About Face

This is really no surprise to anyone who has been watching Barack Obama’s regular reversals on campaign promises, routine double-speak and outright hypocrisy on subject after after subject. But today he carefully executed a tight little pirouette and completely reversed himself on what is probably one of the most important promises he made during the campaign that had a lot to do with getting him elected.

Instead of the oft-repeated promise that people would get to keep health insurance they are happy with, Obama firmly announced that the government would force them to switch. Which is completely dodging the fact that the government’s perverse incentives would make companies opt out of offering any health insurance. This has always been the danger of the Democrat’s big plans.

Every bill now being drafted in Congress would establish a “pay or play”-type choice for employers: Employers must either offer government-approved coverage to workers (“play”) or pay a tax to the government instead to partially cover the costs of their premiums for insurance secured through a new “exchange” system. For years, Democrats have argued that this construct would ensure that reform “builds upon” the employer-based insurance system. But, in fact, the Democratic approach to reform would have exactly the opposite effect. Employers would get burdened with new costs and insurance requirements, even as the government used price controls to offer a government-run insurance option with artificially low premiums and provided new subsidies for coverage only for workers getting insurance through the “exchange.” That’s a recipe for dismantling job-based insurance. The Lewin Group has estimated that, assuming certain plausible specifications, some 119 million people would end up leaving job-based coverage for a government-run plan as employers opted to “pay” rather than “play.”

Faced with incontrovertible evidence that he and his allies have no intention or ability to fulfill their commitment to Americans regarding their current coverage, President Obama decided today at his press conference to try to redefine the promise. What he meant, he now says, is that the government wouldn’t force people out of their health-care plan. If tens of millions of people get pushed out of their current coverage, it would be because firms chose to drop their insurance plans – never mind the fact that they would do so based on the financial incentives the government put in place.

As I see it, based on what little is being leaked at this point, the very first victims to lose their health coverage will be those who retired from companies before the age of 65 and who have “bridge” health care coverage until they reach aged 65. Then it will be employees of companies that simply make the calculation that it is cheaper to pay than it is to play – especially since the falsely low cost government option will inevitably drive up the cost of playing.

The left knows full well – as does Obama – that a government option will destroy the private health insurance market. They also know that a lot of people will, indeed, lose the coverage they like. They simply do not care.

Add to that the fact that Congress will exempt itself and Federal employees from the rules they will impose on the rest of us and you should be able to see where this is heading. It is not going to be pretty and there will be a lot of very unhappy voters in a very short period of time after they find out what has been done to them.

But your private, employer-based insurance? Gone. Bet on it.