Fix Health Care Policy

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) Outlines a New Paradigm for Health Care Reform

Yesterday, Representative Paul Ryan (R–WI) shared his outlook for repealing and replacing Obamacare.

Ryan pointed out that rising health care costs not only make insurance unaffordable for many Americans; they are also a main driver of growing federal deficits. As medical inflation pushes the cost of insurance and medical goods and services sky high, the cost to taxpayers of Medicare, Medicaid, and the new open-ended entitlements created in Obamacare goes up as well.

Adequately addressing rising costs will require pinpointing the root causes of medical inflation. Ryan defined these as over-utilization, under-payments, and inefficiency stemming from the detachment of consumers from the costs of their health decisions in a third-party system. The irony, as Ryan put it, is that “the system that shields us from the cost of services has actually left us paying more.”  (Read the rest on The Foundry…)

Tags: consumer-driven care, health reform, Rep. Paul Ryan, repeal Obamacare, replace, rising costs

House Subcommittee: Obamacare Will Burden Small Businesses

The House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health recently held a hearing to review how Obamacare regulations will affect employers’ ability to maintain health coverage.

To illustrate the magnitude of the new regulatory burdens on businesses, subcommittee chairman Joe Pitts (R–PA) displayed a stack of over 3,500 pages of Obamacare rules, notices, and regulatory guidance issued so far by the Administration. This additional burden, the hearing highlighted, will harm employers’ ability to offer health coverage and disrupt coverage for Americans across the country.

Among the new regulations are “minimum loss ratio” (MLR) requirements, which force health insurers to spend at least 80 percent of premium revenues on medical claims costs or “activities that improve health care quality.” The MLR requirements are likely to force some insurers out of the market, leaving businesses with fewer coverage options.   (Read the rest on The Foundry…)

Tags: health insurance, House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee, medical claim costs, minimum loss ratio, Rep. Joe Pitts, repeal Obamacare

New Report Shows Sec. Sebelius is Overstepping Her Authority

One negative provision of Obamacare is back in congressional crosshairs. The CLASS (Community Living Assistance Services and Support) Program, a new long-term care entitlement, has already endured withering criticism. In July 2009, the American Academy of Actuaries released a blistering report on its structural flaws. Senator Kent Conrad (D-ND), Chairman of the Budget Committee, referred to CLASS as a Ponzi scheme during the Obamacare debate. And more recently, President Obama’s deficit commission recommended repealing or significantly revamping the program.

Secretary Sebelius has repeatedly asserted that CLASS is unsustainable. She has advocated repeal if CLASS can’t be reformed. It appears likely that the Obama Administration knew the program was fiscally unsustainable before Obamacare became law, and included it in the health care law only as a mechanism to reduce the price tag of the bill. Now, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius is asserting power that Congress did not grant her in a futile attempt to remake the program into something sustainable. (Read the rest at The Foundry…)

Tags: CLASS Act, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Ponzi scheme, repeal Obamacare

PolitiFact, FactCheck, and WaPo All Confirm: The $105 Billion Obamacare Slush Fund Exists

Today former Congressman Ernest Istook testified before the House Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee about the $105 billion slush fund in advance appropriations liberals tucked inside Obamacare. The $105 billion bypasses the traditional yearly budgeting process and is spread throughout the 2,700 page legislation. It took the Congressional Research Service (CRS) seven months to identify all the disparate funds and it was not until February (11 months after the bill passed) that all of the funds could be totaled up.

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) has been beating the drum to raise awareness of this unprecedented level of advance spending. But the liberal media has been attacking her for calling it “hidden” funding.  (Read the rest at The Foundry…)

Tags: $105 billion slush fund, congressional research service, repeal Obamacare

How the States Can Carry the Torch to Repeal Obamacare

Last night, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 2, which would scrap Obamacare in its entirety. Regardless of whether this legislation makes it to the President’s desk, supporters of a new direction for health care reform have reason to be encouraged: Implementation of Obamacare faces an uphill battle in the states as well.

So far, 27 states have filed suit against the new law’s individual mandate and requirements forbidding states from reducing eligibility for their Medicaid programs. But the legal battle isn’t the only way states can throw a wrench in the health care overhaul. This week, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) debuts “The State Legislators Guide to Repealing Obamacare” highlighting ways in which states can continue the battle. (Read the rest at The Foundry…)

Tags: Individual Mandate, repeal Obamacare, state lawsuits, unconstitutional

Guest Blogger: Obamacare and the Law of Unintended Consequences

The virtue of prudence dictates that one should heed the law of unintended consequences and seek to minimize the unwelcome outcomes that result from almost every endeavor. When one fails to do so, the damaging unintended consequences can be overwhelmingly; oftentimes to such a degree that any rational supporter of the endeavor must seriously consider whether it is worth the pains.

