More evidence Obamacare is a nightmare for taxpayers
In October, the Obama administration acknowledged that the portion of Obamacare that contributed the most deficit “reduction” — the CLASS Act, which created a new long-term care entitlement and allegedly was going to reduce deficits by $86 billion between 2012 and 2021 — was unworkable. The House this month voted to repeal the law, while the White House seeks a way to fix it. But the clear bottom line was that more than two-thirds of the $124 billion in promised deficit “savings” during these 10 years was unlikely ever to materialize.
Now, President Obama’s new budget finishes off the always-ludicrous notion that he could create a new, $1 trillion-a-decade entitlement and somehow reduce deficits. Avik Roy reports at Forbes:
The White House’s fiscal year 2013 budget adds $111 billion in exchange spending between 2014 and 2021, with even more spending to come in future years. … In 2021 alone, the difference between the two budgets is almost $20 billion, implying that exchange spending will be up by over $200 billion in the decade following 2021.
For the math-challenged: Subtracting $86 billion and $111 billion from an alleged deficit reduction of $124 billion equals a deficit increase of $73 billion. And this is the best-case scenario, as Roy goes on to explain:
If businesses do what the new health law clearly incentivizes them to do, exchange spending could be up by over $2 trillion in the decade following 2021.
The incentive to which Roy refers is the fact that Obamacare makes it relatively cheaper for employers to dump their health coverage, pay a fine and let employees use federal subsidies to buy health insurance in the federally mandated exchanges.
The costs for the most reckless piece of federal law in at least a generation only continue to rise, just as all of us who opposed Obamacare predicted. And the forecasts are only going to get worse with each passing year, if only because we are now burning through the years when Obamacare front-loaded new tax revenues before really adding new spending; that was another of the budgetary ruses Democrats used to create the fiction that Obamacare was fiscally responsible.
It is increasingly clear that taking the law completely off the books is the only way to avoid a true fiscal catastrophe.
– By Kyle Wingfield
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296 comments Add your comment
Dusty
March 5th, 2012
2:36 pm
Dear Mark V
Unfortunately, it has not worked out that more people mean more government money. In our country, 50% of the population pay no taxes. That has gone up considerattly from the past. It will probably get even greater in non payers with population increases.
China, with its government healthcare provided by its communist government is now putting brakes on the population growth. They have put a legal limit on the number of children in one family and I believe the limit is two. Maybe one. Even with all their land and resources, they have found that they cannot afford growth in population.
Some smaller countries in Europe are advancing towards bankruptcy. Greece, Spain & Portugal are cutting back and I am sure government healthcare is under scrutiny. They cannot afford it.
There is no such thing as cheap healthcare. It is either good or it is inefficient and unprofessionally provided. I am against “cheap” and want good healthcare.
ObamaCare is neither cheap nor good. We must find other options that work in a democratic republic.
MarkV
March 5th, 2012
2:43 pm
Dusty @2:36 pm
Dusty,
You have made a number of points, which are worth discussing. They have nothing to do with what you originally wrote about the size of the country. While I would prefer that you simply admitted that you had made a blunder, at least you have stopped making that bad argument. As Kyle once graciously wrote to me when I made a blunder – and admitted it -, “it happens to the best of us.”
I have to leave for a while, but will try to respond to you points a little later.
DannyX
March 5th, 2012
2:45 pm
“Do liberals ever tell their children that an item is not affordable?”
That’s hysterical Linda. Keep ‘em coming!
Medicare Part D was FREE!!!
The two wars were FREE!!!
The Bush tax cuts paid for themselves!
The Dept of Homeland Security FREE!!!
Defense spending FREE!!!
Oil subsidies FREE!!!
Dusty
March 5th, 2012
2:48 pm
Linda,
Keep telling ‘em about the national debt. It is almost as though some people go brain dead when “the debt” is mentioned..
But it is there, big and looming, and how anyone can overlook it is beyond me. But they do!!! And they sound like Democrats!
HDB
March 5th, 2012
2:51 pm
Lil’ Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
March 5th, 2012
1:30 pm
“Your thesis is that trickle down doesn’t work, but if it did that Republican voters wouldn’t vote Republican.”
You’re half right! My thesis IS that trickle-down doesn’t work (it doesn’t)….and because it DOESN’T, those who persistently vote GOP are voting AGAINST their best interests! (That’s what I implied!! You can’t read an implied statement??)
