During his 2012 State of the Union address, President Obama barely discussed his health care law. But that doesn’t mean Americans must remain in the dark about how the unpopular health law will impact each and every one of them. Heritage has compiled a series of videos that highlight how individuals and families will be affected by the new law.
Business Owners
Obamacare’s new taxes and mandates on business are a hindrance to economic growth and job creation. The law requires that employers provide health insurance to their employees or face a fine. As the cost of health insurance continues to increase under Obamacare, employers will face increasingly steep costs to keep employees insured and avoid the penalties. According to research by McKinsey and Company, close to one-third of employers says they will definitely or probably stop covering employees once Obamacare is fully implemented; this increased to 50 percent after the law had been explained to employers in greater detail.
The following video highlights some business owners who are already concerned about the impact they face.
Seniors
Instead of using the savings from cuts to Medicare to increase the program’s own solvency, Obamacare uses them to pay for new government spending. The law cuts provider payments, weakens Medicare Advantage (a program that gives seniors more choices to obtain coverage), and creates an unelected board of government bureaucrats to impose further Medicare spending reductions in coming years. These policies will threaten the doctor–patient relationship, as a Medicare beneficiary and doctor discuss in the following video:
Future Generations
Obamacare did nothing but worsen the condition of the nation’s unaffordable and broken health care entitlement programs, which threaten our future fiscal health with their trillions in unfunded obligations. Rather than put these programs on a sustainable path and improve them for the patients they serve, Obamacare adds over a trillion dollars in new spending. Meanwhile, the “debt-paying generation” is staring down the barrel at crushing debt and higher taxes to pay for it. The sheer size of the debt is on its way to stifle economic growth and will make it more difficult for future generations to save, invest, and prosper in the United States, as the following video the following video illustrates:
Doctors
Obamacare imposes new problems on doctors and health care providers. Besides adding millions of Americans to Medicaid, which pays doctors and hospitals significantly less than private insurance, the new law expands bureaucratic power in Washington and undermines the doctor–patient relationship. Furthermore, Obamacare continues to ratchet down on provider payments in Medicare. Low reimbursement will make it harder for physicians and hospitals to keep their doors open to these individuals and stay in business, as the following video shows:
States
Obamacare will impose new burdens on already strained state governments. The new law adds millions of people to an already struggling Medicaid program, which is partially funded by the states and consumes a growing portion of their budgets, crowding out other priorities. More fundamentally, Obamacare undercuts the authority of the states to reform their health care systems to best meet the specific needs of their states. Governor Mitch Daniels (R–IN) is just one of many state leaders to enact successful reforms that are threatened by the lack of flexibility in the health law, as this video shows:
