Many Low-Income Workers Say ‘No’ to Health Insurance

MSN News

Many Low-Income Workers Say ‘No’ to Health Insurance

The New York Times

By STACY COWLEY 6 hrs ago

 

© Logan R. Cyrus for The New York Times An employee at Golden Corral taking clean cups from the kitchen. Some Golden Corral restaurants began offering health insurance to employees, but few have…

 

 JACKSONVILLE, N.C. — When Billy Sewell began offering health insurance this year to 600 service workers at the Golden Corral restaurants that he owns, he wondered nervously how many would buy it. Adding hundreds of employees to his plan would cost him more than $1 million — a hit he wasn’t sure his low-margin business could afford.
His actual costs, though, turned out to be far smaller than he had feared. So far, only two people have signed up.

“We offered, and they didn’t take it,” he said.

Evidence is growing that his experience is not unusual. The Affordable Care Act’s employer mandate, which requires employers with more than 50 full-time workers to offer most of their employees insurance or face financial penalties, was one of the law’s most controversial provisions. Business owners and industry groups fiercely protested the change, and some companies cut workers’ hours to reduce the number of employees who would be eligible.

But 10 months after the first phase of the mandate took effect, covering companies with 100 or more workers, many business owners say they are finding very few employees willing to buy the health insurance that they are now compelled to offer. The trend is especially pronounced among smaller and midsize businesses in fields filled with low-wage hourly workers, like restaurants, retailing and hospitality. (Companies with 50 to 99 workers are not required to comply with the mandate until next year.)

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Government Takeover: White House Forces Obamacare Insurers To Cover Unpaid Patients At A Loss

 

Forbes

Avik Roy, Contributor

Of all of the last-minute delays, website bungles, and Presidential whims that have marred the roll-out of Obamacare’s subsidized insurance exchanges, what happened on Thursday, December 12 will stand as one of the most lawless acts yet committed by this administration. The White House—having canceled Americans’ old health plans, and having botched the system for enrolling people in new ones—knows that millions of Americans will enter the new year without health coverage. So instead of actually fixing the problem, the administration is retroactively attempting to force insurers to hand out free health care—at a loss—to those whom the White House has rendered uninsured. If Obamacare wasn’t a government takeover of the health insurance industry, then what is it now?

On Wednesday afternoon, health policy reporters found in their inboxes a friendly e-mail from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, announcing “steps to ensure Americans signing up through the Marketplace have coverage and access to the care they need on January 1.” Basically, the “steps” involve muscling insurers to provide free or discounted care to those who have become uninsured because of the problems with healthcare.gov.

HHS threatens to throw non-complying plans off the exchanges

HHS assured reporters that it would be “urging issuers to give consumers additional time to pay their first month’s premium and still have coverage beginning January 1, 2014.” In other words, urging them to offer free care to those who haven’t paid. This is a problem because the government has yet to build the system that allows people who’ve signed up for plans to actually pay for them. “One client reports only 15 percent [of applicants] have paid so far,” Bob Laszewski told Charles Ornstein. “So far I’m hearing from health plans that around 5 percent and 10 percent of consumers who have made it through the data transfer gauntlet have paid first month’s premium and therefore truly enrolled,” said Kip Piper.

“What’s wrong with ‘urging’ insurers to offer free care?” you might ask. “That’s not the same as forcing them to offer free care.” Except that the government is using the full force of its regulatory powers, under Obamacare, to threaten insurers if they don’t comply. All you have to do is read the menacing language in the new regulations that HHS published this week, in which HHS says it may throw otherwise qualified health plans off of the exchanges next year if they don’t comply with the government’s “requests.”

“We are considering factoring into the [qualified health plan] renewal process, as part of the determination regarding whether making a health plan available…how [insurers] ensure continuity of care during transitions,” they write. Which is kind of like the Mafia saying that it will “consider” the amount of protection money you’ve paid in its decision as to whether or not it vandalizes your storefront.

