ObamaCare requires insurers to guarantee health coverage to children with pre-existing conditions starting on September 23rd. That will raise costs so significantly for insurers that they are abandoning the child-only market and cease issuing any new policies.
Democrat strategists uniformly predicted that ObamaCare would be popular after its passage. Looking back, their statements were clearly wrong.
ObamaCare was promised to protect and preserve the Medicare program. But as confirmed by the Congressional Budget Office and the Medicare actuaries, money being is double-counted as both being saved for Medicare and being used to reduce the deficit. Thus it raided hundreds of billions of dollars from the Medicare program to pay for a new entitlement. Furthermore, new cost savings programs are likely to fail, while proven programs, like Medicare Advantage, were dramatically restricted.
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius threatened insurance companies to stop telling customers that higher prices can be blamed on ObamaCare. “But there is every reason to think this alleged libel is true. The health care law requires health insurers to do all sorts of things, such as eliminate lifetime limits on total costs, include various preventive care with no co-payment, and let unmarried dependent children stay on their parents’ policies until the age of 26. Additional requirements will take effect in 2014.”
Tax credits for small businesses in ObamaCare were supposed to help them cover the costs of expanding coverage, but the cuts are so small and restrictive they’ll likely do very little. “Though small firms eligible for some level of the tax credit employ approximately 16.6 million employees, the report estimates that businesses that might actually take advantage of the credit employ only 3.4 million workers. Moreover, a large portion of those 3.4 million already receive health insurance through their job.”
“Two new studies highlight the growing concern that the true cost for Obamacare is greater than originally anticipated. Last week, a new report from the Office of the Actuary at the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) revised its estimates—exposing yet again that the new law will mean more health care spending, not less. Plus, the Congressional Research Service released a report that suggests states will face higher costs as a result of ObamaCare.”
“When a government report found that President Barack Obama’s health overhaul would modestly raise the nation’s total health care tab, the White House responded with a statistic suggesting costs would go down. Health reform director Nancy-Ann DeParle wrote on the White House blog last week that the same government report indicates spending per insured person will be more than $1,000 lower in 2019 because of the law — some 9 percent below previous projections… It turns out that may be fuzzy math.”
“Congress had no scruples in passing a bill whose constitutional basis was paper thin. President Barack Obama was proud to sign it. Now only the federal courts stand between our burgeoning federal government and the Constitution’s model of limited government.”
“Given today’s high rates of unemployment and the fact that most Americans get health insurance through their employers, the increased number of uninsureds comes as no surprise. The exodus from job-based insurance will only escalate under Obamacare.”
On Tuesday, September 14th, e21’s ObamaCare Watch project
held an event “ObamaCare at Six Months: What Else Have We Learned?”
The event featured the release of a new, in-depth
research study by OCW Director James Capretta co-authored by Robert Book,
Senior Research Fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Their paper analyzed the
cuts instituted by the new health law on a county-by-county basis. The event
also featured a keynote speech by Sen. Mike Johanns (R-NE) and commentary by
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, all moderated by Bill Kristol.
Read “Reductions in Medicare Advantage Payments: The
Impact on Seniors by Region” at heritage.org.
Click here to see the county-by-county table of
Medicare Advantage disruptions.
Read an op-ed by Book and Capretta summarizing their findings
from The
Daily Caller.
Event Photos:
Presentations:
Introductory Remarks by Jim Capretta from Economics 21 on Vimeo.
Presentation of the study’s findings by Robert Book from Economics 21 on Vimeo.
Commentary by Doug Holtz-Eakin from Economics 21 on Vimeo.
Discussion Moderated by Bill Kristol from Economics 21 on Vimeo.
Keynote Address by Sen. Mike Johanns, (R-NE) from Economics 21 on Vimeo.
Q & A: Two Parts
Q&A – Part 1 – Senator Johanns from Economics 21 on Vimeo.
Q&A – Part 2 – Questions for Panel from Economics 21 on Vimeo.