Surprise, surprise! The Federal Reserve reports that Obamacare is causing layoffs and a slowdown in hiring.
Finding out what’s in it: The CEO of a major health insurance company warned that rates will likely go up 20% to 100% next year because of Obamacare.
Finding out what’s in it: A new poll finds that support for Obamacare continues to drop.
Another chance at killing Obamacare in the Supreme Court?
Finding out what’s in it: The Obama administration today released more than 700 pages of new regulations to implement parts of Obamacare.
Won’t it be nice to have to deal with the equivalent of the Motor Vehicle Administration whenever you have to see your doctor in the future?
To me, the most irritating thing about this might not be the law itself, but having to hear people who voted for Obama complain about it. And they will complain. Everyone will. I guarantee it.
Who woulda thunk it? A new GAO report says that Obamacare will increase the federal government’s long term debt by $6.2 trillion.
The worse part of this is that these government predictions of debt are always wrong, but in the wrong direction. If this is the prediction, the actual increase in debt caused by Obamacare is likely to be far higher.
Note also that this is no surprise to the Republicans who opposed this bill. It also proves just how much Obama was either incompetent or simply lying when he said this:
“I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits — either now or in the future,” Obama told a joint-session of Congress in September 2009. “I will not sign it if it adds one dime to the deficit, now or in the future, period.”
Finding out what’s in it: Because of the cost of Obamacare, employers are dropping healthcare coverage for spouses.
By denying coverage to spouses, employers not only save the annual premiums, but also the new fees that went into effect as part of the Affordable Care Act. This year, companies have to pay $1 or $2 “per life” covered on their plans, a sum that jumps to $65 in 2014. And health law guidelines proposed recently mandate coverage of employees’ dependent children (up to age 26), but husbands and wives are optional.
Not fit to print: Two days ago the Congressional Budget Office increased its projection for the cost of Obamacare by 29 percent, while also saying that seven million workers will lose their health insurance due to the law, almost twice as many as previously estimated.
As noted at the link, not one news organization has seen fit to mention this juicy tidbit in their news reports. I wonder why?
Meanwhile, we will go bankrupt. This law, and the government that is imposing it on us, is unsustainable.
I wonder why: The newly released “ObamaCare Survival Guide” has rocketed to the No. 2 spot on The New York Times’ bestseller list for advice-giving paperbacks.
It is also No. 1 on many amazon.com lists. This quick demand only indicates once again how bad this law is, requiring people to desperately search for ways to deal with it. Sadly, its negative impact on business and healthcare in the coming years is going to continue.
Update: And in related news, Virginia’s state liquor organization is limiting the hours of all part-time workers to avoid the costs of Obamacare.
We’ve only just begun: “The bishops have made it very clear that the institutions for which we’re responsible will simply not cooperate.”
According to the Congressional Budget Office, seven million people — twice the number previously predicted — will lose their health insurance under Obamacare.
Finding out what’s in it: Electronic medical records — required by Obamacare — are costing doctors time while taking them away from their patients.
Probably the biggest problem with electronic records is simply that it requires the physician to input all notes and orders, rather than dictate them. As a result, as my bride puts it, “they’ve taken the highest paid person in the department and turned him/her into a data entry clerk”. On average, she and her colleagues spend more time per patient wading through drop-down menus, clicking boxes and filling in required but utterly irrelevant information than they do at the bedside, actually treating the patient. In short, it’s her experience that they see fewer patients per shift than they did previously, and spend less time with each one, now that they are required to sit down at a computer after seeing each patient and jumping through hoops to place orders instead of, as previously, simply telling the nurse what is needed and then moving on to the next patient. [emphasis mine]
Have you noticed in your recent visits to the doctor how the doctor seems to be spending his entire visit with you staring at his laptop, typing continuously as you talked? I have. Say goodbye to simplicity in the medical field. The future shall be complex bureaucracy and less medical treatment.
You voted for it: College adjunct professors crushed by Obamacare.
Finding out what’s in it: A Pennsylvania hospital has decided to stop delivering babies because of Obamacare.
The detail that “obstetricians are either leaving or refocusing their practices” suggests once again that doctors are reacting negatively to Obamacare and are deciding in large numbers to get out of the business because of it.
The part-timing of America: An Omaha-based chain of fast food restauants has decided to cut the hours of all non-management employees workers’ hours to part time in order to avoid the costs of Obamacare.
And they voted for it! Under Obamacare health insurance rates for young adults will skyrocket 40 percent next year, according to a new study.
Finding out what’s in it: Health premiums to double under Obamacare.
Surprise surprise! To avoid Obamacare, companies are cutting back, turning more employees into part-timers while also refusing to hire new employees.
