Obamacare; The Train Wreck Is Coming!
Sep 24, 2013 22:55:30 #
WASHINGTON, DC - MARCH 26:
Ron Kirby holds a sign while marching in protest of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on March 26, 2012 in Washington, DC.
It was one of candidate Obamas most vivid and concrete campaign promises. Forget about high minded (some might say high sounding) but gauzy promises of hope and change. This candidate solemnly pledged on June 5, 2008: In an Obama administration, well lower premiums by up to $2,500 for a typical family per year .. Well do it by the end of my first term as President of the United States.
Unfortunately, the experts working for Medicares actuary have (yet again[1]) reported that in its first 10 years, Obamacare will boost health spending by roughly $621 billion above the amounts Americans would have spent without this misguided law.
What this means for a typical family of four
$621 billion is a pretty eye-glazing number. Most readers will find it easier to think about how this number translates to a typical American familythe very family candidate Obama promised would see $2,500 in annual savings as far as the eye could see. So I have taken the latest year-by-year projections, divided by the projected U.S. population to determine the added amount per person and multiplied the result by 4.
Interactive Guide: What Will Obamacare Cost You?
Simplistic? Maybe, but so too was the Presidents campaign promise. And this approach allows us to see just how badly that promise fell short of the mark. Between 2014 and 2022, the increase in national health spending (which the Medicare actuaries specifically attribute to the law) amounts to $7,450 per family of 4.
Obama's 2009 Promise Of Cheaper Healthcare Has Morphed Into 2013 Price Hikes
Don't Be Fooled, ObamaCare Will Drive Up Unemployment And Healthcare Costs
The Coming Liberation: Health Care For All Without Obamacare
No, Obamacare Is Not A Good Deal For Young People In The Long Run, Not Even Close
Let us hope this family hasnt already spent or borrowed the $22,500 in savings they might have expected over this same period had they taken candidate Obamas promise at face value. In truth, no well-informed American ever should have believed this absurd promise. At the time, Factcheck.org charitably deemed this claim as overly optimistic, misleading and, to some extent, contradicted by one of his own advisers.
The Washington Post less charitably awarded it Two Pinocchios (Significant omissions or exaggerations). Yet rather than learn from his mistakes, President Obama on July 16, 2012 essentially doubled-down on his promise, assuring small business owners your premiums will go down. He made this assertion notwithstanding the fact that in three separate reports between April 2010 and June 2012, the Medicare actuaries had demonstrated that the ACA would increase health spending. To its credit, the Washington Post dutifully awarded the 2012 claim Three Pinocchios (Significant factual error and/or obvious contradictions.)
The past is not prologue: The burden increases ten-fold in 2014
As it turns out, the average family of 4 has only had to face a relatively modest burden from Obamacare over the past four yearsa little over $125. Unfortunately, this years average burden ($66) will be 10 times as large in 2014 when Obamacare kicks in for earnest. And it will rise for two years after that, after which it hit a steady-state level of just under $800 a year. Of course, all these figures are in nominal dollars. In terms of todays purchasing power, this annual amount will rise steadily.
But what happened to the spending slowdown?
Some readers may recall that a few months ago, there were widespread reports of a slow-down in health spending. Not surprisingly, the White House has been quick to claim credit for the slowdown in health spending documented in the health spending projections report, arguing that it is good for families, jobs and the budget.
On this blog, Avik Roy pointed out that a) since passage of Obamacare, U.S. health spending actually had risen faster than in OECD countries, whereas prior to the law, the opposite was true. Moreover, to the degree that U.S. health spending was slowing down relative to its own recent past, greater cost-sharing was likely to be the principal explanation. Medicares actuarial experts confirm that the lions share of the slowdown in health spending could be chalked up to slow growth in the economy and greater cost-sharing. As AEI scholar Jim Capretta pithily puts it:
An important takeaway from these new projections is that the CMS Office of the Actuary finds no evidence to link the 2010 health care law to the recent slowdown in health care cost escalation. Indeed, the authors of the projections make it clear that the slowdown is not out of line with the historical link between health spending growth and economic conditions (emphasis added).
