1. "[E]mployers with more than 50 full-time equivalent employees will be charged a penalty for any employees over 30 full-time employees that they don't cover."
2. "[B]ecause of Obamacare, we are going to be cutting front-of-the-house employees to under 30 hours, effective immediately."
Problem solved? No wait, there's more:
3. "Metz said he will add a 5 percent surcharge to customers' bills to offset what he said are the increased costs of Obamacare."
So... In whose pockets does that 5% surcharge wind up then?
Posted by Stephan (Member # 7549) on :
I wonder if he considered shopping other policies. Does the new laws require how much the employer pays?
It Denny's for god sakes, not something we have to eat anyways.
[ November 15, 2012, 03:58 PM: Message edited by: Stephan ]
Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
I'm hoping that the consequences of all the businesses who are cutting their employees' hours to avoid providing them health insurance will prompt a more widespread demand for a public option.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Like the article says, it's merely a political ploy. It's his attempt to get people to see the costs of healthcare with every meal, labeled right before their eyes, regardless of how real or true that figure is. Then they can stomp their feet and blame the president for raising the cost of everything.
My dad keeps throwing a hissy fit about Obamacare. He's the head custodian at a church/private school, and he said rates have skyrocketed since Obamacare was passed, and things are only getting worse.
One of the big failings of Obamacare as it stands seems to be that it's done far more to address coverage than it has to address costs. I know there are the exchanges and a few other cost saving measures, but the fundamental problem remains to be addressed.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Strider: I'm hoping that the consequences of all the businesses who are cutting their employees' hours to avoid providing them health insurance will prompt a more widespread demand for a public option.
Isn't that exactly what the GOP has been accusing Obama of trying to engineer?
If the tax on employee healthcare, the penalty, is less prohibitive than the actual cost of providing care, millions will be dumped into the private market while the government is flush with cash and also a mandate to create a cheaper alternative. The tax thus becomes a backdoor fund for a public option.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
No kidding. Honestly, I wanted Obamacare overturned so we could go back and just do a full-blown, single-payer system. Having insurance is a big step in the right direction of course, and would be very important should something significant happen to me. In the meantime, Obamacare doesn't make me more likely to get preventive care, which strikes me as the main way we could save money on healthcare.
Hobbes Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Frankly I can't understand why the business community hasn't gotten more on board with single payer. Wouldn't it be a boon to them all to suddenly have healthcare payments removed from their spreadsheets? They shell out trillions of dollars for premiums, wouldn't it be easier to just decouple healthcare from employment for their sake?
Especially with the burden they claim Obamacare is, you'd think they'd be CLAMORING for single payer.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
business solutions to obamacare, for business owners
- don't be an ass
(this post is a way lot more serious than it sounds)
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:One of the big failings of Obamacare as it stands seems to be that it's done far more to address coverage than it has to address costs. I know there are the exchanges and a few other cost saving measures, but the fundamental problem remains to be addressed.
That's what you get when Max Baucus, the principal author of the legislation, is completely owned by health insurance and pharmaceutical companies. He also forcefully ruled out singer payer as an option at the start of the process.
Posted by Godric 2.0 (Member # 11443) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Frankly I can't understand why the business community hasn't gotten more on board with single payer. Wouldn't it be a boon to them all to suddenly have healthcare payments removed from their spreadsheets? They shell out trillions of dollars for premiums, wouldn't it be easier to just decouple healthcare from employment for their sake?
Especially with the burden they claim Obamacare is, you'd think they'd be CLAMORING for single payer.
Good point. Is it that they are afraid of higher business taxes then to help fund the single payer option?
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
My opinion of Obamacare is thus: it was absolutely 100% literally the maximum extent of damage control that Congress allowed. Period. Obamacare was the absolute best reform possible. If it was up to the executive entirely, we would have single payer by now.
But we don't and congress sucks and Joe Lieberman was a regressive element that inhibited even the public option. But that's .. uh, 'okay,' overall, because this isn't where it ends. Obamacare is a one-way directional shift. Won't be reversed. We'll continue down the road to single payer.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
I agree with both Samprimary and MrSquicky.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
quote:My opinion of Obamacare is thus: it was absolutely 100% literally the maximum extent of damage control that Congress allowed. Period. Obamacare was the absolute best reform possible. If it was up to the executive entirely, we would have single payer by now.
Wasn't one of the "big differences" between Clinton and Obama in the primaries that she wanted single-payer, and he wanted ... this?
Hobbes Posted by Stephan (Member # 7549) on :
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky:
quote:One of the big failings of Obamacare as it stands seems to be that it's done far more to address coverage than it has to address costs. I know there are the exchanges and a few other cost saving measures, but the fundamental problem remains to be addressed.
That's what you get when Max Baucus, the principal author of the legislation, is completely owned by health insurance and pharmaceutical companies. He also forcefully ruled out singer payer as an option at the start of the process.
What worried me the most was the fact that health insurance companies were not complaining. That told me it was more for them than for us.
We need one system. A public option would be expensive to taxpayers because only those who can't get private insurance would be on it, the high risk. But one big insurance pool should help costs, most people are healthy.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Hobbes:
Wasn't one of the "big differences" between Clinton and Obama in the primaries that she wanted single-payer, and he wanted ... this?
Hobbes [/QUOTE]
The big difference between Clinton and Obama in this regard was that Clinton presided over an era in which the GOP would hypothetically not have blocked anything even remotely like a single payer system.
By the time Obama got to it, the only healthcare reform that he was going to get passed had to go through Lieberman.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Not that Clinton (see "primaries" and "she" references).