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Obamacare Exchanges Claim 258,497 Sign-Ups In November, But No Word On How Many Are Actually Enrolled Avik Roy Contributor

Obama Officials In 2010: 93 Million Americans Will Be Unable To Keep Their Health Plans Under Obamacare Avik Roy Contributor

Medicare Deputy CIO: Somewhere Between '30-40%' Of Obamacare's Exchange Software Has Not Yet Been Built Avik Roy Contributor

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Why Are American Health Care Costs So High?

vlogbrothers


 

Published on Aug 20, 2013

In which John discusses the complicated reasons why the United States spends so much more on health care than any other country in the world, and along the way reveals some surprising information, including that Americans spend more of their tax dollars on public health care than people in Canada, the UK, or Australia. Who's at fault? Insurance companies? Drug companies? Malpractice lawyers? Hospitals? Or is it more complicated than a simple blame game? (Hint: It's that one.)

For a much more thorough examination of health care expenses in America, I recommend this series at The Incidental Economist: http://theincidentaleconomist.com/wor...
The Commonwealth Fund's Study of Health Care Prices in the US: http://www.commonwealthfund.org/~/med...
Some of the stats in this video also come from this New York Times story: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/02/hea...
This is the first part in what will be a periodic series on health care costs and reforms leading up to the introduction of the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, in 2014.

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Chris Wallace Pins Down Ezekiel Emanuel on Obamacare Promises in Blistering Argument - 11/3/13

WeNeedASavageNation


 

Published on Nov 3, 2013

11/3/13 - (Fox News Sunday) - Ezekiel Emanuel, one of the principal architects of the Affordable Care Act, appeared on Fox News Sunday and strongly debated host Chris Wallace and American Enterprise Institute's James Capretta over President Barack Obama's "if you like your plan, you can keep it" pledge. The pugnacious Emanuel so loudly argued over his opponents that Wallace got tongue-tied at one point and told Capretta, "Don't talk while he's interrupting!" Wallace fought back against Emanuel's argument that the grandfather clause, which allows people to keep any insurance policy acquired before March of 2010, was a fulfillment of Obama's promise.

"Your grandfathering is so narrow," Wallace said to Emanuel, "if your insurance company changes your co-pay by more than $5 over the course of the three years since 2010, it's no longer grandfathered in."

"That's usually a 25% change," Emanuel said. "That's a big change...You have to ask the question: how many planks do you change in a boat before it's a different boat? That's the same thing here: we had a plan, we argued about it."

"You didn't tell the American people," Wallace said. "You said, if this plan is in effect until March of 2010, you can keep it."

"That's what it said!" Emanuel said. "That's how we fulfilled that pledge."

Wallace continued to press Emanuel on a variety of issues, including why the government gets to mandate minimum insurance coverage for people who may not need it, and the number of large employers dropping insurance policies, effectively forcing employees onto the federal exchanges. "Simple question," Wallace said to Emanuel. "Are those people going to be able to keep their coverage, as the President promised?"

"The law does not say, 'Sears, drop coverage!'" Emanuel said. "Sears decides what's good for Sears. The law doesn't say to the insurance industry, 'You drop coverage!' The insurance industry decides how to make money. When the private companies decide that they're going to drop people or put them in the exchange, you decide to blame President Obama. He is not responsible for that."

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FSB Extends Too-Big-to-Fail Bank Resolution to Insurance Firms and Australia joins the Bail in Parade

FSB Extends Too-Big-to-Fail Bank Resolution to Insurance Firms

• 

By Carolyn Bandel

August 12, 2013

The Financial Stability Board said an extended version of its guidance on the resolution of systemically important banks will apply to non-bank financial institutions, such as Allianz SE (ALV) and other large insurers.
The Basel, Switzerland-based body set up by the Group of 20 nations has developed “annexes” to its advice for local regulators of financial institutions that aren’t lenders, according to an e-mailed statement today. The FSB asked for responses from market participants by Oct. 15.
The FSB, led by Bank of England Governor Mark Carney, is coordinating the global regulatory response to the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression to prevent a repeat of the turmoil that followed the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and bailout of American International Group Inc.
Read More Here
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26 June 2013

