Unholy Vow Posted 06:41 PM ET
ObamaCare: The president swore his health care overhaul wouldn't cause any American to lose insurance coverage. Once again, that statement has been shown to be an empty promise. Some might even call it a lie.
'If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan," President Obama said in August 2009 at a New Hampshire town hall meeting. Yet today, years before ObamaCare is fully implemented, small businesses are already reporting that their employees' health plans have been, or will soon be, dropped.
According to a new survey by the National Federation of Independent Businesses, 12% of small companies have been told by their insurers in the last year that their health plans have been or will be terminated and "will not be available in the future."
This doesn't mean their workers will be losing insurance. The survey indicates that little change is expected in the number of small-business that provide health care insurance.
What has changed, and will change, are the types of plans the workers will be offered. The NFIB says this is "the first major impact" of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act "on the small-business population." The result is a government-instituted limit on choice.
While one in eight small businesses say they expect their employee plans will be eliminated, nearly one in five (19.6%) say they anticipate making "major changes" in their plans when they come up for renewal.
More than a third (35%) of those expecting to make changes said the shifts will include reduced benefits and greater financial contributions from their workers.
The NFIB didn't ask these companies why they expect to make major changes. Nor did the group ask why reduced benefits and more cost-sharing will be the biggest differences.
But it's reasonable to assume that the many mandates in ObamaCare that will increase employers' costs are causing these businesses to rethink their plans.
As Richard Foster, chief actuary of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, noted last year in his report on ObamaCare: "Some smaller employers would be inclined to terminate their existing coverage" due to perverse incentives in the law.
Can the country believe anything the White House and the Democrats have said about their health care takeover? They've certainly been less than honest in forcing their scheme on a public that didn't — and still doesn't — want it.
If they can't be trusted to tell the truth, there's no reason to trust them to build a health care system that will work. |
