Wisconsin Takes a Hit Under ObamaCare
This is Scott Walker, writing in the Washington Post:
- 100,000 people will be dropped by their employer-sponsored health insurance;
- 59 percent of people who buy their own health insurance will experience an average premium increase of 31 percent;
- 150,000 people will stop buying health insurance in the private sector and will instead become dependent on the government and taxpayers; and
- Between 2014 and 2019, ObamaCare could cost Wisconsin taxpayers $1.12 billion; after all federal aid and tax credits are applied, the state’s portion of the bill will be $433 million.
These estimates come from a study by Jon Gruber, an architect of RomneyCare and a paid advisor to the White house during the construction of ObamaCare.
HT: Chris Jacobs.
I don’t have the data at my fingertips, but it would be an interesting exercise to find out the distribution firms by workforce size, broken down by employee income. All firms that employ fewer than 51 workers will be far better off dropping coverage. Those firms employing more than 50 workers (with a workforce that is mostly moderate-income workers) would be better off dropping coverage and paying the $2,000 fine. Large firms that can easily do so should split into different operating units and spin off divisions with a high-ratio of low-wage workers into entities that would drop coverage. This wholesale restructuring of the labor market may not make sense by efficiency standards. But the subsidies are too large to ignore.
This is not a good idea; but it will occur.
ACA doesn’t solve our problems, it only adds new ones.
This article really puts things into perspective for me. As a “moderate conservative” I have been leery of the Affordable Care Act and what this means to me both as a registered nurse and as a patient. These numbers, quite honestly, scare me.
This was supposed to offer equal healthcare to all Americans, but what about state run Medicaid? One quote from Mr. Walker not mentioned here in the blog: “Approximately 122,000 parents, caretakers and pregnant women with an income of more than 133 percent of the federal poverty level will no longer be eligible for Medicaid.”
I believe in capitalism with less government interference in my life. I am concerned that this will lead to the opposite. How can small businesses grow if they are going to be taxed so much more. Would this not lead to less hiring of jobs and higher unemployment? Our government has proven that it cannot stay within a budget and not spend frivolously. How can we expect them to basically oversee our healthcare and not fail?
I am not a great fan of ObamaCare, and I rather like Scott Walker — but nonetheless, his article is misleading on a couple of counts.
a. He does not fully acknowledge the subsidies in the exchanges.
Take a young person, whose premium might go from $100 a month today up to $400 a month in a community-rated and guaranteed issue environment.
If that young person has a modest income, say under $40,000 a year, then with subsidies his personal cost will go back to $100 a month and he will have a much better policy in terms of low deductibles and co-payments.
Now one can argue legitimately that the subsidies will either costs trillions or be abandoned. But the law was at least designed to help average citizens, albeit in a cumbersome and expensive way.
2. If Obamacare will in fact cost Wisconsin $433 million over 5 years, that is $90 million a year.
Hardly a back breaker in a fairly affluent state, and one which has had liberal Medicaid plus Badgercare for the working poor plus a functioning high risk pool.
However, ObamaCare will have a dramatic financial cost to the stingy states like Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, Florida, etc., which have had very restrictive Medicaid programs. In Louisiana the level of state spending on health care would go up by 48%.
I would say that it should go up, given how these states have been cruelly indifferent to their uninsureds for years. But that does not change the tough politics ahead– much tougher than Wisconsin’s.
Obamacare doesn’t allow for those who don’t use standard medical services such as the Amish,the Mennonites and Christian Scientists. Nor does it allow for those who prefer natural practitioners such as naturopaths and homeopathic medicine in general. There are no insurance plans that completely cover this sort of health care as it is based on natural means which are not patentable. Therefore BigPharma can’t make much money from these sorts of treatments.
Some religious communities do not believe in the taking of blood for ANY reason and since most alopathic (standard medical) diagnosis procedures are based on blood tests, they opt out of going to regular doctors.
