“Americans are so focused on the availability of health care provided by the Affordable Care Act that they completely overlook the quality of care they might receive. Government interference, intrusive mandates and cumbersome regulations are making it impossible to continue providing high-quality care.”
“Essentially, the Court struck down the mandate while retaining the penalty. So those champions of Obamacare who relied on behavioral economics to argue that the law’s individual mandate could be sufficient to avert an insurance death spiral must now contend with the fact that the Court has closed off that argument.”
“But as they gathered here this weekend at a meeting of the National Governors Association, most governors in both parties said that faced with a choice they did not expect to have, they needed to study how to proceed with this significant change in federal-state relations. Not all Democrats were leaping at the chance to expand their programs, and not all Republicans were ruling it out.”
“How about the fact that health reform really isn’t paid for? That half the dollars needed to pay for it will require Medicare cuts so draconian that Congress is unlikely to ever let them take place? Hmm…You don’t remember reading about that? What about the fact that families at the same income level will get vastly different subsidies under the reform — differences that amount to $10,000 a year or more? Ahh…You didn’t read about that either?”
“Republicans on a House Appropriations subcommittee beat back Democratic efforts Wednesday to protect the health reform law, winning passage of a spending bill that would defund the Affordable Care Act, eliminate a decades-old health research agency and slash the budget for other health programs. The subcommittee approved the Labor-Health and Human Services appropriations bill on a mostly party-line vote of 8-6.”
“Another prominent religious college has filed suit against the Obama administration over a policy meant to ease women’s access to free birth control. The suit from Ill.-based Wheaton College — dubbed the ‘Notre Dame’ of Protestant higher education — states that the controversial policy violates the religious freedom of people who object to birth control or consider forms of it equal to abortion.”
“Instead of betting on entrepreneurs, Obamacare assumes that improvements in the delivery of medical care will arise as a result of shifts in market power. This turns on a shortsighted view that once providers are grouped into larger networks, they’ll make wider use of things like information technology to better coordinate the care of patients, in turn lowering costs.”
“In short, small business owners will change from investing in their employees and their company to a strategy of avoiding growth that will require them to comply with the health care law. Support for the law is very low among small businesses surveyed (21%), and almost eight-out-of-ten (77%) of small businesses surveyed support its repeal.”
“Where things can get a little complicated, however, is when you sell your home for a substantial profit, and your adjusted gross income for the year exceeds the $200,000 or $250,000 thresholds. The good news: The surtax does not interfere with the current tax-free exclusion on the first $500,000 (joint filers) or $250,000 (single filers) of gain you make on the sale of your principal home. Those exclusions have not changed. But any profits above those limits are subject to federal capital gains taxation and could also expose you to the new 3.8% surtax.”
“The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) provides tax credits and subsidies for the purchase of qualifying health insurance plans on state-run insurance exchanges. Contrary to expectations, many states are refusing or otherwise failing to create such exchanges. An Internal Revenue Service (IRS) rule purports to extend these tax credits and subsidies to the purchase of health insurance in federal exchanges created in states without exchanges of their own. This rule lacks statutory authority. The text, structure, and history of the Act show that tax credits and subsidies are not available in federally run exchanges. The IRS rule is contrary to congressional intent and cannot be justified on other legal grounds. Because the granting of tax credits can trigger the imposition of fines on employers, the IRS rule is likely to be challenged in court.”