PPACA In The Real World

Queen Sheila was bucking for some sound bites today for the evening news. Evidently, in her reality, repealing ObamaCare will result in citizens dying. As if the whole POS was not adopted  rife with flaws on a party line vote which required the fixes to be passed using reconciliation, In that spirit let me add just a few real life repercussions of PPACA from the front lines where business people must live.

A client called today seeking assistance with finding a child only individual health insurance policy. Ju8st a responsible parent trying to make sure her child was covered with health insurance. It seems they had tried finding a policy online with no success. Both parents are covered at work but the cost for their child to be covered was prohibitive. Unfortunately, PPACA leaves many Americans without a market for individual major medical child only policy options since dependent children now must be covered with no pre-existing condition exclusion. Many elected not to offer policies which were guaranteed to lose money and since the mandates do not kick in until 2014 the risk pool will be contaminated prior to then and their stockholders and customers may not understand. So today many Americans find themselves with no access to inexpensive (relative to Group policies) individual health insurance on a child only basis. How many of them will die due to the self-serving liberal Democrats like Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee who voted for PPACA which left them without a viable child only market? Care to answer that Queen Sheila?

Then there is the group client who covers management with a major medical policy while providing non-management employees with a mini-medical policy for those in minimum wage jobs. Since the company is non-unionized, located in a right to work state, with owners who would have been very unlikely to contribute to democratic politicians, what are the odds HHS gives their limited medical plan a waiver? What are the odds the non-management personnel get a free mini-med in 2014?  I am sure there are some readers thinking well in 2014 they will have to pay or play so they will be required to either provide health care or pay the fine and that is true if the mandate proves to be constitutional, which is highly debatable. However, do the math for yourself its a simple calculation; Either you pay $2,000 per employee as a fine or you pay for $5,000 per employee to provide health insurance. Lets say you are retail business, how do you possibly choose the latter and stay in business? Can you answer that Queen Sheila?

And lets discuss the impact of passing a 40% payroll cost increase through to the public on our nation from an inflationary perspective in the middle of a recession? And PPACA is not a job-killer? Does no one in the Democratic Party take economics? Have you no common sense whatsoever Democrats? And by the way what is the client to do until 2014 since your precious PPACA has further eliminated all remaining markets for management only carve-outs in the group market Madam Congressman Lee? And by the way how many jobs did PPACA kill at Principal Financial Group & Humana when your ill-conceived carve-out killer passed? I heard a businessman today spell out he could either pay $140,000 in fines beginning in 2014 or $250,000 to provide health care or he could just shut down one location get below 50 employees and solve the whole problem until representatives with an ounce of common sense held majorities in the House and Senate. Which do you think he is leaning toward?

Its long past time for the American people to tell the Democratic Party to drop the crack pipe and pay attention. Stop Spending our freaking money! Stop helping us!  Your precious PPACA is killing jobs and restricting options today in the real world.  November elections were no accident. People all over the nation will contribute to the opponents of the embarrassing representatives like Sheila Hackson Lee who pontificate about matters like PPACA without any real understanding of the damage they have already brought to average American's. Unlike that nut job in AZ we will do so at the ballot box Queen Sheila you arrogant windbag,

Failure Of Central Planning Via HHS

It is indeed a positive trend to notice increasingly cogent reporting coming from the media and blogosphere with respect to Obamacare. Its about time!

 The media is finally reporting on trends average Americans know all too well in the season of open enrollment; Namely, that health insurance premiums are exploding to unaffordable levels particularly for child coverage under group plans. Worse yet, consumers have lost their ability to go to the individual market for child only coverage since insurers are want to write new business individual policies that will be completely unprofitable.

Merrill Matthews writes in Forbes of The Heavy Hand of Katherine Sebellius.

Jeff Jacoby writes in the Boston Globe of Obamacare Blowback.

John Stossell points out that HHS cannot Repeal The Laws of Economics. Quotes from Mr Stossell are below.

When Obamacare was debated, we free-market advocates insisted that no matter what the president promised, the laws of economics cannot be repealed. Our opponents in effect answered, "Yes, we can."
Well, Obamacare has barely started taking effect, and the evidence is already rolling in. I hate to say we told them so, but ... we told them so. The laws of economics have struck back.
Health insurers Wellpoint, Cigna, Aetna, Humana and CoventryOne will stop writing policies for all children. Why? Because Obamacare requires that they insure already sick children for the same price as well children.
That sounds compassionate, but -- in case Obamacare fanatics haven't noticed -- sick children need more medical care. Insurance is about risk, and already sick children are 100 percent certain to be sick when their coverage begins. So if the government mandates that insurance companies cover sick children at the lower well-children price, insurers will quit the market rather than sandbag their shareholders. This is not callousness -- it's fiduciary responsibility. Insurance companies are not charities. So, thanks to the compassionate Congress and president, parents of sick children will be saved from expensive insurance -- by being unable to obtain any insurance! That's how government compassion works.
In 2014, the same rule will kick in for adults. You now know what to expect.

