ObamaCare: 2009 Promises Vs 2014 Reality

On September 9, 2009 the House and Senate Democratic leadership called a joint session of Congress so President Obama could appear on prime time TV, under the most favorable possible conditions, to sell their “health care reform,” what is now called Obamacare. 

To impress the TV audience Mr. Obama entered the hall with State of the Union style pomp and ceremony, complete with several minutes of cheering and applause from all the Democrats and a hundred or so loyal supporters in the balcony.

This is the first of four articles comparing the promises in the President’s 2009 speech with the reality of ObamaCare implementation.

The speech was designed to present only the promised benefits of the pending health care law and to hide costs and risks. 

Obama opened with a list of horrors he claimed were the result of too little government intervention.  One of the most important, indeed one of the top two or three reasons why he insisted the nation should submit to a government take-over of health insurance and medical services was:

Everyone understands the extraordinary hardships that are placed on the uninsured, who live every day just one accident or illness away from bankruptcy…There are now more than thirty million American citizens who cannot get coverage.

Four years later one can only wonder why supposedly free people are being forced to endure the wrenching implementation of Obamacare.  According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) there are some 55 million Americans who are uninsured now, in 2013.  The latest CBO health care report  projects 30 million or more will be uninsured in each of the next ten years –  the same as in 2009 when the President gave his big speech!

The President went on to assure us that Obamacare would address the problem of people who could not afford insurance with government run “markets” called exchanges:

Now, if you’re one of the tens of millions of Americans who don’t currently have health insurance, this plan will finally offer you quality, affordable choices…We will do this by creating a new insurance exchange – a marketplace where individuals and small businesses will be able to shop for health insurance at competitive prices.

Reality turns out to be another disappointment. Back in April the Administration quietly disclosed that the Small Business Health Options Program or SHOP would not comply with the law’s requirement that employees of small businesses be offered several health plan options, like government and big business employees are.  Instead, depending on state and county there will either be one small business option or none at all.

While the President presented the individual exchange as a gift from government it’s actually an enforcement mechanism for the individual mandate.  Everyone above a certain income threshold who is not part of an employer insurance group must purchase Obamacare-compliant insurance, which includes an expensive package of coverages and provisions.

Nearly all states that have determined the cost of ObamaCare-compliant individual policies in their exchanges found that they will be will be much more expensive than the individual plans now available to their residents.  For example:

• The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation just issued a report on all eleven insurance compares that will be offering policies in the Florida exchange, comparing the cost of their current individual policies with the the cost of their new ObamaCare compliant policies.  The increases average 35%, with the highest at 55%.
• The Ohio Department of Insurance announced that individual consumers buying ObamaCare-compliant health insurance on the federal government’s health insurance exchange for Ohio will pay an average of 41 percent more than they did in 2013.
• Maryland’s largest health insurer predicts a 25% increase.
• In New Jersey a very popular low-cost health plan will no longer be offered.  Approximately 106,000 policy holders will be required by federal law to switch to more expensive government approved plans.

There are reports of similar increases, as much as 150%, in several other states. Next:  Small business tax credits promises vs reality