Watch a video of a small businessman discuss how ObamaCare will hurt his family and his business by taking away control of his health decisions.
“But that aside, Obamacare’s fiscal failure comes down to something a lot more basic: Government agencies nearly always overestimate the revenue generated from tax increases, and nearly always underestimate the new spending caused by new entitlements. Americans are a lot smarter than they look from inside the Beltway, and they modify their behavior to avoid new taxes and obtain new largesse. Federal bureaucrats may be good with calculators, but they’re weak on human nature.”
“Physician hospital organizations are firing back at President Obama’s health care law in the press and the courts, seeking a repeal of what they argue are “exclusionary and unconstitutional” restrictions. Section 6001 of the health care law effectively bans new physician-owned hospitals (POHs) from starting up, and it keeps existing ones from expanding. It has already halted the development of 24 new physician-owned hospitals and forced an additional 47 to struggle to meet the deadline to complete construction, according to the Physician Hospitals of America (PHA).”
“While making the case for his health care reform package, President Barack Obama argued that his proposal would make life easier for small-business owners. Unfortunately, now that it is law, Obamacare threatens to undermine a group of small-business owners that, perhaps, is more important than any other to his reform effort – doctors in private practice.”
Health care regulations create new costs to employers when hiring additional staff. ObamaCare’s new rules create strong disincentives for firms to hire low-wage workers or expand their businesses. “With higher-skill jobs, employers can offer the required benefits and pay for them by cutting the wage. But low-wage jobs in the restaurant and retail sectors leave little room for cuts in wages.”
“Rising entitlement spending is already driving the federal budget off a cliff. But Obamacare would add fuel to the fire with the largest entitlement expansion since the 1960s. So it takes a special kind of audacity for Obamacare’s apologists to continue to insist that the new law will cut the projected budget deficits. Evidence clearly shows otherwise.”
“This Essay argues that federal health care reform may induce employers to redesign their health plans to encourage employees who are likely to consume a greater-than-average amount of medical services to opt out of employer-provided coverage and instead acquire coverage on the individual market. Although largely overlooked in public policy debates, this prospect of employer dumping of high-risk employees raises serious concerns about the sustainability of health care reform more generally.”
“Big employers faced with incorporating the first round of health-care changes next month are grappling with how to comply with the long list of new rules. Many companies are hiring consultants to help sort though the mountain of new mandates, which include extending dependent coverage to children up to age 26, and may eventually result in covering more employees. Some are also considering changes to their plans—including pushing costs to workers.”
“HHS has spent the past nine months issuing guidance and regulations at a furious pace in an attempt to fill the holes and correct some of the errors in the healthcare law. But that activity does not account for the numerous special circumstances facing millions of people with all sorts of different insurance arrangements that are unknown or poorly understood by Washington regulators. The waivers help, but they are not permanent and only delay the inevitable.”
Despite its 2000+ pages, ObamaCare still will require over ten thousand pages of new regulations to govern its implementation.