Of Course Mr Stossell is 99% correct. his article points out that Obamacare has already precipitated Principal Financial Group from exiting the group medical market. Principal has arranged for United HealthCare to assume all group medical policies over the next 3 years. One minor point Mr Stossell is that Principal insures 840,000 group health policyholders totalling over 5,000,000 members. Most of these policyholders are small businesses. Many are carve-out plans covering salary only members. I spoke to one such policyholder  yesterday who due to business conditions will likely be dropping health coverage as of November 1, 2010. Do you think those employees will be happy when they vote November 2, 2010?

It should further be noted that everything coming to pass with Obamacare was completely predictable. The sad truth is that we used to have major medical coverage that covered hospitalization. People paid out of pocket for office visits and routine care including prescriptions. Then came Medicare introducing relative value reimbursement and co-pays. Then came the HMO Act of 1973 which normalized low co-pays for routine office visit, pharmacy coverage and deductibles for all health care. Health care inflation exploded. The consumer driven movement in Healthcare that began early in this decade was beheaded by Obamacare because HHS and the exchanges have deemed these plans innappropriate for consumers.

In yesterdays post I pointed out Marc Siegels prescient explanation here but what I did not quote then is relevant and is included below;

None of this is terribly surprising. I mean, imagine if your car insurance covered every scratch or dent. Wouldn't you expect your premiums to rise to meet the expanded coverage? And wouldn't you expect your auto repair shops to become clogged with cars that didn't really need to be repaired, competing for time and space with other cars with broken transmissions or burnt-out motors?
If we want lower insurance premiums, we will need to return to a system that favors high deductible, high co-pay catastrophic-type insurance with a built-in disincentive for overuse, such as the kind that some employers have provided as an option up until now. Patients could pay for office visits from health savings accounts or other flexible spending tax shelters. More than 10 million Americans already have such accounts.
Unfortunately, the new law is taking us away from the kind of insurance that compels patients to have more skin in the game. As a result, we'll all pay in the long run — both financially and with less efficient, perhaps even lower quality, care.


The kind of insurance the new law mandates will, over the years, wear out the health care system in the same way that overuse in orthopedics wears out an elbow or knee joint. This won't be fun for doctors or, most important, for patients.

Marc Siegel is an associate professor of medicine and medical director of Doctor Radio at NYU Langone Medical Center.

Read It And Weep

Marc Siegel has written an op-ed in USA Today that is precisely on target with respect to the options employers no longer have in enacting catastrophic health care plans.

During the battle over this reform, you often heard, even from President Obama, that you'd be able to keep the plan you have. What he didn't say — but what we now know — is that because of this new law, the private markets will have to remake their plans, that the costs will rise and that the plan you were told you could "keep" is in all likelihood no longer available. But when your plan changes, backers of reform will simply blame it on those evil private insurance companies.

Very true Dr Siegel

See The Future?

Consider the difficulty of gaining approval for SSDI or SSI benefits today. Its hard. You have to hire an attorney familiar with the intricacy of the bureaucratic Social Security system and pay them a percentage of your award to get approved. Failure to do so will result in a bureaucrat who will take advantage of your innocence to deny and delay the benefits you are "entitled to". FICA is after all a finite resource. It takes years to get approval in some cases and the SS administration rations through denial and delays. Many people just give up. Yet, this is the very future Americans can expect from ObamaCare with respect to their Health Care. How has SSDI worked out for America. The "trust fund " is bankrupt as a tidal wave of baby boomers hits the ages of 50-60 when disability and healthcare utilization rates are highest. The next time a liberal tells you how great ObamaCare is ask them if we can expect billboards on buses for attorneys assisting citizens in obtaining benefits that were promised to them like SSDI requires today.

The ObamaCare Disaster

Peter Ferrara has written a piece describing the impact of ObamaCare on the US. Focus just on the immediate impact on the average family premium which is aleady occurring;

...one study concludes that under Obamacare a typical family health insurance policy costing $12,300 today will cost $17,200 by 2013, $21,300 by 2016, and $25,900 by 2019. Another study concludes that insurance costs for young (up to 40) and healthy workers will double and triple in many cases.

