Health insurers gouging customers

Re: Michael Hiltzik’s business column “What do we need health insurers for?,” Feb. 28:

WellPoint’s 39% premium rate hike is pure extortion from people who can’t afford to give up health insurance.

Seniors on Medicare don’t live with 39% rate hikes because Medicare is not designed to enrich stockholders.

If private insurers keep gouging policyholders, don’t be surprised if you start having “town hall meetings” with people requesting Medicare or the public option.

George Bruce Wells

Seal Beach

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As a for-profit company, WellPoint and its ilk have priorities that are not compatible with what is best for the populace. Their goal is to ensure profitability on policies they sell, not to preserve or extend life.

Our government, on the other hand, has as a primary directive to protect and preserve its citizens’ lives and futures without worrying about turning a profit.

It seems obvious then that government must play a direct role in establishing a system of healthcare that is both universally available and mandated.

Thomas Miller

Whittier

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The truth of the matter is the health insurance model is not working today, and will become increasingly problematic as aging boomers exit out of the private insurance market and into Medicare.

Health insurance reform is a necessity, not a luxury we can afford to postpone to a later date, when the cure will be more, not less, expensive to implement.

Nora Hazi

Pacific Palisades

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I’m sick and tired of lefties like Michael Hiltzik complaining about how other people run their businesses.

Why don’t they shut up and put their money where their mouths are?

If they don’t like the way for-profit health insurance companies operate, why don’t they band together and form a nonprofit company to compete with them?

Let’s see if their company can provide broader coverage and better service at a lower cost.

Peter A. Mapson

Costa Mesa

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I have been utterly disheartened by companies like Blue Cross and Blue Shield and misleading claims such as the “affordable plan” they say they offer for $156 a month, which covers almost nothing.

We must stop talking about what we cannot do and face this issue head on. Our system is selectively inhumane and will not allow our economy to recover and prosper. Enough is enough.

Jan Stallones

Corona

Carl’s Jr.’s 2003 ads still rankle

Re: “Parent of Carl’s Jr. is sold -- maybe,” Feb. 27:

Seeing the financially shaky Carl’s Jr. (and its parent company CKE Restaurants Inc.) being sold to a Boston-based private equity firm, and never forgetting Carl’s Jr.’s 2003 ad campaign of ethnic slurs against the French, being of French descent, I can only laugh, offer a Gallic shrug of my shoulders and observe with the smugness we French are famous for: C’est la vie.

Donald Bentley

La Puente

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