Who in their right mind thinks that they can force these people to buy health insurance? Why should they purchase something they won’t use and waste money that they need to pay for the kind of health care they want but isn’t insurable?
What about those who pay for their health care out of their own pockets because it is cheaper that way? They are no “burden to society” but they will be penalized for being responsible. Wouldn’t it make more sense to penalize those who haven’t put money aside for emergencies? Penalizing those who AREN’T a burden and have set aside money should they have an accident of some sort is ridiculous.
What about those who are really poor but able to manage well enough that they fall in the cracks when it comes to government help. They are deemed too “rich” to qualify for assistance but they make too little to afford to keep a roof over their head AND pay for insurance or to keep paying the fine. These people will be forced to “go under the radar” and hide. They will be hunted by the IRS as tax dodgers simply because they don’t fit into the scheme as the government sees it.
None of this makes sense until you read Agenda 21, then it all falls into place. The dots are being connected one by one and the American people are deaf, dumb and blind. All they want to know is that they are going to get “free” healthcare yet the truth is most will have to do without.
The results of socialized (“free”) medicine are available for view all over the world; Canada and England are the most advanced in their degeneration. People are fleeing these two countries by the thousands in order to get the procedures they need before they die waiting.
Access to better ways of healing are also being denied by making them non-insurable or deemed “quackery” and all because they don’t make the providers the big profits that the medical “industry” requires. So greed rears it’s ugly head along with the need to control the lives of the population.
There are some really sick SOB’s out there who think we don’t know what is actually going on. I hope they understand that there are more of us than there are of them.
You are right on about alternative medicine, but one paragraph of yours is outdated.
You talk about “those who are poor, but manage their money well yet are too rich to qualify for government assistance” being left out in the cold.
That has been absolutely true under Medicaid. In some states you could make $12,000 a year and get no aid whatsoever.
But as I keep saying, you have to at least read the new law and recognize its subsidies.
Under the new law, a single person making up to $19,000 a year will get Medicaid. Above $19,000 but below about $50,000, they can go the Exchanges and their premium, after subsidies, will be limited to less than 10% or 8% of their income.
Medicaid as we have known it has had a terrible “cliff” that penalized people who worked at lower income jobs, but at least worked.
The new law does try to correct that. The new law may still fail, but give it a little credit for trying.
Mr. Hertz I must give you kudos for a valiant try but I am one of those working “poor” who are too “rich” for subsidies.
I know that my $1200 to $1500 a MONTH income doesn’t seem like it would put me in that category but I have been told exactly that by those who have gone through the system already. Unless I SPEND “down” ALL the money I have in the bank (which, because it is specifically for emergencies, has grown to a fairly large amount considering my income), SELL the “luxury vehicle” that I live in (a 1998 5th wheel- which is paid for), SELL the newest vehicle I drive (since the oldest is a 1989 Silverado and eats gas but hauls more gear for my music studios, the newest would be the 2000 Ranger that SAVES me money in gas)- both vehicles are also paid for – in fact I am totally debt free. And to top this all off, SELL my business which entails two music studios in two different towns and encompasses gear that is totally paid for, I will NOT get any help from any government agency. I was told I would have to move to an apt and make all these changes or I couldn’t get any help.
I’ve been told it is impossible to live on what I make, yet I am doing it. That’s what happens when you only buy what you can afford and don’t buy on credit. That’s what happens when you put your minor debts first, pay them all off and don’t incur any new ones. That’s what happens when you budget for EVERYTHING. That’s also what happens when you learn to barter and trade – the original way we used to do business in this country.
So, for being a responsible citizen and PAYING MY FAIR SHARE of EVERYTHING for my 64yrs of life, the payback is – pay more for insurance that I don’t want and don’t need and can’t budget for.
I pay NO MONTHLY PREMIUMS on anything, no TV service, no house ins, no business ins, only liability on my two trucks so that I’m legal to drive. I make NO MONTHLY PAYMENTS of any kind because I CAN NEVER BE SURE OF HOW MUCH MONEY I WILL BE MAKING FROM ONE MONTH TO THE NEXT. By having no monthly payments I can be assured to afford a little advertising (budgeted), dial up internet (which between the phone line and the access to the net isn’t over $47.00) and my studio rents (also budgeted in).