…and I went to BOTH public and private (Catholic) schools……
Linda
March 5th, 2012
2:55 pm
DannyX@2:45, Do liberals ever tell their children that nothing is “free?”
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
March 5th, 2012
2:58 pm
Why do liberals not understand that the US is broke?
—————
Because they’re self-absorbed idiots who don’t know how a red rubber ball works, much less an economy.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
March 5th, 2012
3:01 pm
Nice try, HDB, but we already read your earlier post.
I win.
Dusty
March 5th, 2012
3:02 pm
DannyX
You listed three items that were for the defense of our country. Do you want Americans to protect and fight for our freedom or just yawn and say nobody is going to bother us?
Did 9/11 mean nothing to you ? Do you enjoy running down our armed forces fighting for us? Did you want Obama to tell the SEALS to drop their guns, forget Osama and come home? Do you want more airliners & passengers blown to bits?
I guess you’d rather have “free” healthcare more than protecting our country. You certainly act like it..
I get really tired of such tripe. Our military people are out there fighting and you sit here griping about the cost. How about working on the costliest president we have ever had who continues to enlarge our debts. Now THAT is a worry.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
March 5th, 2012
3:05 pm
Trickle-down created 16 million jobs during our President Reagan’s eight years.
Obama’s communist scheming has destroyed a million jobs in three-plus years.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jobs_created_during_U.S._presidential_terms
Ernest T. Bass
March 5th, 2012
3:09 pm
Clearly we cant have universal healthcare. I mean look at this list of rouge nations that have universal healthcare and how long they have been doing it!! Clearly we here in the United States know best.
Its why out of the 33 so called first would countries we are the only one who doesn’t.
Forget the fact that the countries with Universal Healthcare all have lower rates of heart disease, diabetes, infant mortality and that their life expectancy is longer. Means nothing.
Also forget the number of Americans who go abroad in search of healthcare. Americans may Mary Canadian citizens all the time so that they don’t go broke trying to pay for healthcare in this country. But ignore all that.
Our system is clearly better. The HMO’s and Insurance companies here have told me so.
Country Start Date of Universal Health Care System Type
Click links for more source material on each country’s health care system.
Norway 1912 Single Payer
New Zealand 1938 Two Tier
Japan 1938 Single Payer
Germany 1941 Insurance Mandate
Belgium 1945 Insurance Mandate
United Kingdom 1948 Single Payer
Kuwait 1950 Single Payer
Sweden 1955 Single Payer
Bahrain 1957 Single Payer
Brunei 1958 Single Payer
Canada 1966 Single Payer
Netherlands 1966 Two-Tier
Austria 1967 Insurance Mandate
United Arab Emirates 1971 Single Payer
Finland 1972 Single Payer
Slovenia 1972 Single Payer
Denmark 1973 Two-Tier
Luxembourg 1973 Insurance Mandate
France 1974 Two-Tier
Australia 1975 Two Tier
Ireland 1977 Two-Tier
Italy 1978 Single Payer
Portugal 1979 Single Payer
Cyprus 1980 Single Payer
Greece 1983 Insurance Mandate
Spain 1986 Single Payer
South Korea 1988 Insurance Mandate
Iceland 1990 Single Payer
Hong Kong 1993 Two-Tier
Singapore 1993 Two-Tier
Switzerland 1994 Insurance Mandate
Israel 1995 Two-Tier
United States 2014 Insurance Mandate
Ernest T. Bass
March 5th, 2012
3:11 pm
How about working on the costliest president we have ever had who continues to enlarge our debts.
That would be Reagan by a long shot. No one has even come close since.
Did 9/11 mean nothing to you ?
It meant alot. I was glad to see Obama get OBL after Bush spent 8 years playing in the sand in Iraq.
Ted
March 5th, 2012
3:14 pm
Just a monthly shout out to the coward Mike Luckovich for accepting no comments, ever, on his political opinions, expressed as cartoons. He can dish it out, but he can’t take it. Here’s to Bookman, Galloway and Wingfield for accepting feedback.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
March 5th, 2012
3:14 pm
Ernest, guess what else every country on your list has in common? They all have economies smaller than that of the U.S.
