“We’re going to be living with Obamacare for the foreseeable future.” And with that, Paul Ryan the Republican speaker of the House threw in the towel on his sweeping plan to replace the ACA (Obamacare). But political leaders in California plan to take the refinement of the state’s healthcare system into uncharted territory. During February of this year, state senators Ricardo Lara and his colleague Toni Atkins wrote proposed legislation to replace private health insurance…
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Health Insurance Reform Lies and the Lying Liars Who Push Them
Louisiana senator Bill Cassidy is catching flak for a letter he wrote a constituent about his stand on the current state of health insurance via the Affordable Care Act. Cassidy, a Republican and a physician, has been a staunch critic of Obamacare, and his answer to the voter’s question pulled no punches. “Obamacare does not lower costs or improve quality, but rather it raises taxes and allows a presidentially handpicked ‘Health Choices Commissioner’ to determine what…
Read MoreNational Health Service in U.K. Continues to Deteriorate
By Linda Gorman, reprinted from Health Care News, Heartland Institute The United Kingdom’s single-payer health care system provides an important model, and cautionary tale, for those who advocate such a system in the United States. Over the Christmas holidays, the waits for emergency care in the British National Health Service (NHS) reached what the nation’s press called “crisis” levels. Compared to 2013, twice as many ambulances had more than 30 minute waits outside of overcrowded…
Read MoreUninsured? Universal health care might be the answer
Why Should You Care About Obamacare? 1. Individuals suffering from pre-existing conditions will no longer be denied insurance. The law prevents individual health insurers from excluding children with pre-existing conditions from being covered by their family policy. Insurers will not be required to take the same steps for adults until January 1, 2014. In the mean time, Obama’s health care law provides coverage for individuals with pre-existing conditions through a temporary national high-risk pool….
Read MoreVermont Embraces Single Payer Despite Obamacare Uncertainty
Regardless of how the Supreme Court rules on the constitutionality of President Obama’s health care law this summer, Vermont will move forward in creating the first single-payer health insurance system in the United States. Under the system signed into law by Democrat Gov. Peter Shumlin in May 2011, a universal, taxpayer-financed government-managed system, Green Mountain Care, will replace private health insurance. All decisions about health care in the state will be made by a five-member,…
Read MoreGOP will attempt to repeal Obama healthcare reforms
Swept to power in this week’s midterm elections, Republican Party leaders have publicly signaled their intention to rollback many provisions of the large-scale overhauls of the American health insurance system passed earlier this year by Democrats at the behest of President Barack Obama. Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell and Speaker of the House-elect John Boehner both voiced their strong opposition to the president’s health care agenda. “We can – and should – propose and vote…
Read MoreLow-Wage Employers Need Obamacare Waivers
GUEST EDITORIAL By Kenneth Artz, The Heartland Institute Beginning in 2014, ObamaCare will require employers with fifty or more full-time employees to offer affordable coverage to all of their employees or risk a hefty per-employee fine. As industries weigh the benefits of cost of coverage versus paying the fines, officials for trade groups representing nursing homes and other low-wage employers are considering asking the Department of Health and Human Services for a waiver excusing them…
Read MoreDefund Obamacare’s Insurance Rate Reviews
GUEST EDITORIAL By Edmund F. Haislmaier, The Heartland Institute The recently published U.S. Department of Health and Human Services regulations for implementing Obamacare’s health insurance rate reviews, effective September 1, are another instance of the arbitrary and politically manipulated regulations that inevitably result when Congress enacts vague, subjective, and aspirational legislation rather than clear, objective, and specific statutes. Political Pressure on Premiums These rate-review provisions were an entirely political exercise from the start. They were…
Read MoreObamanomics: It’s Worse Than You Think
GUEST EDITORIAL By Joseph Bast, The Heartland Institute Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act … all 3,256 pages of it … into law on March 23, 2010. Most of the provisions don’t go into effect until 2014, but some of the taxes to fund it started immediately. By counting ten years of revenues and only six years of expenses, the administration was able to claim it will reduce the federal debt over…
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