According to Senator Chuck Grassley, Senator Max Baucus, the author of ObamaCare, is retiring from the Senate next year because he is “fed up” with ObamaCare.
Read more here.
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Special Treatment for IRS Employees?
The IRS will have the power to monitor you and even force people to buy insurance or pay a tax. This all centers around ObamaCare’s individual mandate and the health insurance exchanges. In a bit of cruel irony, however, IRS employees want a total and free pass from having to deal with the exchanges themselves.
Read more here.
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Filed under ObamaCare
37 Reasons to Repeal ObamaCare
The Ways and Means Committee has come up with a list of 37 reasons to repeal ObamaCare and has sited to various reports and studied that substantiate their reasoning. The list covers reasons such as costs, impact on job creation, the inability to keep your insurance and more.
The list is reprinted here in its entirety:
| Individuals and Families Will Pay More for Health Care
1. Secretary Sebelius admitted premiums will increase for Americans. 2. The American Society of Actuaries estimates a 32 percent increase in the cost of covering people in the individual market as a result of ObamaCare. 3. The New York Times recently reported some states are seeing health insurance premium hikes up to double digits. 4. “Maryland health insurers … said they will need to charge more for health insurance to compensate for new risk and additional requirements under the federal Affordable Care Act. CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield, for example, has proposed a 25 percent rate increase to many of its plans in the individual and small group markets. In the company’s filing, CareFirst — the region’s largest insurer — attributes the increase largely to new rules under the Affordable Care Act.” 5. A report by the House Energy and Commerce Committee reveals “consumers purchasing health insurance on the individual market may face premium increases of nearly 100 percent on average, with potential highs eclipsing 400 percent.” 6. The same report shows “small businesses can expect average premium increases in the small group market of up to 50 percent, with potential highs over 100 percent.” 7. Insurers agree. According to one industry executive, “We’re going to see some markets go up by as much as 100%.” (Mark Bertolini, CEO, Aetna) 8. “We estimate that almost 80 percent of those ages 21 to 29 with incomes greater than 138 percent of FPL [Federal Poverty Level] who are enrolled in nongroup single coverage can expect to pay more out of pocket for coverage than they pay today – even after accounting for premium assistance.” (Oliver Wyman consultants) 9. Beginning in 2014, Americans buying coverage on their own or as an employee of a small business – whether inside or outside the Exchange – will be forced to pay a “user fee” totaling 3.5 percent of the monthly premium to fund the bureaucratic operations of the government-run federal Exchange. ObamaCare Threatens Job Creation, Wages, and Hours 10. According to a recent report/survey, 70 percent of small businesses cite ObamaCare as a major obstacle to job creation. 11. USA Today and the Wall Street Journal have reported that many businesses plan to bring on more part-time workers next year, trim the hours of full-time employees or curtail hiring because of the new health care law. 12. According to a study by the Hudson Institute, in the franchise industry alone, ObamaCare’s employer mandate puts up to 3.2 million jobs at risk. 13. The Federal Reserve recently warned, “Employers in several [Federal Reserve] Districts cited the unknown effects of the Affordable Care Act as reasons for planned layoffs and reluctance to hire more staff.” 14. According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the amount of workers in the labor force will be reduced by 800,000 in 2021 as a result of the Democrats’ health care law. 15. Regal Cinemas, the largest theatre circuit in the United States, announced they would be cutting the hours of thousands of employees as a result of ObamaCare. 16. The Wall Street Journal reported, “Several restaurants, hotels and retailers have started or are preparing to limit schedules of hourly workers to below 30 hours a week…. CKE Restaurants Inc., parent of the Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s burger chains, began two months ago to hire part-time workers to replace full-time employees who left…. Home retailer Anna’s Linens Inc., is considering cutting hours for some full-time employees to avoid the insurance mandate if the health-care law isn’t repealed….” 17. From the New York Times: “There is another reason to believe that part-time employment will stay higher for longer, namely the incentives to employ part-time workers created by Obama’s health care reforms.” (Paul Dales, senior United States economist for Capital Economics) 18. The ADP payroll survey shows U.S. companies added just 119,000 jobs in April, the fewest in seven months. According to AP, “New requirements under President Barack Obama’s health care law may be prompting some small and mid-size companies to hold back on hiring.” 