Utilities for the RV are covered by the rent I pay to the park and most of that is traded “out” in service since I am the manager. I also have a deal with the landlords as far as my cell phone – also a low price so that we can stay in touch if they decide to leave town on business.
The government says I am a small business person. I am too “wealthy” because of that designation, no matter how little I make, to get any help. What is funny is that my CPA has had me paying only Soc Sec for the last 6 yrs because, according to her I don’t make enough to pay taxes. Now since I told her I won’t be claiming Soc Sec OR Medicare she told me to just drop off the roles and go on a cash only basis. Get my emergency fund out of the bank so the IRS can’t touch it when it gets to the point that I can’t afford the “tax” penalty for NOT buying health ins. and stay under the radar.
The cheapest health care plan in this state is still too expensive for me to budget into my “expected” income. I have a limit that I MUST make if I’m to pay all my bills. Usually I make that limit and I do NOT budget over it. What with the drought and the declining economy, that limit may not be met next year and definitely will not cover the first year’s “tax” fine – the lowest- to be imposed on those who do not purchase health insurance.
If I have anything extra at the end of the month, it is saved or spent on things that need repair or replacing. I don’t take vacations, I don’t go out unless a friend takes me out and I don’t buy much in the way of “toys” like most of the population does.
I also budget for the money to go to a naturopath from time to time because I actually get HEALED so that I don’t have to keep going back, unlike what most MD’s seem to be able to do. After blood test after blood test, pill after pill and then being told you are allergic to almost anything they can give you, you get tired of the rigamarole and you go find the health care that really works.
In order to keep being able to budget in that sort of care when it is needed or when I want to improve on something so that I don’t lose what good health I still have, I can’t be paying out for health insurance that doesn’t cover this kind of care. Homeopathic care isn’t recognized as viable because it doesn’t make a lot of money for the medical INDUSTRY.
There are very few women who can do what I do at my age and that’s because most of them have been conned into hysterectomies , gall bladder removal, bottles of pills for every sort of physiological and psychological aliment that can be found, all because it makes enormous amounts of money for Big Pharma.
Now, I don’t figure I will be healthy forever and I have already told people that when they find me someday, let me die. . . no life support or anything that involves a hospital stay, just let me go. Same goes for an accident. If it can’t be taken care of in the emergency room so that I can go home (I can afford to pay for that), then let me die. Doctors can’t let well enough alone and won’t agree to that sort of treatment so I make it a point to keep to myself.
I’m extremely cautious about my movements mainly so as not to cause others harm but also to keep from being a burden. I have NO FAMILY. I either take care of myself or I die. That’s how I see it. The state be damned. I don’t want them making money off of me by taxing everyone else for whatever they decide ails me and keeping me hanging on until THEIR budget can’t take it anymore.
I appreciate your honest description and I admire your integrity.
I am also 64 years old and I sell health insurance, for whatever that is worth.
Let me offer two comments.The first is an observation I have made in this blog before.
a. When you are 65, you will be able to get a very decent health insurance policy for $100 a month and maybe less through Medicare or Medicare Advantage.
Every night on television, the large insurers who ignore you today are advertising for your business.
This incredible difference between lavish benefits over age 65 and health-care poverty under 65 is a real scandal of American life. I am ashamed at any conservatives who are over 65 and say that our system is just fine without reform.
Now for a second comment, more technical in nature.
You certainly do not qualify for any government assistance today, since Medicaid in your state requires absolute destitution.
By the time the health exchanges might be able to help you in 2014, you will be in Medicare-land anyways.
And there is a glitch in ObamaCare anyways, which allows age-rating by insurance companies. Even after 2014, insurers can charge 3 times as much for coverage to older persons. The result for mamy is that even the subsidized policies will be unaffordable.