These cost increases have already begun. But expect the liberal/left to insist that the soaring insurance costs caused by Obamacare prove that the public option, or even more overt socialized medicine, was needed after all. They will seek to prohibit the necessary premium increases, as in Massachusetts, and will be glad if that forces private insurers out of business.

Blame Canada II

Very interesting article that looks at the path Canada and Massachussets (which was the model for ObamaCare) have taken in Health Care and the implications for ObamaCare.

Dangerously Out Of Touch

Despite the debt induced meltdown which occurred in Greece President Obama asked G20 leaders recently to spend more only to be rebuffed by European leaders. Yesterday President Obama in the face of 9.5% unemployment figures for June told the American people we need comprehensive immigration reform before our border can be secured. On Wednesday the courthouse in El Paso was fired upon by Mexico and Texas' Attorney General begged President Obama for help;

Yesterday, gunfire from the cartels pierced that threshold and struck City Hall in El Paso. Fortunately no one was injured or killed. But that good fortune was not the result of effective border control - it was mere luck that the bullets struck buildings rather than bodies.
Luck and good fortune are not effective border enforcement policies. The shocking reality of cross border gunfire proves the cold reality: American lives are at risk.

In case your interested in the magnitude of the illegal problem in border states perhaps you might check out gamecam pictures from south Texas ranches where instead of deer photo's you are just as likely to find illegal immigrants who are increasingly carrying backpacks filled with cocaine and methamphetamine.

 CBO has weighed in on the stunning magnitude of America's debt time bomb and Obamacare has not even kicked in yet except in the form of massive rate increases to fund the Obamacare taxes as well as to boost reserves for dependents with pre-existing conditions as well as the coming days when the uninsured and all their costs must be absorbed with community rates. Small group health renewals of 30%-40% are common due to declining membership, risk pools that no longer include the young and healthy who are now unemployed, Obamacare taxes, a provider feeding frenzy of utilization driven by plans to accelerate retirement before reimbursement drops further and the certainty that the future holds no hope for improvement.
 
The harsh reality is that President Obama is in a race to secure a permanent reliable majority Democratic voting block. He needs a recipient class of reliable voters. Already almost 47% of Americans pay no income taxes and almost 49% approve of the IRS so providing 10-20M illegals a path to citizenship will be a game over strategy.

There was a time illegal immigrants traveled by night through South Texas and slept by day. We have reached a point to day where they travel by day with well armed coyotes carrying backpacks laden with drugs through well planned routes painstakingly planned by narcotics cartels.

As pointed out on this blog previously the uninsured in Texas create a significant tax burden on citizens through property taxes to fund their free healthcare. Now if Democrats succeed in passing immigration reform the rest of the counry will get to pay for their free Obamacare tax credits.Medical trend will accelerate as providers cost shift to private payers to close their reimbursement gap. Barack Obama is the shamwow salesman in a suit.

The Price of Unfunded Mandates to Texas of Obamacare

From the Speaker of The Texas House of Representatives Joe Straus in todays Houston Comical Opinion;

Many Texans may not realize how dramatically the new law expands the state's Medicaid program, which currently provides health care coverage for the very poor, as well as low-income children, aged and disabled persons. It mandates that every legal resident of Texas must purchase private health insurance or be enrolled in the Medicaid program, resulting in a projected increase of more than two million Texas Medicaid recipients.

Our State Health and Human Services Commission estimates the new mandates will cost the Texas state budget $27 billion over the 10-year period from 2014-2024, or an average of more than $5 billion for every two-year Texas budget cycle. That dramatic increase in health care costs will significantly limit legislative discretion in virtually every other area of state spending. Historically, the Texas Legislature has made education our top funding priority. Today, more than 60 percent of our state's general revenue goes to public and higher education. Health and human service spending is the second largest expenditure, at 30 percent, with all other costs a much smaller piece of the total pie. As the new federal law forces Texas to spend multiple billions more each biennium on health care, that will continually shrink our state's ability to spend discretionary dollars elsewhere, including our top priority of education.

Get ready for increased property taxes, a state income tax and higher sales taxes.

Stormclouds Over Massachusetts

MASSACHUSETTS' SHORT-TERM CUSTOMERS BOOSTING HEALTH COSTS




Will consumers game Obamacare the way they have in Massachusetts?...



BOSTON GLOBE



THE MASSACHUSETTS INSURANCE BLACKOUT



Mass. Gov. Deval Patrick (D) has made the health insurance business so painful the government actually has to order private companies to sell their products (albeit at sub-market costs), say observers...