19. In April, the city of Dearborn, Michigan announced it will cut hours of part-time and seasonal workers because of ObamaCare. 20. Citing added costs and the competitive disadvantage ObamaCare puts larger companies at, The United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers and Allied Workers has withdrawn its public support for ObamaCare and now favors its repeal. 21. “To date, employers are still missing key pieces of guidance needed to construct their systems, make plan design changes and communicate with their employees…the delay in issuing the regulations pertaining to the notice and reporting requirements is becoming increasingly untenable for employers.” (Employers for Flexibility in Health Care Coalition Comment letter to the Treasury Department, March 15, 2013) You Can’t Keep the Health Plan You Have and Like 22. The State of Washington is considering a plan that “threatens to affect the federal budget and the pocketbooks of some part-time workers, as it would push a group of employees out of their current health care plans and into an exchange developed under the Affordable Care Act.” 23. Based on two separate analyses provided by CBO and Deloitte, as many as 20 million to 65 millionAmericans might lose their employer-sponsored health insurance as a result of the Democrats’ health care law. 24. Secretary Sebelius has admitted up to 24 million Americans will lose the coverage they currently have and like. 25. The Wall Street Journal reported that annual premium increases and costs associated with the law, including a $65 per person coverage fee set to take effect beginning in 2014, are driving, and will continue to drive, up the cost of care and make it prohibitive to continue offering health coverage. A result of such cost pressures is that employers are being forced to discontinue the offering of spousal coverage in employer health plans. 26. ObamaCare contains $308 billion in cuts to the Medicare Advantage (MA) program, which the Medicare Trustees originally predicted could cut enrollment in MA in half by 2017. 27. Approximately nine-in-ten seniors with retiree benefits will lose their retiree prescription drug coverage through their employer under the Democrats’ health care law. ObamaCare Is a Burden on American Families and Employers 28. Estimates from CBO and the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) confirm that the Democrats’ health law is a one trillion dollar tax hike on families and employers. 29. The law contains 21 tax hikes, and more than half of those fall on the backs of Americans earning less than $200,000 per year for singles and $250,000 per year for married couples – a clear violation of the President’s pledge to avoid tax hikes on low- and middle-income taxpayers. 30. According to the Obama Administration’s own estimates, ObamaCare will require American job creators, families, and health care providers to spend over 190 million hours per year on compliance. 31. The employer mandate penalty raises significantly the cost of hiring lower-skill workers, because the penalty is a higher proportion of their compensation than for high-skill workers. Industries that have traditionally offered the greatest opportunities to entry-level workers – leisure and hospitality and restaurants – will be particularly hard-hit by the new law. ObamaCare Is a Train Wreck 32. At a time when the IRS’s credibility is in serious question, the Obama Administration says it needs to hire an additional 2,000 IRS agents to implement functions related to ObamaCare. 33. Henry Chao, a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services official, oversees the technology for the Exchanges and has downgraded his expectations for ObamaCare saying he just wants to “make sure it’s not a third-world experience.” 34. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) both warned ObamaCare could become a “huge train wreck.” 35. A Kaiser Family Foundation poll found that just 35 percent of Americans view ObamaCare “very” or “somewhat” favorably. 36. The same poll showed that more than half of Americans “say they do not have enough information about the Affordable Care Act to understand how it will affect them.” It Didn’t Have to be This Way 37. The House GOP alternative to the Democrats’ health care law was the only legislation that met the top health care priority of American families – lowering the cost of health insurance premiums. |
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Filed under ObamaCare
Sebelius Shakesdown Industry, Actions Questioned as Illegal
The Washington Post recently reported that Secretary of Health and Human Services Kalthleen Sebelius has been approaching “health industry officials, asking them to make large financial donations to help with the effort to implement President Obama’s landmark health-care law, two people familiar with the outreach said.”