Bob, if I may call you that :), you are actually being a big help to me, and it IS appreciated. What you are saying, and have the expertise to back up, is that once I reach 65, I either get a policy for $100 a month or forget about it after 2014. That low price would, I’m sure, incrementally increase as I get older while my income would be decreasing. Not a workable plan for me.
At this point in time, I can’t even afford the $100 a month because of changes going on here where I live that may force me to either buy a piece of land or change how I am berthing my RV. (Fri the 13th was not a good day for me when I was talking to the owner of the property.) Be that as it may, I absolutely agree that those over 65 will be prejudiced against getting affordable health care or insurance and will be left out in the cold.
Agenda 21 is also against the “baby boomers” actually making it to a real old age – “too much of a burden on society”, not to mention the REAL TRUE history that we’ve lived through which the power-hungry do NOT want the younger generation privy to as evidenced in the history books they are using to feed the state pablum to the kids in the classrooms.
So, from my perspective, the actions that I have taken so far, and the future actions that I will have to take are my best bet on being able to survive.
There is nothing in Obamacare that is really going to serve my best interests. This plan is simply a power grab sold to the young people and the minorities (who will soon be the majority) as a way for them to get something for nothing. I can’t believe how many have bought into the idea that they will have “free” healthcare!!!! There’s a sucker born every minute.
FDR and LBJ did the same sorts of things during their terms of office and expanded the scope of the government to the point that now, our Constitution and our Congress can’t seem to stop it.
Once health,energy,food and most big businesses are nationalized (like the auto industry is now) we become the USSA (United Socialist States of Amerika – the “k” is intentional) and it will take generations of fighting to get it back, if that is even possible. More likely a section of the country will have to defect or secede in order to restore a portion of it to it’s former glory.
So thank you sir, and though I know you want to give the benefit of the doubt to this plan, this regime preys on doubters and well-meaning hearts. Just keep your powder dry and your eyes and ears open.
Thanks for the kind comments.
Medicare is much more generous than you think.
Plan A for hospitalization is totally free to you.
Plan B for office visits etc has the $104 premium, but my gosh it does not go up by age like private insurance. Medicare is social insurance. The premium only goes up when it goes up for everyone.
If your income is low enough and you cannot afford the $100 per month, Medicaid will pay that in some cases. You can go into any Social Security office wnen you are close to your 65th birthday and find out.
Like many Americans in the vicious individual insurance market, you have been kicked around for so long that you cannot believe the decent things that social insurance does.
This article really puts things into perspective for me. As a “moderate conservative” I have been leery of the Affordable Care Act and what this means to me both as a registered nurse and as a patient. These numbers, quite honestly, scare me.
This was supposed to offer equal healthcare to all Americans, but what about state run Medicaid? One quote from Mr. Walker not mentioned here in the blog: “Approximately 122,000 parents, caretakers and pregnant women with an income of more than 133 percent of the federal poverty level will no longer be eligible for Medicaid.”
I believe in capitalism with less government interference in my life. I am concerned that this will lead to the opposite. How can small businesses grow if they are going to be taxed so much more. Would this not lead to less hiring of jobs and higher unemployment? Our government has proven that it cannot stay within a budget and not spend frivolously. How can we expect them to basically oversee our healthcare and not fail?
Bob, I understand what you are saying and it works for those who are willing to be dictated to. Those who are willing to be told where they will go and who they will see for their health care. I, for one, refuse to be dictated to.
Medicare isn’t going to work because too many doctors are no longer accepting Medicare patients. The government refuses to pay enough to make it worth their while. The doctors can’t stay in business on the poor return that Medicare gives them. If people are on Medicare now and have a doctor, they are in a good position. Those who are not on Medicare and don’t already have a doctor who will accept it once they do get on it, will have quite a shake-up in their lives or will have to simply accept what they can get at the local state run clinic, IF they can even get an appointment.