Pelosium Discovered

A major research institution has just announced the discovery of the densest element yet known to science. The new element has been named Pelosium.

Pelosium has one neutron, 12 assistant neutrons, 75 deputy neutrons, and 224 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 311. These particles are held together by dark forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons. The symbol of Pelosium is PU. Pelosium's mass actually increases over time, as morons randomly interact with various elements in the atmosphere and become assistant deputy neutrons within the Pelosium molecule, leading to the formation of isodopes. This characteristic of moron-promotion leads some scientists to believe that Pelosium is formed whenever morons reach a certain quantity in concentration. This hypothetical quantity is referred to as Critical Morass. When catalyzed with money, Pelosium activates CNNadnausium, an element that radiates orders of magnitude more energy, albeit as incoherent noise, since it has half as many peons but twice as many morons as Pelosium.

History Repeats

It's De'ja' vu really. Consider that we have Charlie Rangel stepping down this week "temporarily" for violating House rules amidst an ethical cloud at the same time the final push for Obamacare is occuring. Flash back to the 1980's and recall former House Ways & Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski. The Tax Reform Act of 1986 was passed and contained a wildly unpopular provision called Section 89. Ultimately, Section 89 was repealed. Dan Rostenkowski was convicted, although he did receive a pardon from President Clinton. Employers and The US Chamber of Commerce won the battlefield because govern mandated social engineering solutions like section 89 reduce freedom and introduce complex Federal rules that are in fact thinly disquised measures intended to extract more revenue based on perceived inherent unfairness. Which brings us to Obamacare and Mitch McConnell's prophecy. My what poor students of history compose todays majority.

Bye, Bye Obamacare

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpevc2t_Frw

Happy New Year

I must admit I have always been fascinated with politics and as a student of political cleavage I found the results of a recent poll on the Brown vs Coakley special election for Ted Kennedy's US Senate seat absolutely fascinating. Why? Well let's just say in a state where Democratic voters outnumber Republicans by a 3-1 majority recent polls now show Brown with a 4 percent lead.

In the race for U.S. Senate, who will you vote for?
Scott Brown: 50%
Martha Coakley: 46%
Joseph L. Kennedy: 3%
Undecided: 1%
In your opinion, who won the debates?
Scott Brown: 41%
Martha Coakley: 25%

Joseph L. Kennedy: 2%

Undecided: 31%

As a U.S. Senator, do you think Martha Coakley will be an independent voice or tow the Democratic Party line?
Independent voice: 24%
Tow the party line: 64%
Undecided: 11%
Do you support the proposed national near universal healthcare law?
Yes: 36%
No: 51%
Undecided: 13%
Can the federal government afford the proposed national healthcare law?
Yes: 32%
No: 61%
Undecided: 7%
What is the most important issue facing our next U.S. Senator?
Healthcare: 38%
Economy/Jobs: 44%
Taxes: 1%
War: 5%
Education: 0%
Spending/Budget: 3%
National Security/Terrorism: 1%
Other: 4%
Don’t know: 4%

Less anyone think of me as a Fox News robot check out what CBS has to say on the matter.
When 64% of the voters think you will toe the pary line and 61% think he nation cannot afford the proposed legislation you still have a problem even with a 3-1 party advantage. That Ted Kennedy's staffers essentially composed the legislation is poetic justice.

Merry Christmas From Congress

Every Picture Tells a Story

U.S. Health Care Versus England and Canada

Very interesting. Just so everyone can comprehend what President Obama means when he say's we will go broke without health care reform. This is the rationing he has in mind and what Harry Reid has placed under your Christmas Tree

A recent "Investor's Business Daily" article provided very interesting statistics from a
survey by the United Nations International Health Organization.

Percentage of men and women who survived a cancer five years after diagnosis:
U.S. 65%
England 46%
Canada 42%
Percentage of patients diagnosed with diabetes who received treatment within six months:
U.S. 93%
England 15%
Canada 43%
Percentage of seniors needing hip replacement who received it within six months:
U.S. 90%
England 15%
Canada 43%
Percentage referred to a medical specialist who see one within one month:
U.S. 77%
England 40%
Canada 43%
Number of MRI scanners (a prime diagnostic tool) per million people:

U.S. 71%
England 14

Canada 18%
Percentage of seniors (65+), with low income, who say they are in "excellent health":
U.S. 12%
England 2%
Canada 6%
I don't know about you, but I don't want "Universal Healthcare" comparable to England or Canada .

Moreover, it was Sen. Harry Reid who said, "Elderly Americans must learn to accept the inconveniences of old age."

