Not What the Doctor Ordered

20 Million Could Lose Employer Coverage
Posted by Robalini on May 9, 2012
http://www.disinfo.com/2012/05/not-what-the-doctor-ordered-20-million-could-lose-employer-coverage

In all the hand-wringing over the last two months for Obamacare by “liberal” apologists, little has actually been said about the actual effects of the law. True, whether or not Obamacare is beneficial has little if anything to do with its constitutionality. (And the actual Constitutional issues involved, however valid, have little to do with the cynical politics behind the Supreme Court’s right-wing block in the case.) But you’d think if someone was gonna go to bat for a law, they’d at least acknowledge the law’s merits.

Hence one story that caught my eye in March: “20 million could lose employer coverage under Obama health care overhaul.” The source, the World Socialist Web Site, may not be acceptable to the media establishment, but the primary source for the WSWS certainly is: the Congressional Budget Office. Here’s what the CBO concludes:

As many as 20 million Americans could lose their employer-sponsored coverage in 2019 under the health care legislation signed into law by President Obama in March 2010…The CBO’s most optimistic estimate, which the federal agency says is subject to a “tremendous amount of uncertainty,” is that 3 million to 5 million could lose their employer health coverage each year from 2019 through 2022.The new projections for loss of employee coverage are a substantial increase over last year’s estimates, when the CBO’s best prediction was that only 1 million people would lose employer-sponsored coverage.The new study is the latest indication that the health care overhaul will result in a deterioration of health care for the majority of Americans, and not the improvement touted by the Obama administration. Working families and those in low-wage jobs stand to suffer the most from companies eliminating coverage.

As many as 20 million Americans could lose their employer-sponsored coverage in 2019 under the health care legislation signed into law by President Obama in March 2010…

The CBO’s most optimistic estimate, which the federal agency says is subject to a “tremendous amount of uncertainty,” is that 3 million to 5 million could lose their employer health coverage each year from 2019 through 2022.

The new projections for loss of employee coverage are a substantial increase over last year’s estimates, when the CBO’s best prediction was that only 1 million people would lose employer-sponsored coverage.

The new study is the latest indication that the health care overhaul will result in a deterioration of health care for the majority of Americans, and not the improvement touted by the Obama administration. Working families and those in low-wage jobs stand to suffer the most from companies eliminating coverage.


Of course, this one very disturbing study is hardly the Alpha or Omega on Obamacare. But it certainly shows one major part of the sales job for the bill was a complete con. In June 2009, President Obama declared before the American Medical Association: “If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor, period. If you like your health care plan, you’ll be able to keep your health care plan, period. No one will take it away, no matter what.”  This declaration wasn’t an aberration but the decided norm.  When pressed, Obama would admit even then the statement was only true using weasel talk: that he meant Obamacare wouldn’t require anyone be dropped from a health plan.  But as the CBO now concludes, the framework of Obamacare will certainly encourage — and pretty much subsidize — businesses dumping their workers into inferior health care plans for profit.

Perhaps you have a different conclusion of Obamacare based on the evidence.  (The CBO itself oddly declares “a sharp decline in employment-based health insurance as a result of the ACA is unlikely” when summarizing its own findings.)  Fair enough. But even if you do, a CBO study warning 20 million Americans could lose their health plan shouldn’t be ignored, and for the most part, it has. The de facto censoring of this report is part of a larger pattern of deception: while Obamacare has been sold as supposed universal healthcare program, in reality it is a gigantic windfall for the already crooked and bloated insurance companies at the expense of the public at large. The irony is this masquerade is promoted by progressives that will be left holding the bag as Obamacare continues to be a unpopular political disaster.