1961_Xer
March 5th, 2012
3:16 pm
Kyle wrote: More evidence Obamacare is a nightmare for taxpayers
That automatically means that those who don’t pay federal income taxes ( 49.x% of wage earners, their families, and the myriad of folks who don’t work) simply will not care until this law sets off a Greek-like debt crisis in the U.S.
The biggest justification for this law was to save money. That makes whole premise of Obamacare a lie.
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
March 5th, 2012
3:18 pm
Ernest T. Bass:
Greece 1983 Insurance Mandate
United States 2014 Insurance Mandate
——————–
Hmm…
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
March 5th, 2012
3:19 pm
Ernest T. Bass, how come no African countries on your list?
HDB
March 5th, 2012
3:23 pm
Universal health care and national health insurance were first proposed by U.S President Theodore Roosevelt, a Republican! Why is it that when a Democrat pushes forward a Republican initiative that the GOP gets apoplectic?? Why does the GOP run away from THEIR own ideas???
Lil' Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
March 5th, 2012
3:25 pm
Our President Reagan added a mere $1.8 trillion to the national debt in eight years.
Your Idiot Klown Obozo has already added $4.6 trillion in three-plus years.
Obozo: Inferior to our President Reagan.
Linda
March 5th, 2012
3:29 pm
Social Security & Medicare started off the same way as Obamacare, with the camel’s nose under the tent. Social Security was intended to give some protection to 30 million citizens. The life expectancy in 1934 was 58 for men & 62 for women. It was insurance if people lived “too long,” that is, past 65. People are living so long now that they receive more in benefits than they paid into it in taxes. Too bad congress spent every dime in the trust fund, which is now composed of chits, that is, little pieces of paper with IOU written across the front.
It’s difficult to find anyone in their 20’s or 30’s who expects to receive a dime from social security. Young people call govt. programs Social Insecurity, Medi-uncare & Obama-uncare.
Dusty
March 5th, 2012
3:29 pm
Mr. Bass,
If President Reagan raised a big debt he did so with the population supporting him. He is still known as one of our outstanding presidents. If you can justify a debt, perhaps it is easier to work on it. We have none of that support now and the debt keeps getting bigger and bigger.
You can thank President Bush for fighting against terrorism and having troops in the Middle East where they found Osama. Without that preparation and accomplishments, Osama would still be sitting in Pakistan.
Fortunately, we had a president who could look to the future at 9/11 and work on our protection immediately and in the future. That was George W. Bush. Obama is still following up on most of Bush’s endeavors. They are the best moves Obama has made.
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:34 pm
“Universal health care and national health insurance were first proposed by U.S President Theodore Roosevelt, a Republican!”
He was a one term president.
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:35 pm
Ernest T. ass
How many of those countries have the same population as the US?
ZERO.
Some of those countries are going bankrupt.
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:36 pm
“I was glad to see Obama get OBL after Bush spent 8 years playing in the sand in Iraq.”
Without Bush, Obozo wouldn’t have gotten OBL.
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:37 pm
HDB
Don’t you have some white people to go after?
Dusty
March 5th, 2012
3:40 pm
HDB
We don’t care who “initiated” health care.
What we “care” about is ObamaCare. It is an overboard, poorly planned, illegal, expensive, inefficient, non-medical tool, with discriminatory loopholes, and nothing but political fodder from an inexperienced President with an inept administration.
That is why we care enough to get rid of the biggest boondoggle to ever be imposed upon Americans.
HDB
March 5th, 2012
3:44 pm
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:37 pm
You’re close enough……
HDB
March 5th, 2012
3:46 pm
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:36 pm
Without Bush screwing things up and getting paid off by the bin Ladens, Obama wouldn’t have had to go after OBL……but Obama got OBL when Bush couldn’t…….
That’s the correct statement….
Dusty
March 5th, 2012
3:47 pm
Well, a word for MarkV when he returns.
The larger the country the larger the propulation The larger the population the more people needing healthcare. That’s the connection.
Later……
HDB
March 5th, 2012
3:50 pm
Lil’ Barry Bailout (Unexpectedly Revised Downward)
March 5th, 2012
3:25 pm
“Your Idiot Klown Obozo has already added $4.6 trillion in three-plus years.
Just remember what the last act in the circus is — the clean up crew—–they have to clean up the s#!t that the elephants leave behind!! Just like Obama is having to do after Bush’s departure….and claning up a toxic dump costs!!
