2013
Buried in the Affordable Care Act is a stupid, politically motivated provision that requires members of Congress and their staffs to obtain health insurance through a state exchange beginning in 2014. This supposedly is to subject them to Obamacare like the rest of us. Of course 98.5% of the rest of us will not be using the exchanges because we have health insurance elsewhere.
In any case, this phony sympathy provision would have cost members of Congress and their staffs plenty because like most employees they have insurance that is paid in part by their employer. In this case the employee pays 25% of the cost which is not atypical for large employers. Congress and their staffs are treated like a million other federal workers.
Today the Office of Personnel Management finally decided that the government would continue to pay 75% of the cost of coverage even though coverage would be obtained by individuals through an exchange. That’s fair and the right thing to do. Forcing these people out of the federal employees health benefits plan is inefficient and just stupid.
Nevertheless, our conservative friends especially Rush Limbaugh beat the drums to rile up the uninformed. He claimed these high paid people were now getting a windfall, staffers making an average of $70,000 a year were receiving a subsidy he said as if that were a bad thing or even something new. Millions of Americans earning that much and much more get the same kind of subsidy from their employer. Some state employees get a 100% subsidy and people march in the streets to support unions in order to preserve such benefits.
Serious conservative thought and positions are undermined by the drivel put forth by Limbaugh and friends trying to mislead and create opposition just for the sake of obstructionism.
QUINNSCOMMENTARY 
Sorry, Dick. This time you have great arguments, but miss the #1 point.
You start: “Buried in the Affordable Care Act is a stupid, politically motivated provision that requires members of Congress and their staffs to obtain health insurance through a state exchange beginning in 2014. ”
Dick, if we got rid of all of the stupid, politically motivated (e.g., vote-buying) provisions, healh reform woiuld be no more. Why give anyone a pass on any of this crap?
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I just get annoyed when I hear Limbaugh ranting and raving about Congressional staffers get a 75% subsidy as if its something new or unique to federal workers.
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But, it is. That is, the premium payment that the federal government will make on behalf of federal workers to purchase coverage in the exchange will NOT be imputed as taxable compensation – as it would for any other employer. Instead, I can guarantee that they will not impute it as income to the congressional staff members and members of Congress… and, if we are not careful, for lower paid federal workers, who knows whether they will qualify not only for the subsidy from the federal government, but also for the taxpayer subsidy othewise available from the exchanges.
Next will be the multiemployer plans – this is close to the same demand in the Union letter – let the multiemployer plan qualify on the same basis as the exchange coverage, for both employer financial support and the taxpayer subsidies.
To quote the letter from the unions:
Second, millions of Americans are covered by non-profit health insurance plans like the ones in which most of our members participate. These non-profit plans are governed jointly by unions and companies under the Taft-Hartley Act. Our health plans have been built over decades by working men and women. Under the ACA as interpreted by the Administration, our employees will treated differently and not be eligible for subsidies afforded other citizens. As such, many employees will be relegated to second-class status and shut out of the help the law offers to for-profit insurance plans.
And finally, even though non-profit plans like ours won’t receive the same subsidies as for-profit plans, they’ll be taxed to pay for those subsidies. Taken together, these restrictions will make non-profit plans like ours unsustainable, and will undermine the health-care market of viable alternatives to the big health insurance companies.
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But it was always tax free just as it is for any employer plan. The fact they were forced into an exchange shouldn’t change that in my view although the whole thing from the provision in the law to the exception stinks.
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I agree with you on the misrepresentation of the employer subsidy but I think we disagree on two points. 1. Limbaugh is not the leader of the right — I saw him on Fox News interview last night — he didn’t claim to be a leader. 2. Since Obama and the Dems think that that exchanges are a great way for those without employer insurance is the way to go, it is quite fitting that all the Congressmen and their aides learn to live on the exchange program (which only has subsidies for people with lower pay). IMHO, obamacare will hasten the loss of employer provided insurance for everyone — so let those that make terrible laws like Obamacare should eat their own cooking starting in 2014. Plenty of employers already don’t offer employee health insurance — why should we offer it for Congressmen and their aides (especially since they believe that their exchange program is fine for everyone else).
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You can carry that logic to all one million federal employees, but why are they different than any other workers?
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My point is that the Congress folks need to eat their own cooking — the other government employees didn’t do the cooking. As I understand it, the Obamacare law said that they had to go on the exchanges and did NOT provide for subsidies but Obama and
Congress ignore laws whenever convenient.
Government employees do need to have their health insurance adjusted to what is provided in the private sector. I do have retirement medical (although my employer reduced the subsidy from 80% to 70% a few years after I retired) but employees of BP (my former employer) hired after about 2000 do not have retirement health insurance. My sister who works at 3M in a middle manager position had her retirement medical greatly curtailed (the froze the benefit as did IBM, I believe).
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I would agree with you if all Americans were affected by the exchange part of the law, but barely 3% of Americans are so affected.
Retiree medical is a different story. Public employee generous retiree medical is a real problem for tax payers at all levels and that playing field needs to be leveled.
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