Meeting of the Financial Stability Board in Basel on 24 June

At its meeting in Basel yesterday, the Financial Stability Board (FSB) discussed vulnerabilities affecting the global financial system and progress in authorities' work to strengthen global financial regulation.
Vulnerabilities in the financial system
Despite important progress in strengthening the resilience of the global financial system, some parts of the system remain in a state of incomplete repair. Some jurisdictions need to continue to improve the capitalization of their banking systems. The balance sheet assessment to be undertaken by the ECB later this year in preparation for the single supervisory mechanism, together with clarity on the availability of adequate capital backstops, will be important to strengthening the Eurozone banking system. In other parts of the world where credit growth has been very rapid over recent years, building further resilience remains a priority.
Over the last several weeks, volatility in interest rates, asset prices and capital flows has increased. Market participants and supervisory authorities should incorporate in their stress tests scenarios that involve considerably elevated interest rate risk, widening credit spreads, falls in asset prices, and material volatility in foreign exchange markets and capital flows. Constrained capital levels in banks have been a contributory factor to reduced secondary bond market liquidity, potentially resulting in larger price movements in these markets in times of stress.
Resolution of financial institutions
The FSB approved for public release a set of guidance papers to support the recovery and resolution planning process for systemically important financial institutions. The guidance covers the development of effective resolution strategies, stress scenarios and recovery triggers, and the identification of critical functions. They will be released in July.
The FSB also reviewed Annexes to be added to the FSB Key Attributes of Effective Resolution Regimes on the resolution of financial market infrastructures, the resolution of systemic insurance groups, the protection of client and custody assets in resolution and information sharing among relevant authorities for resolution purposes. These will be issued for public consultation later this summer.
The FSB also agreed to release for public consultation a methodology for assessing the implementation by countries of the Key Attributes of Effective Resolution Regimes. Such a methodology is required for an international standard to be assessed under the IMF and World Bank's FSAP program.
Global Systemically Important Insurers (G-SIIs)
The FSB reviewed the assessment methodology and policy measures for global systemically important insurers, developed by the International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS) taking into account the results of a public consultation. Based on this assessment methodology, the FSB and national authorities, in consultation with the IAIS, will identify an initial list of G-SIIs in July 2013. A decision on the G-SII status of and appropriate risk mitigating measures for, major reinsurers will be made in July 2014.
The policy measures that will apply to G-SIIs include the recovery and resolution planning requirements under the FSB's Key Attributes, enhanced group-wide supervision and higher loss absorbency requirements. As a foundation for higher loss absorbency requirements, the IAIS will as a first step develop straightforward, backstop capital requirements to apply to all group activities, including non-insurance subsidiaries, to be finalized by the time of the G20 Summit in 2014.
Over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives reforms
The FSB discussed progress in the implementation of reforms to OTC derivatives markets. Given the highly international nature of these markets, members stressed the importance and urgency of resolving remaining issues arising from the cross-border application of rules, including to bridge remaining differences between jurisdictions' rules and implementation timetables, ahead of the G20 Summit in early September.
The FSB agreed that global aggregation of trade repository data is essential to enable comprehensive monitoring of risks to financial stability, and launched a feasibility study of options for how information from trade repositories can be aggregated and shared among authorities. The results of the study will be published in the first half of 2014.
Read More Here
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Financial Stability Board

The FSB has been established to coordinate at the international level the work of national financial authorities and international standard setting bodies and to develop and promote the implementation of effective regulatory, supervisory and other financial sector policies in the interest of financial stability. more
FSB consults on implementation guidance for the Key Attributes of Effective Resolution Regimes
The FSB launches a public consultation on
- The Application of the Key Attributes of Effective Resolution Regimes to Non-Bank Financial Institutions. The proposed guidance is designed to assist jurisdictions and authorities in implementing the Key Attributes with respect to resolution regimes for FMIs (including central counterparties, central securities depositories and securities settlement systems), insurers and firms with holdings of client assets.
- Information Sharing for Resolution Purposes. The proposed guidance sets out principles for the design of legal gateways and confidentiality regimes to allow the sharing of non-public information between domestic and foreign authorities that is necessary for planning and carrying out resolution.
The FSB welcomes comments on the consultative documents by 15 October 2013. Responses should be sent to fsb@bis.org.
Read More Here
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Keiser Report: Fake-It-Til-You-Make-It Economy (E401)