Mitch McConnell and Olympia Snowe on Obamacare

Some truth from your minority America.

“This isn’t an energy bill. This is an attempt by a majority to take over one sixth of the U.S. economy — to vastly expand the reach and the role of government into the health care decisions of every single American — and they want to be done after one substantive amendment. This is absolutely inexcusable.
“I think Senator Snowe put it best on Tuesday:
‘Given the enormity and complexity,’ she said, ‘I don’t see anything magical about the Christmas deadline if this bill is going to become law in 2014.’
“And I think Senator Snowe’s comments on a lack of bipartisanship at the outset of this debate are also right on point.
“Here’s what she said in late November:
‘I am truly disappointed we are commencing our historic debate on one of the most significant and pressing domestic issues of our time with a process that has forestalled our ability to arrive at broader agreement on some of the most crucial elements of health care reform. The bottom line is, the most consequential health care legislation in the history of our country and the reordering of $33 trillion in health care spending over the coming decade shouldn’t be determined by one vote-margin strategies – surely we can and must do better.’
“The only conceivable justification for rushing this bill is the overwhelming opposition of the American people. Democrats know that the longer Americans see this bill the less they like it. Here’s the latest from Pew. It came out just yesterday.

“A majority (58 percent) of those who have heard a lot about the bills oppose them while only 32 percent favor them.”
“There is no justification for this blind rush — except a political one, and that’s not good enough for the American people.
“And there’s no justification for forcing the Senate to vote on a bill none of us has seen.
“Americans already oppose this bill. The process is just as bad.

“It’s completely reckless, completely irresponsible.”

Spreading New Yorks Bad Medicine

The NY Post has an excellent op-ed column providing insight into what you can expect if the current Health Care Reform proposals are enacted into law.

Spreading New York's bad medicine


By STEPHEN T. PARENTE & TARREN BRAGDON

Last Updated: 9:05 PM, December 9, 2009
Posted: 1:42 AM, December 9, 2009
New York's individual health-insurance market is not often held up as a national model, and for good rea son. It's the most regulated, most expensive and, as a result, one of the smallest in the country, with only a few costly health plans available.

Since New York policymakers inflicted costly regulations on insurers in 1994, enrollment in the individual insurance market has plummeted by 96 percent.



Current prices are staggering. In New York City, the cheapest individual plan costs $9,036 a year for a single person and $26,460 for a family. In contrast, the Congressional Budget Office estimates the average national family premium at $12,000 to $15,000 a year.



Yet both the House and the Senate health-reform bills would make the rest of America look more like New York's dysfunctional market -- and then force New Yorkers to foot a larger share of the trillion-dollar cost.



Only five states now have New York-style insurance regulations, but both bills force those rules on all 50 states and then force people to buy coverage or face tax penalties. Think about it: If 45 states don't regulate insurance like New York does, there is probably a very good reason. And there is: These regulations drive up costs and limit choices.


Adding insult to expensive injury, Congress also plans to expand Medicaid coverage. Here, too, New York is an example of what not to do. The Empire State has the most expensive Medicaid program in the country -- spending as much as Texas, Florida and Illinois combined.

New York's Medicaid program is the fourth largest among all the states as a percentage of the population enrolled, yet the state's rate of uninsured ranks 24th highest in the country. Of the 26 states with a lower rate of uninsured than New York, only two have a larger share of residents on Medicaid.

Clearly, doubling down on Medicaid is not the right path to universal coverage -- yet Congress wants to push millions of Americans into Medicaid and thrust new costs onto the states.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/spreading_new_york_bad_medicine_5f6AoI9hr8WKAjwlzuSj7H#ixzz0ZO8RazRX




Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/spreading_new_york_bad_medicine_5f6AoI9hr8WKAjwlzuSj7H#ixzz0ZO85KC2p

Psst...Obamacare will cost $6B not $1B over 10 years

Don not miss this little gem

What's Wrong With This Photo Op?

I have to be home by 5:30 pm these days to take my son to football practice. Passing by the tv on ABC during the national news last night and I see the image of Senator Baucus at the podium. Alone. Charlie Gibson is wondering why the plan has no bi-partisan support from republicans since Baucus has met all the Presidents objectives. Gibson never notices the podium void of any Democratic supporters. Nor does he notice Harry Reid being quoted the bill wont work for Nevada due to the oppressive burden it places on States after the Medicaid Mandates remain long after the funding dries up which I wrote about last month.
Meanwhile, The President is slated for a full Ginsburg on the Sunday talk shows followed by Letterman on Monday for a full hour. Making dogfood is just not a pretty sight.