In the interests of fair and honest reporting, perhaps it is time the mainstream media begin using Affordable Care Act whenever reference is made to this terribly misguided law. Anyone obviously is welcome to quarrel with the Medicare actuary about their numbers. I myself am hard-put to challenge their central conclusion: Obamacare will not save Americans one penny now or in the future. Perhaps the next time voters encounter a politician making such grandiose claims, they will learn to watch their wallet. Until then, lets spare strapped Americans from having to find $657 in spare change between their couch cushions next year. Lets delay this law for a year so that policymakers have time to fix the poorly designed Rube Goldberg device known as Obamacare.
For a nation with the most complicated and expensive health system on the planet, making it even more complicated and even more expensive never was a good idea.
Igor Volsky at ThinkProgress has declared this article is totally wrong. Center for Budget and Policy Priorities Paul Van de Water described this calculation as one of the stupidest things hes read in a long time asserting that Ive calculated an average that doesnt mean anything for anyone.
To his credit, MIT economist Jonathan Gruber at least concedes my basic point: The bottom line is that the government has consistently reported that Obamacare will raise national health spending by about 1 to 2 percent. But then goes on to say This is a small fraction of the typical 5 to 7 percent annual growth rate in health care and is a small price to pay for insuring 30 million or more Americans.
Notably absent from Mr. Volskys scathing critique is any mention of the person who started this use of a typical American family: President Obama. Most important, Professor Grubers point essentially substantiates my own: it was the Presidents claim of $2500 premium savings for the typical family that was and continues to be totally wrong.
Its simply not possible for national health spending to rise by $621 billion and for the typical family to expect a $2500 (per year!!!!) premium reduction. Did Paul Van de Water or anyone else at CBPP call candidate Obamas promise one of the stupidest things hes read in a long time? If not, why not?
People are welcome to argue that Obamacare is a great deal, that its worth all that added spending to get extra coverage for tens of millions of Americans. But of course, thats not how Obamacare was sold. Rather than tell Americans the truth that theyd have to pay more and that the extra price was worth it, candidate Obama promised the ultimate free lunch: well cover 30 million uninsured AND the typical family will see their premiums go down by $2500 (per year!!!!).
And Jonathan Gruber seems to have changed his tune since the fierce debates about health reform, since as Avik Roy has recounted, What we know for sure, Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber told Ezra Klein in 2009, is that [the bill] will lower the cost of buying non-group health insurance.
Obamacare was sold on the promise that it would not increase health spending or the deficit or increase taxes on families making less than $250,000 a year [I can make a firm pledge under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes.]
Every one of these promises/claims/predictions turned out to be totally wrong. We can start having a productive debate when progressives are willing to concede these simple, easily demonstrable empirical claims. And then perhaps we can move on to junking this unworkable law and replacing it with the world-class patient-centered health system Americans deserve.
Wonkette is the latest to weigh in on the purported stupidity of my post: In other words, this is incredibly stupid. Sure, the latest Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services report [PDF] says that Obamacare will lead to roughly $621 billion in additional health spending over the next ten years. But that emphatically does not mean that you, me, and the other two members of our typical family will be paying this money out of pocket. Most of it will be paid out by insurance companies, who will have a whole bunch of new policyholders because of Obamacare.
Much of it will be paid by the government in subsidies and increased Medicaid enrollment. And yes, some of it will be paid by healthy (for now), well-off (for now) young (for now!) people who would otherwise forgo insurance and roll the dice on not ever being carted to the hospital in an ambulance (emphasis added).
Wonkettes attitude about the $621B illustrates precisely the attitude that has led to the mess were in (both related to Obamacare specifically, and entitlements more generally). Dont worry. Families wont have to pay the tab. Well stick it to greedy insurance companies or Uncle Sam will cover it. No problem!