Hobbes Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
err, shouldn't have said 'presided.' I mean when she was first lady. Clinton was invested in the healthcare issue quite significantly back then.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Right, but my point was that I'm not convinced Obama wanted single-payer, since he said in his primary run (distinguishing himself from his main competition, so it's not like it was just too radical to say) that he didn't want single-payer.
Hobbes Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Stephan: I wonder if he considered shopping other policies. Does the new laws require how much the employer pays?
It Denny's for god sakes, not something we have to eat anyways.
To answer your question, under the ACA an employer must cover 50% of the employee only coverage.
That usually isn't much. Most employee only plans are between $100-$300 a month, depending on the size and risk pool of the company, as well as the state. If employee only coverage for an employee is $200 and the employee wants to cover their entire family, the employer still only has to pay 50% of the $200, or $100. The employee would have to cover the difference.
Honestly it shouldn't be the companies complaining as much as their employees. Someone needing family coverage may not be able to afford it due to their employer paying 50% of their only Employee only plan. Problem is if they DON'T pay for it, they get fined when they file their taxes. Most of these people probably won't be eligible for the subsidies either.
I think there are some good things in the ACA, I really do. I just think the government was too concerned about getting it passed quickly instead of caring about quality, and I honestly believe that in the long run it will hurt more than help. The good thing is that Congress is already taking action to get rid of some of the horrible things in the bill, such as the new 1099 requirements.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Unsure. I suspect (possibly naively) that he wanted a single payer system.
Posted by theamazeeaz (Member # 6970) on :
As much as the ACA is pooh-poohed, it makes a lot of things that should be illegal, illegal, like the concept of uninsurable children.
I see what we had before the ACA and single payer on the opposite ends of a spectrum. The insurance company system is too entrenched to survive such a blow. Thus the ACA is a large crack in that armor, that will allow single payer to happen.
No one likes to pay more for anything, but paying higher prices because insurance companies can't drop people on their butts as a cost-saving measure, a category that could include me if I ever get cancer, I'm actually okay with paying a bit more.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by theamazeeaz: As much as the ACA is pooh-poohed, it makes a lot of things that should be illegal, illegal, like the concept of uninsurable children.
Pff. What's wrong with fetuses with 'pre-existing conditions?'
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
quote:Unsure. I suspect (possibly naively) that he wanted a single payer system.
If he wanted it, why would he say he didn't want it? I understand a lot of politics operates on the wink-and-a-nod level of communication, but that was, in my memory of it, the biggest difference highlited between him and his main, Democratic competitor.
Hobbes Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Hobbes:
quote:Unsure. I suspect (possibly naively) that he wanted a single payer system.
If he wanted it, why would he say he didn't want it? I understand a lot of politics operates on the wink-and-a-nod level of communication, but that was, in my memory of it, the biggest difference highlited between him and his main, Democratic competitor.
Hobbes
more than just winks-and-nods, it's just a matter of figuring out which etch-a-sketch picture was real.
When Bill Clinton was president, they looked around the world and saw almost everyone had a single payer health care system, and they worked. He turned to his lovely wife and said, "Get this done dear."
The Republicans, supported by doctors who didn't want to become federal employees, who didn't want their investments in education to be undermined by what fees politicians thought they could survive on, and supported by insurance companies who saw their businesses headed to irrelevance, shot her down...hard.
One of their suggestions was to reform the insurance industry so everyone could be given true medical care, and all the medical folks could get paid. The left said, "That market strategy won't work." The right and the medical industries said, "Single payer is inefficient socialism and will never work. Want our support, do it our way."
The Republicans took over the government and said a solid, "No" to anything about healthcare reform.
Eight years passed and a strange thing happened. Health Insurance costs went up. Not only did this leave more and more voters uninsured as their companies dropped insurance, but those companies that kept insurance were not happy that their insurance costs kept going up. One thing insurance provided by your employer is supposed to do is attract good employees and keep the employees you have happy. Instead employers were paying more and more for insurance, and costing their employees more and more to cover part of that insurance. The more they paid the less happy their employees were. Businesses and people wanted something to change.
Then President Obama was elected. He promised to do something about health care. President Obama is a peacemaker, and a Lincoln fan. Instead of imposing a single payer system and forcing the health care industry to support it, he went to them and made deals. What do they want? Everyone enrolled? Fine. What would they give? No ad campaigns attacking the law like they paid for when Mrs. Clinton was pushing her plan? Great. A deal was cut.
Democrats negotiated and made deals, but a growing fear in the Republican quarter set in. If President Obama gets this plan, which was originally suggested by the very conservative Heritage Foundation and based on the successful Mitt Romney plan, were to succeed then the President would have a success. That might make him popular. They plotted to stop him from having any success.
Around the nation right wing radio, pundits, and politicians started attacking Obama-care. They said it wouldn't work. They labeled it as job-destroying. They called it every name in the book. It was no longer about health care. It was about politics.
In some places the media campaign worked. In Missouri 70% of the voters voted against anything to do with Obama-care, and every Republican politician, and several Democratic ones, ran on an anti-Obama-care platform.
That is how we got what we have today.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote: Instead of imposing a single payer system and forcing the health care industry to support it, he went to them and made deals.
You really seriously make it sound like it was just an option he didn't take.
It was completely, legitimately impossible. Like I said, it all hinged entirely on Lieberman, who effectively killed even the Public Option. Obamacare was the distinct maximum possible option for getting through republican obstruction.
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