This move prompted Members of Congress to question whether the Secretary had violated the law. Senator Orrin Hatch commented, stating, “To solicit funds from health-care executives to help pay for the implementation of the President’s $2.6 trillion health spending law is absurd. I will be seeking more information from the Administration about these actions to help better understand whether there are conflicts of interest and if it violated federal law.”
Jason Young, an HHS spokesperson, defended the Secretary’s actions arguing that ObamaCare encourages the Secretary to work with outside groups to implement the law. The Secretary’s actions, however, would appear to violated the Anti-Deficiency Act as well as Department of Justice regulations. DOJ’s regulations, which apply to all Federal officials, prohibit Federal officials from fundraising in their professional capacity but they do allows a Cabinet member to solicit donations as a private citizen provided they do not “solicit funds from a subordinate or from someone who has or seeks business with the Department, and [the official does] not use [their] official title.”
By pointing to the law, HHS spokesman Jason Young has admitted that Sebelius was acting in an official capacity which suggests that Sebelius is violating the law. The Washington Post reported:
“Meredith McGehee, policy director for the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center, which researches government ethics issues, said she was troubled by Sebelius’s activities because the secretary seemed to be ‘using the power of government to compel giving or insinuate that giving is going to be looked at favorably by the government.’”
Furthermore, the Washington Post reported that “industry official who had knowledge of the calls but did not participate directly in them said there was a clear insinuation by the administration that the insurers should give financially to the nonprofits.” In other words, Secretary Sebelius is working like the Corleone family from the GodFather, “it’s a mighty nice insurance company you have there, shame if anything would happen to it.”
UPDATE: Michael Cannon from the CATO Institute has additionally commentary on this issue that can be found here.
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Filed under ObamaCare
Does Expanding Entitlement Spending Equate to a Tax Cut?
According to the Examiner, President Obama claimed that ObamaCare represented the “largest health care tax cut for working families and small businesses in our history.” Philip Klein writes that Obama’s:
“argument was a Hail-Mary effort to redesignate subsidies for individuals to purchase health insurance on government-run exchanges as a ‘tax cut.’ But according to the Congressional Budget Office, these subsidies actually qualify as more than $1 trillion in ‘Exchange Subsidies and Related Spending.’”
Klein also writes that:
“Far from being a historic tax cut, Obamacare actually qualifies as one of the largest tax increases in history. It contains roughly $1 trillion in taxes — on insurance plans, medical devices and investment income. And many of the taxes will end up falling on the middle class. The law’s individual mandate, which the Obama administration successful argued was a tax before the U.S. Supreme Court, is projected to hit nearly 5 million Americans with incomes less than $60,000 by 2016.”
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Filed under ObamaCare
Boehner, McConnell Refuse to Appoint IPAB Member
ObamaCare creates the 15 member Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) that will have the the power to set payment rates for medical care. In this regard, critics of IPAB argue that IPAB will impose cost controls which will eventually result in sub-standard care and eventually rationing. What makes IPAB even more offensive is that ObamaCare largely removes IPAB’s decisions from Congressional oversight.
On May 9, House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell sent a letter to President Obama advising the President that they would not be exercising their authority to appoint members to the IPAB board. You can read the full text of the Boehner and McConnell letter here.
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Filed under ObamaCare
ObamaCare Hurting Employees, Leading to Fewer Jobs, Fewer Hours
Recent economic data is demonstrating that ObamaCare is leading employers to reduce employees’ hours to exempt the employee from many of the coverage requirements of ObamaCare. The move is the only option for many employers to avoid the disasterous impact of ObamaCare on things such as rising premiums and $2,000 per employee fines under ObamaCare.
Circle K, Regal Entertainment, AAA Parking are among the employers who have announced their intent to shift employees to part-time work schedules.
Read more on this subject at the following sites:
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Filed under ObamaCare
