Posted on 05/02/2014 4:55:16 AM PDT by lowbridge
The Affordable Care Act could save some of America’s largest corporations hundreds of billions of dollars over the next decade, according to a market analyst group.
According to a report by S&P Capital IQ released Thursday, S&P 500 companies will likely move their employees from employer-provided health insurance plans to the healthcare exchanges under the Affordable Care Act, saving employers nearly $700 billion through the year 2025. If current healthcare inflation stays constant, those savings could be greater than $800 billion, researchers found.
Corporations are expected to start out by dropping low-wage and part-time workers from their employer insurance plans since they are able to reap the benefits of government tax subsidies under ObamaCare, leading them to pick up new plans under the healthcare law. Eventually, the burden of healthcare coverage will shift from employers to employees.
“Neither lawmakers nor the White House originally anticipated the idea that the ACA could provide corporations with an enormous subsidy to earnings,” say authors of the report. “However, once a few notable companies start to depart from their traditional approach to health care benefits, it's likely that a substantial number of firms could quickly follow suit.”
As some Republicans have softened their tone on repealing the new healthcare law before the November elections, authors of the report say the political battle may shift to try fix it by making it more market-oriented, increasing coverage options and updating federal regulations.
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
Well, it doesn’t surprise me, as I know the press and driveby media talking heads are “friggin retards”.
It wouldn’t surprise me at all to hear they actually believe whatever the Magic Negro tells them.
I teach at a big university down South. It still amazes me how dumb journalism students are and how unmotivated they are to learning. It is 24/7 partying for most of them. Luckily, as a Computer Scientist, very few if any take my courses!
I knew it was inevitable. Think about how much time, money, and resources companies devote to managing employees’ health insurance, rather than their core business.
Wait until she retires, their costs will skyrocket.
I know. Hubby and I are both retired and have been paying for our own health insurance for over 9 years. If we had the money keeping that insurance had cost us........
“S&P 500 companies will likely move their employees from employer-provided health insurance plans to the healthcare exchanges under the Affordable Care Act,”
My employer will not “move me onto the exchange.” They may drop my current employer provided health insurance, but I will not join the exchange.
And w the paycuts, a Great Depression.
How can that be, since it will be repealed?
As an employer, if I'm paying an employee $30/hour in direct wages and I'm picking up the cost of a medical insurance policy that translates to around $5/hour for him, it's true that I am effectively paying him $35/hour (let's leave aside any other benefits he may be receiving). But that doesn't mean I'm going to go to great lengths to look for opportunities to eliminate that medical plan just to save $5/hour in costs. Think of it this way:
1. If I'm looking to save $5/hour in labor costs with this employee, it might be easier to just reduce the direct salary to $25/hour either by cutting his pay or (more likely) by hiring someone else to do the same job for less money.
2. It costs more than $5/hour to pay for an insurance plan that translates to a $5/hour cost for this employee. There's an administrative side of this that costs money and is increasingly bureaucratic, legalistic and complex. To be frank with you, it is an enormous pain in the @ss. I'm not in the health care business ... I'm in the business of selling Product X or Service Y. And yes, I'd be perfectly fine just paying the employee $35/hour and letting him deal with his insurance needs on his own. Getting involved in health care for my employees isn't much different than negotiating with their landlords or mortgage lenders, or attending parent-teacher conferences for their children. Did I mention that it's an enormous pain in the @ss?
Exactly. See my previous post just above this one.
The only reason that employers got involved in health insurance in the first place, was as a workaround for wage controls.
Right. But the U.S. tax code also provides an incentive for it by making it a tax-deductible expense for employers. If my employer buys a life insurance policy for me, I have to report the premiums as income. But if my employer covers my medical insurance costs, it’s tax-deductible to the employer as a “business expense” and I don’t have to report it on my own tax return.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.