RussiaToday

Published on Feb 2, 2013

In this episode of the Keiser Report, Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert discuss the global yellow cake baking, talcum powder shaking, perpetual war making, balloon boy chasing, fake it til you make it economy in which spoof trading and a shadow banking system collateralised by a combination of liar loans and temporary workers consuming genetically modified food-like products produces such heroes for our times as Robb U, the guy who was handed $6 million in loans based on having a YouTube music video with a million plus views. In the second half of the show, Max Keiser talks to former Scotland Yard fraud squad detective, Rowan Bosworth-Davies of Rowans-Blog.blogspot.co.uk about justice departments and regulators going after the 'little guy' because he is 'easier' to get than the too-big-to-fail.
Follow Max Keiser on Twitter: http://twitter.com/maxkeiser
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Black Update: Australia Bank Bail In 2013-2014 Government Plan To Use Citizens Wealth To Bail In

Published on Jul 17, 2013

ttp://barnabyisright.com,

I found it.
As predicted. Apologies it took so long.
Unsurprisingly, the evidence was fairly well buried. Naturally, the government does not want you to know what they are doing.
Just like the Canadian government did in March, and just as Europe, the USA and the UK have now done, the Australian government too is now beginning to make good on its 2010 G20 commitment to implement the Goldman Sachs-chaired, internationalist Financial Stability Board's new regime for bailing out the banks using depositors' money.
On page 134 of the Australian Government Budget 2013-14 Portfolio Budget Statements, under the section for the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, we find the first of APRA's main strategic objectives for 2013-14.  It can be effectively summarised as "business as usual".
Their second strategic objective for 2013-14, is to:
• consolidate the prudential framework by enhancing prudential standards where appropriate, in line with the global reform initiatives endorsed by the G20 and overseen by the Financial Stability Board; [see image at top of this post]
Those "global reform initiatives endorsed by the G20″ include the FSB plan to "bail-in" insolvent banks:

FSB: 'Key Attributes of Effective Resolution Regimes for Financial Institutions', Annex III (click to enlarge)
In the waffle that follows, we find further that:
APRA will focus on implementing the new global bank liquidity framework in Australia...

page 134, Portfolio Budget Statements, Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, Australian Government Budget 2013-14.
This is likely referring in particular to the Basel III International Framework For Liquidity Risk Measurement, Standards, and Monitoring.
When published in combination with the previously mentioned strategic objective to "consolidate the prudential framework... in line with the global reform initiatives endorsed by the G20 and overseen by the Financial Stability Board", the implication is crystal clear.
"Global bank liquidity framework" is really just technocrat-ese for "global bankster plan to prop up insolvent banks using other people's money, and so instantly impoverish everyone who still has any savings left".
For further proof that what this all means is the Australian government planning to steal your money to "bail-in" so-called "systemically-important financial institutions" (SIFI's) — under the orders of an unelected international body (of bankers and bureaucrats) you've never heard of; a body funded by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), and chaired consecutively by Goldman Sachs alumni — then please study the detailed primary source evidence in this blog's original breaking story published on April 1st -
G20 Governments All Agreed to Cyprus-Style Theft Of Bank Deposits ... In 2010
That's something else to thank our recently-deposed PM Julia Gillard for doing, without our knowledge or permission.

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What a Single Payer Health Insurance Plan Looks Like

August 2, 2012 by desertrose 

Published on Jul 31, 2012 by TheRealNews

Gerald Friedman: A single-payer plan in Maryland would cover everyone, improve outcomes and make business more competitive

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