Melissa Melton
Infowars.com
A post-election poll of more than a thousand Americans showed that support for repealing the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, dropped to an all-time low. Although President Obama’s health care initiative will include 20 new or raised taxes, forty-nine percent of respondents still favored it, even as businesses are already planning massive layoffs and price hikes ahead of its implementation.
Freedom Works has compiled a list of companies planning to lay off workers and outsource jobs because of Obamacare. Boston Scientific will be doing both, as CEO Ray Elliott has announced the company will cut up to 1,400 employees and shift workers and investments to China. In order to cover the $24 million in estimated additional Obamacare expenses, auto parts manufacturer Dana Holding Corp. has let go of several higher ups and hinted at more layoffs coming to its 25,000+ workforce. Medical device manufacturers Medtronic and Stryker have both cut at least a thousand jobs already.
Last Year, Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Elmendorf testified before the House Budget Committee that the Affordable Care Act would cost this country 800,000 jobs.
Unfortunately, layoffs won’t be the only consequence of Obamacare. Consumers are about to foot the bill for the president’s health care reform in a lot more ways than one.
Business analysts are forecasting that many companies will turn to price hikes to offset the financial burden of complying with Obamacare. Papa John’s CEO John Schnatter claims the health care law will cost his company $5 to $8 billion annually; in an attempt to neutralize this, Schnatter has announced he will raise product prices. He isn’t the only one. An NY Applebee’s owner said Obamacare will cost the company millions, forcing them to freeze hiring and stop building new restaurants. Waivers aren’t even stopping some companies from instituting price increases. Even though McDonalds has been granted an Obamacare waiver, the company’s Chief Financial Officer Peter Bensen announced in July the company would see up to $420 million in new health care costs, ultimately leading to higher menu prices.
Regardless of what restaurants a person chooses to patron, the bigger picture here is an expensive trend that will likely spread across our nation, from business to business and wallet to wallet.
While we are all paying higher prices for products, employees will also shoulder the financial burden of health care premium increases or a smaller paycheck due to their hours being cut — or both.
A National Business Group survey found that employers will raise health care rates an average of at least seven percent due to Obamacare, but many are being forced to hike rates much higher. Universities across North Carolina have cited Obamacare as the reason for “substantial” student health care premium hikes; some students in that state will now pay double for insurance. Walmart recently raised health care premiums, in some cases 36 percent, leaving many of its employees unable to afford any health insurance coverage at all.
The Affordable Care Act also changes the definition of what a full-time employee is (the massive piece of legislation requires 18 pages just to define it) to anyone who works 30 hours a week. As the majority of Walmart employees are not full-time, the company may cut worker hours even further to avoid full-time designation. Darden Restaurants, owners of national chain restarurants Olive Garden, Red Lobster and LongHorn Steakhouse among others, is “experimenting with limiting the hours of some of its workers to avoid health care requirements”. National grocery store chain Kroger has announced it will be doing the same.
As if all of this financial burden sliding downhill isn’t enough, a recent poll of more than 13,000 doctors found that a whopping 84 percent feel America’s medical profession is in decline, and six out of every 10 doctors have a negative view of America’s health care future following Obamacare. More than 60 percent said they’d retire now if given the option, up 15 percent from before the law passed. The U.S. already faced a chronic doctor shortage prior to Obamacare. The New York Times announced this shortage is “likely to worsen” under the president’s health care law. The Association of Medical Colleges is projecting a 10-15 percent reduction in physicians by 2015 alone.
With fewer jobs, higher prices, and a smaller pool of doctors to go around, it remains unclear exactly how Obamacare will make health care more accessible or “affordable.”
As Infowars has previously reported, Obamacare was largely written by insurance companies, not health care providers. The House Energy and Commerce Committee’s investigation into the mandate’s crafting found that numerous backroom deals took place between special interest groups and the White House. It makes no logical sense that profit-hungry health insurance companies worth billions and related special interest groups would help craft a legislation behind closed doors that would actually save the average American money.
Nomi Prins points out the real danger of Obamacare is a health insurance company takeover of our health care system:
“And if you’re keeping score – billions of dollars are flowing from insurance companies – NOT to reduce premiums to patients and NOT to reimburse doctors and NOT to enhance the quality of care, but to simply expand nationally and globally… And if insurance companies can manage doctors directly, they can control not just costs, but treatment – our treatment. It’s not an imaginary government takeover anyone should fear; but a very real, here-and-now insurance company takeover, to which no one in Washington is paying attention.”
By 2014, every American will be forced to get health insurance or pay the Obamacare tax our Supreme Court deemed was constitutional for the government to charge us.
This is only the beginning.