No Health Insurance, Thanks Obama
So Obama told you if you liked your insurance you could keep it. However a recent report from McKinsey indicated that a third of employers will most likely drop ESI (employer-sponsored insurance). According to their survey the more the employer understand Obama Care, the greater the chance that their employees will have to go into the subsidized-exchange.
This may have been the key item learned from McKinsey: “Contrary to what many employers assume, more than 85 percent of employees would remain at their jobs even if their employer stopped offering ESI, although about 60 percent would expect increased compensation.” ESI, you will recall is the product of wage freezes from World War II.
The question of savings to drop ESI was answered in a Wall Street Journal MAY 21, 2010, Opinion by John C Goodman where he wrote “AT&T, for example, paid $2.4 billion last year to cover medical costs for its 283,000 active employees. If the company dropped its health plan and paid an annual penalty for each uninsured worker, the fines would total almost $600 million. But that would leave AT&T with a tidy profit of $1.8 billion.”
Most companies offer insurance in levels. For example the construction company that I used to work for offered two types of insurances. They had a policy for hourly that was geared to offer incentive for the hourly employee to become salaried. Hourly employees paid a small percent of their policy and near full price for spouse and children. However, once they made salary, it covered spouse or significant other, and children at no cost.
Those days will end. But the rub could be that Obama Care as passed by the Democrats will end coverage for unmarried and gay couples. It might be that the Democrats are showing their true colors. They had to know that the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), signed by President Clinton, would end significant other inclusion in health insurance. Meaning; only married couples will qualify and their children.
So with no incentive to maintain insurance perks for employees, there is no reason to offer them. When a company looks at the saving they receive from paying the fine and the savings that their competitors are receiving there is no reason to continue. Because of DOMA the insurance companies will have no incentive to provide any discounts to significant others, non-married couples. Just think what wonderful choices we will have for insurance, as this program will be designed, most likely, by the same genius that came up the DMV lines.
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