Whenever I’ve needed to see the nurse practitioner here at the clinic in the next small town, the only way I could get in was to just land on their doorstep;sick. If I called in I was told it would be a MONTH to get an appt.!!! That’s why I went to alternative care. There are other options out there if people will only stop thinking they MUST comply with the norm. The only way we are going to survive is to keep from getting sick, because once you are, it will be hell trying to get anyone to see you.
Of course Obamacare doesn’t think you should have any other options and states that it will penalize you for going outside of the “accepted list” of doctors even if you pay for it yourself.
I have no intention of getting my Soc Sec when I’m 67 (the earliest I can get it) because even at that age I would be lucky to get $350 a month (just enough to pay for some health insurance, right? But it will be cut off if I make as much or more than I’m making right now- some trade off). I’ve made so little income my working life that not much was ever put into the fund and so that means I won’t be asking for Medicare.
This is all part of my plan to not be flagged by the system and staying under the radar. I didn’t even take my tiny IRS refund (don’t ask me how the CPA managed THAT one) because it came as a debit card that I would have had to activate in order to claim. THAT isn’t happening. Just another way for the government to reel me in. I may be extremely hard-headed and stubborn (I see your eyes rolling LOL), but I’m not stupid. I will not be conned into giving my life away to the government.
Kerri, you are spot on. Keep in mind that no member of Congress will be forced to enroll in Obamacare. They, along with the rest of the elite in this country, will go right on along with their private care providers and their high-priced insurance, all subsidized by the government as part of their “service” to our country.
Now do you see why it was so easy for them to pass this legislation. Even when their terms are up, they will “retire” with such a substantial pension that they will never have to worry about coming down to our level and dealing with the kind of health care that will be doled out to us.
I don’t believe in taking any kind of government help and may be a bit over zealous in that train of thought. I have explored the idea as stated in my posts earlier in this blog just to see where I stood. But those who really NEED help and simply want a hand-up NOT a hand out will never see any real help in their healthcare, not with this plan.
To me, this plan seems to be “culling the useless eaters” (this term is commonly used by the elite to get rid of those of us who no longer produce enough revenue to suit them). However, it will do nothing to rectify the mountains of garbage and waste that has built up in the system and keeps the prices high and the service mediocre. We do have a health care problem in this country but it isn’t going to be solved by conning everyone into believing that they will be getting something for nothing. It can only be solved by honest competition not the graft that is going on between BigPharma and the insurance companies.
Want MORE?
In 2014, The Obama Dictatorship Will Be Complete
July 9, 2012 By Doug Book
Though few Americans are aware of it, the unconscionable ObamaCare ruling of Chief Justice John Roberts stands to provide Barack Hussein Obama unlimited and fundamentally irrevocable power less than 2 years after the November election. For should he win, Obama will acquire the “legal” authority to select 15 individuals whose word will automatically become the law of the land.
Within the 2500 pages of the comically-named Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is cached the 2014 establishment of the Independent Payment Advisory Board. Nominated exclusively by the president, the 15 members of the Board will ostensibly be tasked with “…prevent[ing] per-enrollee Medicare spending from growing faster than a specified target rate.” To accomplish this congressional mandate, ObamaCare has provided the Board with the authority to submit legislative “proposals” to Congress; proposals which will automatically become law unless both Houses AND the President agree upon and pass into law a substitute measure.
In short, “the Board’s edicts …become law without congressional action, congressional approval, meaningful congressional oversight, or being subject to a presidential veto.” Moreover, citizens will have NO authority to challenge the Board’s pronouncements in court, for ObamaCare “…specifically states that the Secretary [of Health and Human Service’s] implementation of IPAB’s proposals is not judicially reviewable.” Therefore a group of presidential, POLITICAL appointees will have the practical power of shaping and imposing upon the American public, the laws of the land! For in addition to creating edicts loosely attached to Medicare and its myriad applications, in 2015 the IPAB will be permitted to impose price controls, taxes and “…ration care for all Americans whether the government pays their medical bills or not!” Thus even the Medicare stipulation will no longer be a practical deterrent to the Board’s authority.
