Obamacare Twice as Likely to Hurt Americans than Help
A rising number of Americans are claiming that Obamacare has negatively impacted their health insurance policies.Peak Number Of Americans Delaying Medical Care Over Costs
Only 14 percent claim they have been helped by Obamacare, while more than twice as many (35 percent) say they have been hurt by it, according to a Rasmussen Reports poll release Monday.
“Among voters who say their health insurance has been changed by the law, 17% say they have been helped, but 66% report being hurt by it.The majority of Americans polled (60 percent) believe the government’s monopolization of the health care industry will only stifle free market competition and exacerbate costs.
A majority of voters (55%) still views the health care law unfavorably, while 39% share a favorable opinion of it. This includes 38% with a Very Unfavorable view versus 16% with a Very Favorable one. Negative opinions of the law fell to a recent low of 50%. . . two weeks ago.”
One in three Americans has put off seeking medical treatment in 2014 due to high costs, according to Gallup — the highest percentage since Gallup began asking the question in 2001.So is that what the democrats intended when they said they wanted to help the middle-class; make them more like the poor? This is not the income redistribution the middle was looking for.
Thirty-three percent of Americans have delayed medical treatment for themselves or their families because of the costs they’d have to pay, according to the survey. Obamacare, of course, had promised that it would help make health care more affordable for everyone, but the number of people who can’t afford a trip to the doctor has actually risen three points since 2013, before most Obamacare provisions took effect.
The hardest-hit: the middle-class. Americans with an annual household income of between $30,000 and $75,000 began delaying medical care over costs more in 2014, up to 38 percent in 2014 from 33 percent last year; among households that earn above $75,000, 28 percent delayed care this year, compared to just 17 percent last year.
The lowest-income section, some of whom can take part in Medicaid and who are more likely to qualify for significant premium and cost-sharing subsidies on an Obamacare exchange, are less likely to delay care this year. Now, 35 percent of those who earn under $30,000 a year are putting off seeking medical care, down from 43 percent last year.
U.S. CEOs threaten to pull tacit Obamacare support over 'wellness' spat
Leading U.S. CEOs, angered by the Obama administration's challenge to certain "workplace wellness" programs, are threatening to side with anti-Obamacare forces unless the government backs off, according to people familiar with the matter.The relationship between the Obama administration and the insurance companies throughout the Obamacare process has been amusing to say the least. Instead of the single payer system that Obama and his crowd would like, the insurance companies were offered guaranteed business if they would play ball and accept a mandated insurance system through the government. What they are finding out, like many other businesses before them, is when you accept government largess, the government determines the terms, which may change on a whim.
Major U.S. corporations have broadly supported President Barack Obama's healthcare reform despite concerns over several of its elements, largely because it included provisions encouraging the wellness programs.
The programs aim to control healthcare costs by reducing smoking, obesity, hypertension and other risk factors that can lead to expensive illnesses. A bipartisan provision in the 2010 healthcare reform law allows employers to reward workers who participate and penalize those who don't. But recent lawsuits filed by the administration's Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), challenging the programs at Honeywell International and two smaller companies, have thrown the future of that part of Obamacare into doubt.
The lawsuits infuriated some large employers so much that they are considering aligning themselves with Obama's opponents, according to people familiar with the executives' thinking.
"The fact that the EEOC sued is shocking to our members," said Maria Ghazal, vice-president and counsel at the Business Roundtable, a group of chief executives of more than 200 large U.S. corporations. "They don't understand why a plan in compliance with the ACA (Affordable Care Act) is the target of a lawsuit," she said. "This is a major issue to our members."
Bad Obamacare month could haunt White House
November has been a terrible month for President Obama, between his party losing control of the Senate and seemingly unending bad news for Obamacare.Dark days ahead for ObamaCare
The last few weeks were the worst stretch for his signature domestic initiative since the botched rollout of Obamacare in fall 2013, stoking doubts about whether the president can ever sell his healthcare policies to the American public.
First, the Supreme Court announced it would hear arguments on the legality of Obamacare subsidies, a move that could gut the centerpiece of the Affordable Care Act.
Then, a string of videos surfaced in which Obamacare architect and MIT economist Jonathan Gruber said the legislation passed because of the “stupidity of the American voters.”
Next, the White House had to account for a pair of enrollment problems. The Department of Health and Human Services projected that between 9 and 9.9 million people would enroll in Obamacare plans next year, well short of the 13 million predicted by the independent Congressional Budget Office. Just a few days later, administration officials admitted they inflated sign-up figures for Obamacare in 2014, including dental plans, to pad the numbers by 400,000 — allowing the administration to meet its original goal of enrolling 7 million consumers.
Perhaps most surprisingly, Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., a major Obama ally, admitted this week that Democrats wasted political capital in passing Obamacare instead of other initiatives so early in the president's first term.
“Democrats blew the opportunity the American people gave them,” Schumer told reporters. “We took their mandate and put all our focus on the wrong problem — healthcare reform.”
And for good measure, Republicans finally filed a long-anticipated lawsuit against Obama for his unilateral delays of the healthcare law.
The Obama administration is facing a slew of healthcare challenges as the winter holidays approach.I foresee a lot of golf in the President's future.
While this fall has been a far cry from last year, when HealthCare.gov was melting down, 2014 has brought wholly unexpected problems to the fore for federal health officials and the White House. . .
Take the conflict surrounding Jonathan Gruber, the ObamaCare consultant whose suggestion that a "lack of transparency" and voters' "stupidity" helped the law pass, went viral.
ObamaCare's health insurance exchanges have opened for enrollment with few stumbles this year, in a victory for Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell. But that doesn't mean the open enrollment period doesn't come with other difficulties. The administration has just until Feb. 15 to bring millions of new customers into the system and encourage existing enrollees to come back and shop again.
The three-month window — about half as long as last year — is proceeding while the back-end of HealthCare.gov remains partly unfinished. Health insurers have been exasperated by the delays, as health officials verify some account and application details by hand.
A Republican investigation revealed Nov. 20 that ObamaCare enrollment figures at HHS were inflated by roughly 400,000 people after the department miscounted dental plans as medical coverage. The finding was a public relations setback for Burwell and the Obama administration, bringing back partisan strife over enrollment figures that had quieted since the spring.
The Obama administration was not pleased with the Supreme Court this month when it decided to hear King v. Burwell, a case that challenges the validity of subsidies distributed through ObamaCare's federally run exchanges.
Coverage of that case distracted from the fact, however, that the administration faces mounting challenges to the law's birth control mandate from non-profit groups.
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