But of course, we can be pretty certain that insurance companies (especially if they are greedy!) are unlikely to be paying for any tab without turning around and passing that cost along to (gasp!) American families. Similarly, Uncle Sam has nowhere else but American families to keep replenishing tax coffers.
In short, American families manifestly WILL be absorbing every single penny of the $621B in added health spending created by Obamacare and it is intellectually disingenuous (and certainly no contribution to informed public debate) to pretend otherwise.
Avik Roy at NRO has done a splendid job of explaining the genesis of President Obamas original estimate of $2500 savings for the typical family. Its essentially identical to the method used for my own calculation. Aviks post also includes a very entertaining montage of the number of times President Obama made this claim. I encouraged anyone interested in actually understanding this issue to read his piece.
Footnotes
[1] The Medicare actuary first issued a report carefully estimating the cost impact of Obamacare on April 22, 2010. Its annual national health expenditure projections reports for 2010, 2011 and 2012 all have contained tabulations showing that Obamacare will increase health spending over the next 10 years compared to a counterfactual scenario in which the law was never enacted.
Ron Kirby holds a sign while marching in protest of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on March 26, 2012 in Washington, DC.
It was one of candidate Obamas most vivid and concrete campaign promises. Forget about high minded (some might say high sounding) but gauzy promises of hope and change. This candidate solemnly pledged on June 5, 2008: In an Obama administration, well lower premiums by up to $2,500 for a typical family per year .. Well do it by the end of my first term as President of the United States.
Unfortunately, the experts working for Medicares actuary have (yet again[1]) reported that in its first 10 years, Obamacare will boost health spending by roughly $621 billion above the amounts Americans would have spent without this misguided law.
What this means for a typical family of four
$621 billion is a pretty eye-glazing number. Most readers will find it easier to think about how this number translates to a typical American familythe very family candidate Obama promised would see $2,500 in annual savings as far as the eye could see. So I have taken the latest year-by-year projections, divided by the projected U.S. population to determine the added amount per person and multiplied the result by 4.
Interactive Guide: What Will Obamacare Cost You?
Simplistic? Maybe, but so too was the Presidents campaign promise. And this approach allows us to see just how badly that promise fell short of the mark. Between 2014 and 2022, the increase in national health spending (which the Medicare actuaries specifically attribute to the law) amounts to $7,450 per family of 4.
Obama's 2009 Promise Of Cheaper Healthcare Has Morphed Into 2013 Price Hikes
Don't Be Fooled, ObamaCare Will Drive Up Unemployment And Healthcare Costs
The Coming Liberation: Health Care For All Without Obamacare
No, Obamacare Is Not A Good Deal For Young People In The Long Run, Not Even Close
Let us hope this family hasnt already spent or borrowed the $22,500 in savings they might have expected over this same period had they taken candidate Obamas promise at face value. In truth, no well-informed American ever should have believed this absurd promise. At the time, Factcheck.org charitably deemed this claim as overly optimistic, misleading and, to some extent, contradicted by one of his own advisers.
The Washington Post less charitably awarded it Two Pinocchios (Significant omissions or exaggerations). Yet rather than learn from his mistakes, President Obama on July 16, 2012 essentially doubled-down on his promise, assuring small business owners your premiums will go down. He made this assertion notwithstanding the fact that in three separate reports between April 2010 and June 2012, the Medicare actuaries had demonstrated that the ACA would increase health spending. To its credit, the Washington Post dutifully awarded the 2012 claim Three Pinocchios (Significant factual error and/or obvious contradictions.)
The past is not prologue: The burden increases ten-fold in 2014
As it turns out, the average family of 4 has only had to face a relatively modest burden from Obamacare over the past four yearsa little over $125. Unfortunately, this years average burden ($66) will be 10 times as large in 2014 when Obamacare kicks in for earnest. And it will rise for two years after that, after which it hit a steady-state level of just under $800 a year. Of course, all these figures are in nominal dollars. In terms of todays purchasing power, this annual amount will rise steadily.