How is all of this possible? According to the Cato Institute, “…by carving out a discrete list of limitations on the Board’s delegated powers, the [Affordable Care] Act implicitly gives IPAB otherwise unlimited power to exercise any enumerated congressional power with respect to any governmental body, industry, property, product, person, service or activity.” And just like Congress, the IPAB has been given the authority to appropriate federal funds and impose conditions for their receipt. This means “the Board could propose…to require states to implement federal laws or to enact new state laws in order to receive federal funding.”
Incredibly, Congress does not have the authority to do away with the IPAB until 2017, when a 3/5 vote by both Houses must accompany the signature of the President! Clearly, Barack Obama and the radically leftist, 2008 congress went to extraordinary lengths to shelter their conspiratorial overthrow of our constitutional Republic from standard methods of repeal.
Should the Manchurian Candidate be returned to the White House, does anyone believe he would not nominate to the IPAB a select coterie of like-minded, Marxist plutocrats, eager to wrench by any means from the American people their last remaining vestige of individual liberty?
Did John Roberts realize that his constitutionally depraved ruling would provide the America hating Obama with literal, dictatorial authority over the government, people and future of the United States? If so, the Chief Justice has assumed his place in history as a traitor of unmatched ability.
Obamacare was never JUST about healthcare. It started way back with the Clintons when the talk was just about a data base of medical info on people so that, should they have an emergency, their critical information would be available in the emergency room. . . look where it’s gone!
The medical profession in the USA has defeated just about every effort at cost control for the last 40 years.
If IPAB mandates fewer back surgeries, I promise you will see more heart surgeries, or whatever IPAB does not get around to.
Medicare worked diligently from about 1985 to 2000 to cut down on inpatient hospital stays. And it worked. But hospitals found higher profit in outpaitent procedures, and now derive about half their income from overpriced outpatient charges.
You and Cato give way, way too much credit to IPAB.
And let me add — it is not a left wing conspiracy if our government tries to limit what it spends on health care. If there are no limits to health spending, then roads and schools and libraries and parks will all suffer.
The debate is over what kind of controls will actually work.
Actually, the government needs to STAY OUT of health care and let the pocketbooks of the population take care of it. It’s BigPharma, the insurance companies and the INDUSTRY that has grown up around health care that has turned it into nothing more than a profit making situation – even if there is no profit to be made.
Let the people decide what THEY want. What they pay for will determine what is available and what works. That will bring the costs down, as it does when us “free riders” pay for medical costs out of our pocket now. I’ve been told before, by pharmacists, how any prescription costs will always be LESS if the pharmacy doesn’t have to bill an insurance company and deal with all the paperwork to get their payment.
Same goes for most medical help. It’s the middle men and the red-tape that generally bring the cost up. All the nickel and diming that goes on between the patient and what they actually receive in health care. Human illness is big business and deceit is just another tool to raise prices.
Excellent cet blog! Merci bcp ^^
the best thing you can do, is call the insurance cmnpaoy and tell them. The reason is that it may buy you some time, even a partial payment looks better than nothing, so send them something, most people, don’t say or write to explain, and believe it or not, you are better off communicating with the insurance, sometimes there you talk to them, work a deal, and later get a cancellation notice, with maybe a small refund. DON’T PANIC, DON’T CASH THE REFUND, AS LONG AS THAT REFUND CHECK IS NOT CASHED, YOU STILL HAVE INSURANCE sometimes even when you make a payment arrangement the computer generates a letter, and someone else just mails it by mistake, you then call back with the details of who, and when, and what the arrangement was, because you made notes when you called to arrange late payments, it works, but pay it as soon as you can, Keep in mind, things are tough all over, insurance companies know this, but if you do not ccommunicate they will not know, and if you get some real butt head on the phone, don’t argue, hang up asap, call back in an hour and find someone who just ate lunch, they may want to help you if they can, you never know, its always worth a phone call, good luck.