Every single candidate running in the Republican Presidential Primary should be talking about what is wrong with ObamaCare (well, except maybe for MItt Romney that is).  It fits with the Republican Party's election year narrative.  Job-Killing Taxes? Check! Over Regulation? Check! Size and Scope of Government? Check! So why aren't the candidates talking about it? 

Michael D. Tanner with CATO has more to say on the subject. You can read his commentary here.

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The Heritage Foundation has a new analysis that concludes that ObamaCare will deprive many Americans who are considered "lower skilled workers" job opportunities.  Specifically, the law could result in employees losing out on full time employment, instead forcing them into part time jobs. Read Heritage's full analysis here.

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According to media reports, Georgia is asking the federal government to let it become another state to push the cost of providing healthcare to the children of state employees on the backs of federal taxpayers. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has already approved this process for Montana, Alabama, Texas, Kentucky and Pennsylvania.

These states are seeking to push the kids of state employees into the CHIP program, a federal program originally designed to provide health care to kids in lower income families. But this latest move by the states seeks to expand coverage well beyond what the federal program was designed to accomplish.

The national implications of the states attempting to do this are numerous, including:

1. Taxpayers in other states will now be forced to finance the cost of state government in another state through their federal tax dollars. This is unfair to taxpayers nationwide.
2. This will also reduce the incentive for states to fund the benefits they promise and to live within their means.
3. This will lower incentives for states, like Texas and Georgia, to actually come up with appropriate budgetary savings and to live within its means.  For example, Gov. Mitch Daniels (IN) has moved his state employee health plan to HSAs which has reduced the burden on taxpayers and created market incentives for state employees to make better health care decisions.   
4. ObamaCare expands CHIP while reducing the applicable pool of participants in the private insurance market. In this regard, the states that are attempting this maneuver are further reducing that pool which could have negative affects on everyone who relies on private insurance in that state.
5. Finally, the real implications have to deal with the Health Care Compact. Texas and Georgia have both adopted the compact with the promise it would let states "keep their money" and give states control over health care to design more efficient health care systems. The move by Texas and Georgia shows these states are hypocrites when it comes to the promised goals of the compact. It also shows that the compact is filled with nothing more than empty promises and hot air. Otherwise, the HCCA (which is pushing the compact) would be doing far more to hold elected officials in these states accountable instead of giving them a pass to say one thing while doing another. If anyone should be decrying the move by these states it should be Leo Linbeck III (a resident of Texas and co-chair of the HCCA) but his silence on the issue speaks volumes about how ill-conceived the compact really is.

According to The Heritage Foundation, ObamaCare is driving a dramatic rise in health insurance premiums. Among the cost-drivers is a provision of ObamaCare that has already taken effect - that is the requirement to cover adult children up to age 26. AHEC has previously noted that this provision would skew the marketplace, by encouraging only the most sick to take advantage of this provision, thereby dramatically increasing prices for employers and employees.  (Read AHEC's March 2011 Newsletter for an explanation).

But the really bad news for employees and employers is that the real impact of ObamaCare, and all of its negative consequences, is yet to kick in.

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Grace-Marie Turner writes for the American Spectator that Obama has a new election strategy to deal with the issue of ObamaCare - silence.  Read her full article here.

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Grace-Marie Turner at the Galen Institute has a wonderfully researched article entitled "ObamaCare: A Hidden Jobs Killer" that was published by The New York Post.  Her article explains that the U.S. economy was recovering until the passage of ObamaCare, after which, job creation has stalled.  She links the issue of joblessness and ObamaCare making a compelling case for the need to fully repeal this onerous, job-killing law.  

AHEC's commends the article to you, the full article can be found here.

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In what is a clear victory for taxpayers, Kansas Lt. Governor Jeff Colyer announced that the Brownback Administration would not implement an ObamaCare insurance exchange until the multi-state lawsuit challenging ObamaCare was decided by the Supreme Court.

Kansas had previously received an ObamaCare grant to implement the insurance exchanges but has returned the money to the federal government - another victory for taxpayers. In what is clearly not a victory for taxpayers, the media reports that: "Kansas Insurance Commissioner Sandy Praeger, also a Republican, has vowed to continue working on the exchange issues."  Praeger appears to be nothing more than a big government Republican who things government can better allocate resources that the free-markets.

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According to the actuaries at CMS, health care costs and insurance costs will grow faster under ObamaCare than without.  Here is what some commentators had to say about the CMS numbers:

• Our friends at Docs4PatientCare write: "Under the PPACA, spending to fund government health care bureaucracy and administration will increase dramatically (14.6% growth in 2014), growing more than twice as fast as spending on health care itself. For comparison, spending on hospital care is expected to grow by 7.2 percent and physician and clinical services by 8.9 percent. (It is also worth noting that the increase in spending on bureaucracy is 16.2 times greater than the nation’s anticipated population growth).
• Avik Roy writes for Forbes that: "contrary to the President, the actuaries find that Obamacare will dramatically increase the near-term growth rate of health care costs. In 2014, the actuaries find that growth in the net cost of health insurance will increase by nearly 14 percent, compared to 3.5% if PPACA had never passed. The growth rate of private insurance costs will rise to 9.4 percent, from 5.0 percent under prior law: an 88% increase."
• Sally Pipes writes about this latest information: "So ObamaCare is certainly fueling the expansion of government health care. But as the Medicare actuaries’ work shows, it’s also driving up health costs for private payers as well. In 2014, costs in many major sectors of the health care market are expected to be much higher than they would be without ObamaCare’s 'reforms'"
• Docs4PatientCare also notes: "According to the report, “out-of-pocket” spending [on health care] is projected to decline by 1.3 percent.... But this is not good news..... This kind of shift is not without costs, as it will: reduce incentives for patients to seek less expensive alternatives; make the health care system less transparent; and lead to more expensive health insurance." 

UPDATE 1: While perhaps related, South Carolina has decided to raise the amount of premiums required to be paid by the state's workforce for their health insurance.

UPDATE 2:  See HealthAffairs blog on the same subject (more numbers, less analysis).

UPDATE 3: Senate Finance Committee staff has a breakdown on these numbers as well.

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The Heritage Foundation details how ObamaCare relied on Accountable Care Organizations (ACO) to curb costs and how that regulations that the Administration has issued have been met with a lukewarm reception among the medical community. Read more here. 

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House Budget Chair Paul Ryan (R-WI) writes in Politico that the "debt crisis is, above all, a health care spending crisis. About one-quarter of all federal government spending goes to health care — a percentage that would rise dramatically under the president’s new health care law." 

Ryan writes PPACA is "a 2,700-page mistake that has compounded the worst problems in American health care, weakened our economy and accelerated out-of-control government spending. The law’s many restrictions and mandates have jeopardized access to affordable, quality health care for millions of Americans."  He continues by stating that the "only sure way to control costs is to reform the government’s role in health care at every level by introducing choice and competition."  Accordingly, the surest way to tackle the nation's debt problem would be to repeal ObamaCare.

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