This is the story of Obamacare, literally “the law” of unintended consequences. And tragically, we’re only in year one of its implementation.

Most prominently, President Obama repeatedly promised that “if you like your plan, you can keep it.” However, tens of thousands of Americans have already been forced to change plans, the majority being seniors holding Medicare Advantage plans that Obamacare subjected to dramatic cuts. Starting in 2014, hundreds of thousands more will fall victim given that it is cheaper for businesses to drop employees onto the government-run exchange than continue providing them coverage. (Read the rest at The Foundry…)

Tags: Medicare Advantage, President Barack Obama, repeal Obamacare, unintended consequences

The Start of the Debate

Fellow conservatives,

Last night, the House of Representatives, the legislative chamber of Congress closest to American popular opinion, voted to repeal Obamacare—the increasingly unpopular law which led directly to a change in the control of Congress just three months ago.

Many will tell you that yesterday’s bipartisan vote of 245 to 189 was an exercise in futility—an empty, symbolic measure. Liberals in Congress, the White House and their echo chamber in the media all insist, as NPR has duly reported, that “this measure will go no further.”

Don’t believe this for a single minute. The vote last night was an important step in the democratic process of protecting and conserving our constitutional freedoms.

Our country, it is increasingly clear, has arrived at a pivotal moment – perhaps the pivotal moment – in its history. Together, we face a choice between two futures. One is a collectivist future where the federal government claims ever increasing shares of our income and grants itself the authority to make decisions affecting virtually every aspect of our daily lives. The other future is built upon the idea that individual freedom trumps government authority, and that in those rare cases when solving a problem requires government, the government that governs best is the one that is smallest and closest to the people. That is the future that we should seek – reaffirming our individual liberty, strengthening private markets, shrinking the size of governments, and making decisions wherever possible at the local level rather than in Washington. (Read the rest at The Foundry…)

Tags: constitutional, House of Representatives, individual liberty, repeal Obamacare

HHS Report on Obamacare’s Preexisting Conditions Impact: Say What???

On the eve of the scheduled vote in the U.S. House of Representatives on a bill to repeal Obamacare, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a report yesterday entitled: “At Risk: Pre-Existing Conditions Could Affect 1 in 2 Americans: 129 Million People Could Be Denied Affordable Coverage Without Health Reform.”

The report’s “findings” are misleading and wildly inaccurate.

The report implies that without Obamacare’s prohibition on insurers applying preexisting-condition exclusions, nearly half of the entire U.S. population would be at risk of being denied health insurance because they already have a preexisting medical condition.

But claiming that, because millions of people have preexisting medical conditions today, they risk being denied coverage if Congress repeals Obamacare is like saying that, because millions of Americans live within five miles of the seacoast, they risk being killed by the next hurricane if Congress cuts funding for the Army Corps of Engineers. Such simplistic and superficial methodologies deliberately ignore all the other relevant factors that might lead a reasonable person to question their outlandish conclusions. (Read the rest at The Foundry…)

Tags: HHS, pre-existing conditions, repeal Obamacare

Countdown to Repeal: Economy Will Suffer If Obamacare Stands

The House of Representatives will soon vote on full repeal of Obamacare. In an attempt to defend the health care overhaul, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner writes this morning that, in light of continued unacceptably high unemployment, “Given where we are, we must do things that help bolster the recovery, and repealing the Affordable Care Act would be a step in the wrong direction.”

Geithner is right that Congress should act to improve the economy, but leaving Obamacare in place would do the opposite. Repeal of Obamacare is the only way to restore economic prosperity in the United States, according to the 200 economists who signed a letter addressed to House and Senate leadership in support of overturning the new health law. The letter stresses that “the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is a threat to U.S. businesses and will place a crushing debt burden on future generations of Americans.” (Read the rest at The Foundry…)

Tags: economists, House of Representatives, repeal Obamacare, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner

Countdown to Repeal: Doctor Is Already Feeling the Fateful Effects of Obamacare

Dr. Martha Boone is no ordinary urologist. For more than a year she has led a grassroots campaign against Obamacare — and for good reason. Boone’s livelihood depends on it.

As the House prepares to vote on repeal today, Boone is struggling with the consequences of the law. Just this week, for example, she learned the cost of health insurance for her five employees was increasing 27 percent. How will she cover the increase? It’s a question weighing on her mind.

We traveled to Atlanta last year to speak to Boone about her concerns. (Read our report and watch our video.) Boone was in the process of moving to a less expensive office in an older building. The move helped her avoid laying off an employee, but it was just one of the sacrifices she made. (Read the rest at The Foundry…)

Tags: doctors, regulatory burden, reimbursement cuts, repeal Obamacare