Reuters reports today:
If U.S. health reform efforts lead to higher costs for employers, employees may end up bearing the brunt, according to a new survey.
Employers will not absorb higher costs, choosing instead either to reduce benefits, lower salaries or cut jobs, the survey from professional services firm Towers Perrin said on Thursday.
Eighty-seven percent of employers said they were very likely or likely to cut benefits if reform leads to higher costs. Only 11 percent said they would accept lower profits.
This study confirms what conservatives have been saying about Obamacare from the beginning: If you mandate coverage on employers or add taxes to the coverage the offer, it simply comes out of the hide of employees.
All five bills in Congress (three in the House and two in the Senate) contain employer mandates or “pay or play” provisions which require employers to offer health insurance to their employees or pay a tax/fiine to the federal government. Even the left is beginning to recognize that these provisions are job/economy killers and are calling the Baucus “free rider” and other tax provisions the MaxTax.
As we have detailed before:
Congressional advocates of the latest health care reform proposal claim that it will not cost ordinary Americans more–the costs will be borne by “the rich” and by employers. After all, both the House and the Senate versions require employers who do not provide health benefits to pay higher taxes.
But the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) recently reported what economists have long known: Regardless of who is formally required to pay, the burden of these taxes and costs will ultimately fall primarily on employees through lower wages. An employer mandate does not give workers without health insurance something for nothing but rather forces them to purchase it out of their wages whether they like it or not–and no matter how low those wages are. Congressional rhetoric to the contrary, much of the burden of paying for an employer mandate will fall on ordinary Americans, and lower-income workers will be hit the hardest.
We have taken the proposals from HR3200 and our best estimate is that by Year 2 of the plan, we will have to cut our average employee pay by around $4,000 per year whether we opt for the 8% surtax on payroll or whether we provide health insurance that will surely see premium increases due to having to meet the Federal "qualification." I have conducted Businessmen's Town Halls and meet with others from as far north as Frisco, TX and as far south as Austin, TX. Most of those I have visited with who employ 25 to 300 people are faced with the same dilemma. There is little likelyhood of their meeting the mandate and staying in business either way without cutting pay/employees.
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Not so fast there. Only eleven percent said they'd "accept" lower profits?
Hear this well: Obama won. He will damn well do as he pleases; he has both houses of the legislature and the majority of the Supreme Court to back him.
Employers will "accept" the profits Obama says they will "accept".
I don't know whether these employers were paying attention when the unions and ACORN sent "bus tours" around to homes of the recipients of AIG bonuses so that the protestors could get "up close and personal" with the bonus recipients, many of whom "saw the light" and refused bonuses. And where were they when a White House Tsar stated on the record that he would "claw back" bonuses and profits?
As the cop said when he threatened a protestor with trespassing charges, "This ain't America no more".
If Nancy Pelosi thinks your profits are "obscene" or "windfalls", they are hers, not yours.
They DO NOT work for us anymore. We work for them. This year, we worked until late May for them. Soon, it might be Thanksgiving before you're done paying your taxes.
From each, according to his means. To each, according to his needs.
"Profits" are history, as is the "Constitution".
Elections have consequences. 54% of last November's voters either didn't read Orwell's "Animal Farm" or the lessons were lost on them when they pulled the handle for O-Baaaaaaaa-ma.
Jim of course you are right.
Scary isn't it that Obama sent SCIU to those homes?
There is still hope. 2010 must be a good year for us moderates at the polls. Our only hope is that they have awakened enough of us.
Viva La 2010!!!
Who are we to tell every American they must have health care or ????
What ever happen to "free choice?"
Reform is needed within the current Sys.
Why are we NOT looking at all the fraud …SSI cks, medicare and medicaid cks being collected in Post offices on the Border States once a month and the trip North for the fleecing of America?
Where is the accountability in this whacked system?
Start with these abuses.
Audit the system , office by office using E-Verify.
Can't we find leadership that has the gutts to take on these abuses, Mange. that has the gutts to do this?
The slight hope from all of the above is the recent interest in shutting down organizations like ACORN which is under investigation in 28 states an counting.
It has to be a grass roots sweep to get this job done …I know we are better than this.
We have silently allowed our country be fleeced and taken for granted on the most vulnerable levels with the unemploymen rate the highest since the Great Depression.
We must take back our country on all levels one State at a time , by reforming the current sys. that has been damages beyond imaginations.
Certainly on the Federal level we can not depend on any help. It has to be up to the States and States Rights.
I have a sign on my vehicle that says,"ATLAS WILL SHRUG". Our President and Congress ie rapidly moving up the time when that will happen!
Please vote most of Congress and the Senate out, they are totally less smart than five year old,pelosi is a total idiot and sould resign now!!!!!!!!!
Obama should move to foreign country of his choice. If any country is that dumb.
"CHOICE" …is becoming a foreign word to many of those "chosen" servants who represent us in the congress and the senate! It's nolonger a privilege or honor to SERVE our country as a representative of the greatest legislative system in the world.
IF ONE LOSES THE VISION AND MISSION, ONE MAY LOSE THEIR GOD GIVEN RIGHTS TO SERVE!
BRING BACK THOSE WHO LOVE THIS COUNTRY ENOUGH TO REMEMBER THE WORD "FAIR", AND TO FAVOR THE STRENGTH OF "TRUTH" OVER "GREED". OBAMA NEVER USES EITHER WORD IN HIS SPEECHES!
If Obama wins, all of America loses.
Hozro
Tax the rich start with charlie rangle.Cutting waste ,fraud,and down right theft could pay for all this for the forseeable future.If its between 80-120 billion in medicade just imagine what it would be across the board,just do what we absolutly have to.
Folks,
Never forget this: We are those upon whom governments must depend.
Socialism is evil incarnate.
Those who do evil or cause evil are evil.
The members of a society can be and are categorized in many different ways. One of those many ways is with the three P's: Producers, Predators and Parasites.
Socialism benefits both predators and parasites and does so to the detriment of producers.
But even still: We, the producers, are those upon whom governments must depend. Never forget it.
“I am not the first president to take up this cause…” said BHO in his healthcare speech “…but I am determined to be the last.” As for the latter, let’s hope so!! By that I mean, it would be great if BHO were the last candidate of his kind to be elected president. In all future elections: WISE UP VOTERS!! DON’T BE DUPED by the liberal media or leftwing candidates who pretend to be moderate to conservative. The GOP has its faults, and some RINOs. But be really wary of the Democratic Party, which has been hijacked by ultra-liberal statists and socialists over the past 4 decades. In 1993, Rush Limbaugh thought Bill Clinton’s presidency would be the final nail in the coffin of liberalism. Sadly, he miscalculated. But it’s now obvious that BHO has proven to be far more leftwing and radical in 8 months than Clinton was in 8 years. If Obama doesn’t wake up the voters, who will?? God help us if the voters ever elect another president like BHO, or worse!