Dusty
March 5th, 2012
3:52 pm
“Bush getting paid off by the bin ladens”
ding ding ding ..Call the guys in the white coats. There’s another one loose! Bye bye HDB….
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:53 pm
“Without Bush screwing things up and getting paid off by the bin Ladens, Obama wouldn’t have had to go after OBL……but Obama got OBL when Bush couldn’t…….”
??????????????????????
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:54 pm
“Just like Obama is having to do after Bush’s departure’
Except for the fact that he hasn’t cleaned anything up. The debt is much higher, we’re still in a few wars, he didn’t close Gitmo, his health care bill is massively unpopular…
Dont’ let the facts get in the way of your lies, Jesse Jackson.
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:55 pm
HDB
Speaking of the Saudis. Here’s your boy bowing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WlqW6UCeaY
HDB
March 5th, 2012
3:58 pm
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
3:54 pm
More is getting cleaned up than you think…….and here’s Bush kissing the Saudi prince:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/911review/293457625/
Linda
March 5th, 2012
3:58 pm
The Central & Eastern European (CEE) Healthcare is in financial crises. It “…treathens to expose patients to inferior & inadequate services…evermore unsustainable govt. budgets & highlights the necessity of bringing down public expenditure…leading to citizens paying more for their healthcare…whilst services in the future will probably deteriorate regardless…unhappy & underpaid (medical) staff…refusing to work…”
New ways of providing healthcare includes privatization.
http://www.stockholm-network.org/downloads/publications/Weathering_the_Storm.pdf
Why do we want to head down the same path?
tiberius your lightning rod of hate!
March 5th, 2012
3:59 pm
Anybody who knows history will tell you Teddy Roosevelt was no Republican in the way he governed.
But people would rather look at labels instead of actual facts.
MarkV
March 5th, 2012
4:06 pm
Dusty @2:36 pm
Dear Dusty
I do not like to, but I have to remind you again (and again, and again) that when I write an argument, I am making only that argument, and not implying something else. Also, that to the great discomfort of people like Tiberius I try to express exactly what I have in mind, and I expect the same from others. Without that, in my view a rational discussion is impossible.
I am making these points because, as I read you post, it is immediately clear that I could divide your points into those that do not make much sense because of the way you have written them, those that I do not dispute but also find irrelevant, and those that I agree with.
Let me show you what I mean.
“Unfortunately, it has not worked out that more people mean more government money.”
That is apparently still in response to my point about the country size, my point that “the more taxpayers, the more taxpayer money available.” Disputing my statement defies common sense and facts. Not only when we compare different countries. Do you want to dispute that as our population has been increasing, the tax receipts of the government generally increase?
As for the second kind, the example are your two paragraphs starting with “China, with its government healthcare…” and ending ….Greece, Spain & Portugal are cutting back and I am sure government healthcare is under scrutiny. They cannot afford it.” I do not dispute any of that. I also do not find it relevant to the discussion.
Then you wrote the following: “There is no such thing as cheap healthcare. It is either good or it is inefficient and unprofessionally provided. I am against “cheap” and want good healthcare.” I could not agree with you more.
And your final point: “ObamaCare is neither cheap nor good. We must find other options that work in a democratic republic.” That is a point I neither agree nor disagree, because it uses words that are relative. Cheap or not cheap compared with what? Good or not good compared with what? If you are argue that it should be cheaper and better than it is, I agree. It is “the other options” that are in dispute.
Dusty
March 5th, 2012
4:12 pm
Good grief,
What do we get here next? A picture of Clinton and Monica Lewinsky in fond embrace?
Cut it out, guys. There may be children present.
Linda
March 5th, 2012
4:17 pm
The liberals’ cure-all is to raise taxes, raise taxes on the rich, raise taxes on the oil companies, raise taxes on dead people, raise taxes on the fat cats (dead or alive), raise taxes on corporations, etc.
Well, they got their wish! Obama’s new budget raises taxes on all of the above, everyone & everything he’s been demonizing for the last 3 years! It increases personal income tax revenues from $1.1 T to $1.9 T (up 70%)! It increases corporate income tax revenues from $236 B to $473 B (up 142%). It reduces the deficit by $848 B by not spending money we had not planned to spend anyway.
There’s still a few problems. His budget does not pay DOWN the debt. It increases the debt from $16.3 T to $21.3 T (up 30%).
