By Lt. Governor Peter Kinder
Controversy erupted this week over whether Missourians should sign up for healthcare exchanges when the enrollment period starts next week.
A better question is: Why must they?
Last month, a survey of federal employees and retirees found that 92.3 percent believe federal workers should keep their current health insurance and not be forced into Obamacare. Meanwhile, for members of Congress, the president and for their staffs, the answer to whether they should sign up is, “not yet.”
Under the headline “Internal Senate email warns lawmakers not to sign up for Obamacare yet,” The Washington Times on Wednesday reported lawmakers are being advised to hold off on enrolling in health exchanges while the administration finalizes the rules to keep paying for their premiums.
Even the IRS workers union – the federal agency that will enforce Obamacare – is demanding an exemption from the law.
So why should Missourians be forced to comply when our lawmakers in Washington, the president, the Supreme Court and their staffs won’t?
To determine eligibility for health insurance subsidies, Obamacare’s federal exchange must compile information about you and your family from the Treasury Department, the IRS and the Department of Justice, all under the umbrella of the federal Department of Health and Human Services. Aside from the federal government’s having your personal medical data, the potential for abuse or a security breach with a central data hub is mind-boggling.
Again, why must Missourians risk their private, personal information to comply with this boondoggle?
On June 5, 2008, President Obama vowed the Affordable Care Act would “lower premiums by up to $2,500 for a typical family per year.” But, according to the Administration’s own Department of Health and Human Services, individually purchased insurance premiums would go up by an average $2,100 per family due to Obamacare. And many of these plans are Medicaid managed care plans, with limited access to provider networks.
Why should Missourians have to sign up for a healthcare plan they overwhelmingly don’t want and which is likely to increase their healthcare costs while diminishing their care?
Union leaders formerly were the most avid supporters of Obamacare. Now, however, the AFL-CIO, Teamsters and other major unions are in full attack mode, demanding they be allowed to keep their current plans.
Unions are using their leverage to be shielded from a law they supported, while Missourians are compelled to sign up for a law we have rejected over and over.
A landmark study published in the “Annals of Surgery” found that patients on Medicaid have the worst health outcomes of any group in America – including people with no insurance at all. In-hospital mortality rates, lengths of stay and total costs of care all were highest for Medicaid patients. Other studies have found similar results. Obamacare’s health exchanges seek to extend these outcomes to tens of millions of Americans.
Should Missourians without health insurance – either by choice or because their employer has dropped coverage – enroll in the federal health exchange? That’s up to the individual. Everyone’s circumstances are different, and many people will have no other choice but to enroll.
That they have to for the sake of an unpopular, deeply flawed law from which its original supporters are exempt is outrageous.
