Tag Archives: Kaiser Family Foundation

What We Know And Don’t Know About Obamacare, Part I

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Obamacare's third open enrollment season launched yesterday. Here are six things we know about the program. (Tomorrow: four things we still don't know.) Credit:americanlegislator.org

Oba­macare’s third open enroll­ment sea­son launched yes­ter­day. Here are six things we know about the pro­gram. (Tomor­row: four things we still don’t know.) Credit:americanlegislator.org

Obamacare’s third open enroll­ment sea­son has kicked off, begin­ning the next chap­ter in its tur­bu­lent his­to­ry.  Today’s post dis­cuss­es what we know about Oba­macare.  Tomorrow’s will dis­cuss what we still don’t know.

What We Know

Few­er peo­ple are unin­sured. How many few­er is a mat­ter of dis­pute, but the improve­ment is sub­stan­tial by any mea­sure.  HHS Sec­re­tary Sylvia Bur­well cred­its Oba­macare with reduc­ing the num­ber of unin­sured peo­ple by 17.6 mil­lion since 2010.   And though you’ll like­ly hear this num­ber repeat­ed (and often round­ed up to 18 mil­lion), it’s almost cer­tain­ly exag­ger­at­ed.   Con­tin­ue read­ing →

Obamacare And The Daughters of (40% Less) Charity

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The President last week professed his love -- appropriately chaste, of course -- for Sister Carol Keehan, president of the Catholic Health Association and tireless Obamacare advocate. [Credit: Wikipedia]

The Pres­i­dent last week pro­fessed his love — appro­pri­ate and chaste, of course — for Sis­ter Car­ol Kee­han, pres­i­dent of the Catholic Health Asso­ci­a­tion and tire­less Oba­macare advo­cate. [Cred­it: Wikipedia]

I just love nuns gen­er­al­ly.  I’m just say­ing.  – Pres­i­dent Oba­ma, June 9

And nuns just love him too.  At least nuns who run hos­pi­tals seem to.  And with good rea­son: the Pres­i­dent advo­cates poli­cies that enable hos­pi­tals like those oper­at­ed by the Daugh­ters of Char­i­ty to pro­vide less char­i­ty.  Con­tin­ue read­ing →

Let States Exchange Obamacare For Something Better

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Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper established an Obamacare state exchange that is now "teetering," according to a state official. [Credit: mnginteractive.com]

Col­orado Gov­er­nor John Hick­en­loop­er estab­lished an Oba­macare state exchange that is now “tee­ter­ing,” accord­ing to a state offi­cial. [Cred­it: mnginteractive.com]

In the 34 states that did not estab­lish Oba­macare exchanges, Gov­er­nors ner­vous­ly await a Supreme Court rul­ing that could throw their health insur­ance mar­kets into chaos. Mean­while, many of the Gov­er­nors who did estab­lish exchanges are regret­ting their decision.

More than five years after its enact­ment, Oba­macare has proven a bit­ter brew for many states.  Nowhere is this more evi­dent than in health care exchanges.  Con­tin­ue read­ing →

Obamacare By The Numbers: Medicaid

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Obamacare supporters are greatly inflating estimates of the number of previously uninsured people that have gained coverage because of the new law. Here's sensible look at the numbers. [Credit: CNN/Money]

Oba­macare sup­port­ers are great­ly inflat­ing esti­mates of the num­ber of pre­vi­ous­ly unin­sured peo­ple that have gained cov­er­age because of the new law. Here’s sen­si­ble look at the num­bers. [Cred­it: CNN/Money]

Near­ly 13 mil­lion Amer­i­cans now have health insur­ance thanks to Oba­macare. Tell Repub­li­cans to stop vot­ing to take their cov­er­age away. – Demo­c­ra­t­ic Leg­isla­tive Cam­paign Com­mit­tee peti­tion drive

Hyper­bole over how many peo­ple have pre­sum­ably gained health cov­er­age as the result of Oba­macare won’t sub­side any­time soon. At its cur­rent pace, we seem des­tined to reach the point where the num­ber of peo­ple who are alleged to have gained cov­er­age because of Oba­macare sur­pass­es the num­ber that lacked cov­er­age in the first place. Con­tin­ue read­ing →

A Modest (And Potentially Bipartisan) Obamacare Proposal

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Here are three changes Congress should make to Obamacare: 1) no cancellations; 2) no bailouts; 3) no tax on the uninsured. [Credit: thinkquest.org]

Here are three changes Con­gress should make to Oba­macare: 1) no can­cel­la­tions; 2) no bailouts; 3) no tax on the unin­sured. [Cred­it: thinkquest.org]

Here’s a crazy idea: Repub­li­cans and at least some Democ­rats say they sup­port mak­ing changes to Oba­macare; why doesn’t Con­gress give vot­ers a pleas­ant sur­prise and change it?

These changes would be polit­i­cal­ly pop­u­lar, rel­a­tive­ly mod­est and enjoy at least some bipar­ti­san sup­port. Although the pre­vail­ing polit­i­cal cli­mate makes it hard for law­mak­ers to do any­thing of sub­stance, mak­ing the health care law more friend­ly to con­sumers and less accom­mo­dat­ing to cor­po­rate inter­ests would appeal to vot­ers across the spec­trum. Con­tin­ue read­ing →