But what happened to the spending slowdown?
Some readers may recall that a few months ago, there were widespread reports of a slow-down in health spending. Not surprisingly, the White House has been quick to claim credit for the slowdown in health spending documented in the health spending projections report, arguing that it is good for families, jobs and the budget.
On this blog, Avik Roy pointed out that a) since passage of Obamacare, U.S. health spending actually had risen faster than in OECD countries, whereas prior to the law, the opposite was true. Moreover, to the degree that U.S. health spending was slowing down relative to its own recent past, greater cost-sharing was likely to be the principal explanation. Medicares actuarial experts confirm that the lions share of the slowdown in health spending could be chalked up to slow growth in the economy and greater cost-sharing. As AEI scholar Jim Capretta pithily puts it:
An important takeaway from these new projections is that the CMS Office of the Actuary finds no evidence to link the 2010 health care law to the recent slowdown in health care cost escalation. Indeed, the authors of the projections make it clear that the slowdown is not out of line with the historical link between health spending growth and economic conditions (emphasis added).
In the interests of fair and honest reporting, perhaps it is time the mainstream media begin using Affordable Care Act whenever reference is made to this terribly misguided law. Anyone obviously is welcome to quarrel with the Medicare actuary about their numbers. I myself am hard-put to challenge their central conclusion: Obamacare will not save Americans one penny now or in the future. Perhaps the next time voters encounter a politician making such grandiose claims, they will learn to watch their wallet. Until then, lets spare strapped Americans from having to find $657 in spare change between their couch cushions next year. Lets delay this law for a year so that policymakers have time to fix the poorly designed Rube Goldberg device known as Obamacare.
For a nation with the most complicated and expensive health system on the planet, making it even more complicated and even more expensive never was a good idea.
Igor Volsky at ThinkProgress has declared this article is totally wrong. Center for Budget and Policy Priorities Paul Van de Water described this calculation as one of the stupidest things hes read in a long time asserting that Ive calculated an average that doesnt mean anything for anyone.
To his credit, MIT economist Jonathan Gruber at least concedes my basic point: The bottom line is that the government has consistently reported that Obamacare will raise national health spending by about 1 to 2 percent. But then goes on to say This is a small fraction of the typical 5 to 7 percent annual growth rate in health care and is a small price to pay for insuring 30 million or more Americans.
Notably absent from Mr. Volskys scathing critique is any mention of the person who started this use of a typical American family: President Obama. Most important, Professor Grubers point essentially substantiates my own: it was the Presidents claim of $2500 premium savings for the typical family that was and continues to be totally wrong.
Its simply not possible for national health spending to rise by $621 billion and for the typical family to expect a $2500 (per year!!!!) premium reduction. Did Paul Van de Water or anyone else at CBPP call candidate Obamas promise one of the stupidest things hes read in a long time? If not, why not?
People are welcome to argue that Obamacare is a great deal, that its worth all that added spending to get extra coverage for tens of millions of Americans. But of course, thats not how Obamacare was sold. Rather than tell Americans the truth that theyd have to pay more and that the extra price was worth it, candidate Obama promised the ultimate free lunch: well cover 30 million uninsured AND the typical family will see their premiums go down by $2500 (per year!!!!).
And Jonathan Gruber seems to have changed his tune since the fierce debates about health reform, since as Avik Roy has recounted, What we know for sure, Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber told Ezra Klein in 2009, is that [the bill] will lower the cost of buying non-group health insurance.
Obamacare was sold on the promise that it would not increase health spending or the deficit or increase taxes on families making less than $250,000 a year [I can make a firm pledge under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes.]
Every one of these promises/claims/predictions turned out to be totally wrong. We can start having a productive debate when progressives are willing to concede these simple, easily demonstrable empirical claims. And then perhaps we can move on to junking this unworkable law and replacing it with the world-class patient-centered health system Americans deserve.