I told you so. There will NEVER be enough taxes. If everybody sent ALL their money to DC, it would be spent by Memorial Day.
When the Democratic senate voted on Obama’s budget last year, it was 0-97. Reid was so embarrassed that he is refusing to even vote on this new one. What a waste of trees for the paper it was printed on.
Scooter
March 5th, 2012
4:21 pm
The American people should know entitlement programs are sold by politicians and they most always end up being budget busters. We’ve known for some time that Social Security and Medicaid are financial albatrosses around our necks, but we let The Obama create a new entitlement without fixing any others, shame on us!
Jefferson
March 5th, 2012
4:22 pm
Voting to not raise taxes on principal gets nothing accomplished.
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
4:36 pm
This is about the best biz to be in right now under the Obama administration.
http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/Texas-Gun-Sales-Boom-141366763.html
Do what??????
March 5th, 2012
4:36 pm
“and here’s Bush kissing the Saudi prince:”
You do realize that Obama is president NOW, right?
Linda
March 5th, 2012
4:39 pm
Most self-employed people have health care insurance that is designed like auto insurance. Their health insurance is for illness like auto insurance is for losses.
Routine doctor visits cost $65 cash. Blood work at Any Tests cost $35. Prescriptions cost $4. Mammigrams cost less than brake shoes.
If more people had catastrophic health insurance, our health care costs would decrease. If primary care physicians could work on a cash basis with no insurance staff, their savings could be passed on the consumer.
Michael H. Smith
March 5th, 2012
4:43 pm
Wouldn’t argue with what you’ve said in regards to riding ourselves of “obumerCare” Kyle but then what do we do about healthcare services and healthcare insurance?
Going back to the previous hodgepodge status quo is very ill advised in my opinion for a number of reasons that have nothing to do with Fair Share, Fairness, serving Social Justice or any of the usual slobbering tripe bantered about on these blog by the partisan Marxists and corporate Corporatists in cahoots with the medical establishment, as I continue to be one of those who says it is not an either, or proposition, it is a neither, nor preclusion of all of these power hungry groupies approach that only robs “the individual” of the sustainable liberty and affordable choice in healthcare services and healthcare insurance.
On this issue, it is past time for the Republicans in this State to get their act together and get’er done seeing as how the democrats never did in over a 100 years!
Dusty
March 5th, 2012
4:45 pm
Dear MarkV
No need to explain your manner of discussion.
Show me the facts that we are taking in more tax money with increased population when only 50% are paying taxes when a larger percentage of people were paying taxes before that. Show me I am wrong.
China, Spain, Portugal & Greece are EXAMPLES of countries where increased population and/or poor economies have caused subsidized healthcare problems. I was discussing population vs healthcare therefore those examples.
Cheap applied to any subject means poor in quality. That is my conclusion on ObamaCare and I have already mentioned why…
Good as applied to healthcare means professional, responsible, trained personnel and facilities which are clean, adequate and scientifically prepared.
May I ask if you are new to the English language? You do not seem to know many meanings nor any of the connotations of many words. You misunderstand words that have more than one meaning. I don’t think it is intentional. But I wonder why that happens.
Michael H. Smith
March 5th, 2012
4:54 pm
Linda
March 5th, 2012
4:39 pm
All the things you cite could be done a couple of times better and probably cheaper if businesses and individuals could set up healthcare co-ops independent of government control and several regulations (federal and state), in this State. And I’m not talking about that ridiculousness high risk pool garbage that is nothing but a rip-off scheme that will not bend the cost curve Dr. Price (as you well know it cannot).
I’m all for options and not very cordial to mandates.
Linda
March 5th, 2012
4:59 pm
MarkV@1:06, “The more taxpayers, the more taxpayer money available.”
Hey, liberal women, Mark is trying to take away your “free” contraception coverage so we can have more babies that grow up & become taxpayers so the government can have even more money to spend. You will just have to be satisfied with “free” windshield wiper blades from Obama.
Michael H. Smith
March 5th, 2012
5:02 pm
One other thing I’m sure you know Linda is that some prescription medicines are free of charge, at places like Publix. Furthermore if drug re-importation and bulk purchase were allowed instead of prohibited, drugs cost would again be lowered, in many cases significantly. But Big Pharma has bought off both political parties to protect their market share and profits.