are the 800-pound silent gorilla in the room, aren't they?

If we have to completely ignore one-sixth of the entire population of the United States—simply say nothing about them as if they didn't exist—in order to make the case that we have the best overall medical system in the world, then what that says morally and ethically about us is far worse than what it says about them.

They do count.

And the fact that they do not have any medical access to anything other than hideously expensive, and most of the time hideously inappropriate, emergency trauma room care is financially killing us all. Individuals and businesses. If we can't bring ourselves to do the sane thing and reform this upside down system—and do it fast—then the only other viable option would be to repeal the laws that require hospital emergency rooms to treat everyone to the point of stabiliztion. Then when they show up at the door just tell them instead to go find a quiet place under a freeway bridge somewhere and tough it out.

And when their problems are more severe than the sniffles, you know what that means...

Ken
 
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RattyMouse

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The total overall cost for that broken elbow, including eventual rehabilitation, came to just over $100,000. It did include entry into the system via emergency trauma care.

Payable costs between providers and insurance companies are tightly negotiated and controlled. Generally, providers bill at one level, but agree to accept negotiated fee settlements that limit out-of-pocket costs to the insured at a much lower level. So you actually pay the costs via higher insurance premiums and not direct provider reimbursement. Our out-of-pocket was about $4,000. That was a 96% reduction for us. Not too bad. However, to cover the shortfall my employer's cost of his employee's medical insurance premiums are insanely high. This limits his ability to expand and hire.

And because insured patients pay so little out-of-pocket—and uninsured patients almost nothing—there is no visibility of the problem. And no incentive, when feasibile, to shop around for lower costs. It's always somebody else's (the insurance company's) money, so why worry? Except that the insurance companies get that money from us.

It's not a ripoff. In the absence of reform, this is how the system has evolved and works. We deny access to millions, thus forcing them into the most expensive levels of emergency care possible, then spread that unneccesary extra expense to those who do have insurance via insurance company premium structures. In other words, we all pay far more than is necessary to get much lower levels of care (stabilization only) than are actually required.

Something has got to change before we bankrupt this entire country.

Ken


How could a broken arm cost substantially more than emergency surgery and a delivered baby?? My wife was on the operating table less than 30 minutes after me rushing her to the ER. Our baby was delivered immediately and several surgeons did exploratory surgery to try to find out what was causing her such massive pain. Her entire abdomen was examined by the surgeons.

She had several weeks of recovery care due to the extensive nature of the surgery done on her.
 
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RattyMouse

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My current company bypasses health insurance companies completely. They self insure all employees up to around 50,000 dollars/year. If you exceed that then a separate policy kicks in for extreme cases. Result? The "premiums" that I pay are less than HALF of what I paid at my last company, which used a traditional health insurance company. Coverage is the same or better as are the copayments.

Why cant more companies do this?
 
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