Wonkette is the latest to weigh in on the purported stupidity of my post: In other words, this is incredibly stupid. Sure, the latest Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services report [PDF] says that Obamacare will lead to roughly $621 billion in additional health spending over the next ten years. But that emphatically does not mean that you, me, and the other two members of our typical family will be paying this money out of pocket. Most of it will be paid out by insurance companies, who will have a whole bunch of new policyholders because of Obamacare.
Much of it will be paid by the government in subsidies and increased Medicaid enrollment. And yes, some of it will be paid by healthy (for now), well-off (for now) young (for now!) people who would otherwise forgo insurance and roll the dice on not ever being carted to the hospital in an ambulance (emphasis added).
Wonkettes attitude about the $621B illustrates precisely the attitude that has led to the mess were in (both related to Obamacare specifically, and entitlements more generally). Dont worry. Families wont have to pay the tab. Well stick it to greedy insurance companies or Uncle Sam will cover it. No problem!
But of course, we can be pretty certain that insurance companies (especially if they are greedy!) are unlikely to be paying for any tab without turning around and passing that cost along to (gasp!) American families. Similarly, Uncle Sam has nowhere else but American families to keep replenishing tax coffers.
In short, American families manifestly WILL be absorbing every single penny of the $621B in added health spending created by Obamacare and it is intellectually disingenuous (and certainly no contribution to informed public debate) to pretend otherwise.
Avik Roy at NRO has done a splendid job of explaining the genesis of President Obamas original estimate of $2500 savings for the typical family. Its essentially identical to the method used for my own calculation. Aviks post also includes a very entertaining montage of the number of times President Obama made this claim. I encouraged anyone interested in actually understanding this issue to read his piece.
Footnotes
[1] The Medicare actuary first issued a report carefully estimating the cost impact of Obamacare on April 22, 2010. Its annual national health expenditure projections reports for 2010, 2011 and 2012 all have contained tabulations showing that Obamacare will increase health spending over the next 10 years compared to a counterfactual scenario in which the law was never enacted.
Sep 24, 2013 23:06:08 #
What is truly sad is the fact there are 40% of the electorate which are termed "low information voters" that think and will support obamacare regardless of the evidence it will indeed be a Train Wreck!
Sep 24, 2013 23:57:52 #
Jakebrake wrote:
What is truly sad is the fact there are 40% of the electorate which are termed "low information voters" that think and will support obamacare regardless of the evidence it will indeed be a Train Wreck!
These low information parasites have no dog in the hunt as they pay little or no taxes. They have little reason to turn down handouts their Progressive sponsors loot from the productive through government force. Only those with integrity would not support the theft.
Sep 25, 2013 00:21:51 #
gmcase wrote:
These low information parasites have no dog in the hunt as they pay little or no taxes. They have little reason to turn down handouts their Progressive sponsors loot from the productive via through government force. Only those with integrity would not support the theft.
Agreed! :thumbup:
Sep 25, 2013 00:51:46 #
Jakebrake wrote:
What is truly sad is the fact there are 40% of the electorate which are termed "low information voters" that think and will support obamacare regardless of the evidence it will indeed be a Train Wreck!
I agree with you completely Jake; But you know, even though I strongly oppose it, I can easily understand why the people who are getting "freebies" go along with this nonsense, but there are a lot of "otherwise normal, intelligent people" who are convinced that everything Obama does, must be "right", simply because he's a Democrat, and they're Democrats.
And there's something else to think about; I've been doing a LOT of reading from dozens of different sources; and many of them are saying the same thing.........the liberals will leave no stone unturned to "influence" anyone who will listen; they have more "underhanded methods" than most people even realize; there are a LOT of websites with forums; (just like UHH, this one) they realize that a LOT of people read and post on these forums; so one of the lib's "underhanded tricks" is to have well educated, PAID "shills", trolls, or what ever you want to call them, hang out on every forum and constantly spread their liberal garbage. Keeping this in mind, take a close look at the people you see making post after post after post.......always spouting the libertardian BS; I won't even mention any names.......I'm pretty sure I don't even have to.......I think it's pretty obvious!