And we’ve only just begun. The cost of this bad law is so high it will squelch everything it touches.
We’ve only just begun: Another federal judge has ruled that a private company does not have to follow the Obamacare contraceptive mandate.
Hobby Lobby has decided to face millions in fines rather than bow to the Obamacare contraceptive mandate.
They will continue to provide their employees healthcare, but will refuse to include any payments for contraceptives as now required by Obamacare. For standing by their beliefs and doing this, it is very possible this company could end up going bankrupt, thereby putting 13,000 employees out of work. Not only will they lose the healthcare plans that Obama promised they could keep, they won’t even have jobs!
Thank you Obama for giving us Obamacare. And thank you the American voters who have decided to allow this disaster of a law to go forward. Sadly, the worst is yet to come.
Finding out what’s in it: The CEO of Aetna says that Obamacare will double health care premiums.
I think he is underestimating the rise in costs. He is also not mentioning the almost certain decline in care that will happen as well.
Finding out what’s in it: Democratic senators (who voted for it) have joined Republicans to call for the delay or cancellation of an Obamacare tax on medical equipment.
Maybe if these idiots had read the damn bill before they passed it we wouldn’t have this problem. But then again, this is the quality of senators the American people want in charge of our country. I read this and weep.
Guess what: “It will be very costly.”
Finding out what’s in it: Walmart, the nation’s largest private employer, will be eliminating healthcare coverage to its part time employees due to Obamacare.
Essentially, the company is trying to avoid the high costs imposed by Obamacare by dropping coverage for anyone working 30 hours or less, and then moving more employees into that category when possible. As I noted before, this idiotic law is forcing us to be a nation of part time workers.
We’ve only just begun: A federal appeals court has issued a temporary injunction halting enforcement by the federal government of the contraceptive mandate under Obamacare.
The more the merrier: Two more states have now decided not to set up health exchanges, a key component of Obamacare.
That makes 22 states total have have refused to participate in this disaster of a law.
In response to my condemnation of the insane requirement by Obamacare that restaurants and take-out pizza delivery services publicly post on their menus the calorie count for every item, including a calorie count for each of the literally thousands of topping variations for pizzas, regular reader Patrick Ritchie asked me, “What level of super market labeling would you support?”
I replied, “I think the federal government has no business requiring any labeling at all. This is a state matter, pure and simple, both for practical and Constitutional reasons.”
He responded, “Which practical reasons? I’m genuinely curious. What makes a state regulation inherently better than a federal one?”
My response to this last question was quite long, and after reading it Patrick suggested I elevate the comment into a full headlined post. I have decided to do so. Here is what I wrote, edited slightly for clarity:
» Read more
Finding out what’s in it: The requirement in Obamacare that restaurants list calories on their menus will cost billions.
President Obama’s own Office of Management and Budget listed the menu display imposition as the third most burdensome statutory requirement enacted that year, forcing retail outlets to expend 14,536,183 work hours every year just to keep Uncle Sam happy. Instead of applying the menu rule just to restaurants, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) decided on its own initiative to sweep certain convenience stores and pizza delivery storefronts under the calorie-count requirements. FDA bureaucrats are even micromanaging compliance, down to determining the sizes of fonts that can be used on menu signs.
This regulation does nothing to lower the cost of healthcare, and in fact increases costs in more ways than can be counted. Moreover, it is less than useless in improving the public’s health.
However, it does do a lot for federal bureaucrats, giving them more power over businesses and our lives. Hooray!
Finding out what’s in it: When you go for your annual physical — free under Obamace — the doctor cannot treat you for, or even answer questions about, any new ailments.
We are obligated by law to code specifically for the reason of the visit. An annual exam is one specific code; you can not mix this with another code, say, for rectal bleeding. This annual visit covers the exam and “discussion about the status of previously diagnosed stable conditions.” That’s the exact wording under that code — insurance will not cover any new ailment under that code. If you are here for that annual exam, you will not be covered if you want to discuss any new ailment or unstable condition. I cannot bait and switch to another code — that’s illegal. We, the physicians, are audited all the time and can lose our license for insurance fraud.
You, the patient, will then have to make a decision. Do you want your “free” yearly exam, or do you want to pay for a visit which is coded for a particular, new problem? You can have my “free” exam if you only discuss what Obamacare wants me to discuss.
In other words, this so-called “free annual physical” is a fraud. In fact, in order for it to be free, both the doctor and the patient have to purposely ignore any new problems that might have come up since the last physical. Or the doctor has to cheat and do work for which he will not be paid.
None of this should be surprising. You allow the government to stick its hands into everything you do, those hands are going to go places you never expected or would have permitted. Just ask anyone who has had to go through airport security.
The day of reckoning looms: Don’t you dare call it default!
