Various liberal media sources are in sync with government that the ACA is a wonderful benefit to the people of the United States. Typical of liberal thought, if a government program is ‘operating’, it is wonderful.
And the healthcare law is functioning, especially for those who are receiving generous subsidies paid for by other taxpayers. A family of four with income of four times the poverty rate (4XP) or $94,000 qualifies for subsidies (reduced premiums) from someone making a few grand more.
Government-operated business ventures are all successful……for government workers to do what the private sector could do more efficiently. The ACA is a device to take money from some taxpayers and send it to other taxpayers after deducting the cost of bureaucratic administrative paper shuffling.
The name used by economists is ‘redistribution of wealth.’ When subsidy recipients figure out the maximum they can earn to receive subsidies, they can adjust their hours of employment or stop working altogether. CBO projections actually provide for that anomaly.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) that was signed into law on March 23, 2010 contained 2,400 pages. Nobody in Congress had read it, Republicans were not invited to participate in its development; Speaker Pelosi announced that we had to read it to find out what was in it.
By 2013, the law was 2,600 pages supported by 170,000 pages of regulations and instructions. The law is so complicated that the US Supreme Court has spent countless hours studying rulings and issuing decisions. Referred to simply as ‘The Affordable Care Act’ (ACA), the law will cost from $1.4 to $1.7 trillion over the next decade.
The stated purpose of the ACA was to provide health insurance for the millions of uninsured in 2010. The real reason for the urgency of universal healthcare was for federal control of the lives of US citizens, a presidential legacy and redistribution of wealth.
During the 2013 rollout of the healthcare law that cost $400 million in technology expense, it turned out that the government had no way of verifying income levels by applicants for subsidies. The employer mandate was postponed thus allowing subsidy applicants wide ranging options for declaring their current incomes.
Presumably overpayment of subsidies cannot be recovered. Problems persist; last year the Government Accountability Office (GAO) created 12 fictitious identities; all were submitted and 11 qualified for $30,000 in annual ACA subsidized premiums. At the end of the year all 11 subsidies were renewed, some even increased; slipshod government control. Programs are being overseen and audited by 16,000 new IRS Agents.
The ACA sponsored and funded 23 ‘healthcare cooperatives’, consumer operated and state chartered and regulated. One has gone broke, using (losing) $145 million in federal loans leaving 120,000 members without coverage. Only one of these coops is operating in the black (Maine) and the losses by the other coops has incurred about $377 million in underwriting losses. Surviving coops are seeking premium increases of 58% in Utah, 38% in Oregon and 25% in Kentucky.
Ignored by the sycophants of the ACA are some uncomfortable statistics. For example an estimated 2 to 2.5 million jobs will disappear over the next decade due to the healthcare law. Premium increases for 2016 range from 17.6% in Ohio to 38% in Illinois. The cost of Obamacare, Medicaid expansion and taxpayer-subsidized exchanges will rise from $35 billion last year to $77 billion this year to $116 billion in fiscal 2016. Overall, our healthcare law as now conceived and operating is a colossal failure economically and socially.
For those who claim that Obamacare is ‘working’, look over your shoulder at the election results in November 2014. There are now 31 (R) governors, 54 (R) US Senate seats, 247 (R) House seats and 69 (of 99) (R) state legislative chambers. Many of the defeated Democrats supported the healthcare law that polls show 53% in opposition to the law while 43% (subsidy recipients?) think it is a good deal.
Leaders who are never wrong and unable or unwilling to tolerate opposing views are treading on the razor’s edge of tyranny and are unfit to lead steadfast constituents who want to live in liberty and freedom.
– Dick Baynton