Sep 25, 2013 01:33:36 #
Gitzo UH wrote:
I agree with you completely Jake; But you know, e... (show quote)
I strongly believe a few of these trolls or shills reside here in UHH. It is not hard to figure out who they are. Nobody could really believe the nonsense they spew.
Sep 25, 2013 07:40:23 #
My employer provides 100% healthcare coverage for us--even reimburses up to $1200/year of co-pays. They are 100% self-insured with Blue Cross Blue Shield handling the plan administration, which they pay them a hefty fee for. Now we are told that, in order for them to keep providing our current plan after Oct. 1, they will have to pay a $85,000 fine for not insuring us on one of the exchanges. It would be $300,000 if they tried to insure us through our old commercial plan with BCBS(again, outside of the exchanges).
Sep 25, 2013 07:46:31 #
Both sides have the paid trolls and I'm not bashful, it's obvious that Gitmo is one of the paid shills...
Sep 25, 2013 08:39:38 #
Gitmo can only cut and paste, he cannot form his own opinion. Perfect example of a SHEEPLE! I wish he could come up with something on his own except insults.
wrr wrote:
Both sides have the paid trolls and I'm not bashful, it's obvious that Gitmo is one of the paid shills...
Sep 25, 2013 08:49:09 #
kcornman wrote:
My employer provides 100% healthcare coverage for ... (show quote)
Yup....probably be right there with ya. This is what I am hearing might happen to us.
It will be a no-brainer what will happen next.
Sep 25, 2013 09:09:10 #
wrr wrote:
Both sides have the paid trolls and I'm not bashful, it's obvious that Gitmo is one of the paid shills...
You must be one from the other side. :-(
Sep 25, 2013 09:28:54 #
Gitzo UH wrote:
WASHINGTON, DC - MARCH 26: br Ron Kirby holds a ... (show quote)
Logorrhea. You can look it up. . . .
Sep 25, 2013 11:32:09 #
Obamacare was,is, and always will be just another manifestation of Obama's wealth redistribution scheme to remake the USA economy in his image. I believe we have passed the tipping point for changing the U.S. economy from Capitalism to Socialism, and there is no mystery how this is changing the very fabric of our society. We have many examples throughout the world of how this change will ultimately effect us as a country, and those examples portend that the results will not be healthy for the USA. It's hard for anyone to deny that our country has been in a decline relative to our past history and the rest of the world, ever since the Democrat Party has assumed control of our Congress. Will it change anytime soon? No, I don't think so. There are now too many people in the USA that have found that Government Benefits are actually preferable to working for a living, and will vote to continue the policy's promoting government assistance whether or not one really needs it.
Sep 25, 2013 12:59:27 #
Jakebrake wrote:
What is truly sad is the fact there are 40% of the electorate which are termed "low information voters" that think and will support obamacare regardless of the evidence it will indeed be a Train Wreck!
The Affordable Care Act is going to save lives and legacies. Lives because of the health screenings and legacies because the individuals' personal wealth can be saved for their progeny instead of going to pay for necessary care.
Sep 25, 2013 13:31:06 #
bvm
Loc: Glendale, Arizona
In true democRAT fashion, all the assets of KW, Rix prix and ole sarg and their ilk should be confiscated and redistributed among the less fortunate.
They have used the tax system for all these years to accumulate, so it sounds, mass amounts of wealth.
I mean, after all it's only fair, isn't it?
They seem to be economic preppers, who used every way to take advantage of the masses for their own enrichment.
They thrive on chaos, and when it hits the fan will probably move to Belize.
They have used the tax system for all these years to accumulate, so it sounds, mass amounts of wealth.
I mean, after all it's only fair, isn't it?
They seem to be economic preppers, who used every way to take advantage of the masses for their own enrichment.
They thrive on chaos, and when it hits the fan will probably move to Belize.
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