Under the new health care legislation, experts say the first changes Americans with employer-based insurance will see is in their benefits.

Companies don’t have to make any immediate tweaks to their plans, but they will have to incorporate a few of the federally mandated changes by open enrollment time late in 2010, said Tracy Watts, partner with employee benefits consulting firm Mercer.

The changes made this year will come into effect in 2011, with more phased in over the next few years until the law becomes fully implemented by 2018 or later.

Some of the changes will increase costs for employers, she said. Consequently, companies could share more of that burden by charging employees higher premiums and deductibles.

So here’s what you can to expect in 2011.

Dependent coverage to age 26: This is one of the most significant changes, said Watts.

Currently there are different laws in different states regarding the timeframe for dependent coverage. Typically employers provide coverage for dependents ’till age 22 or 23.

In 2011, employers will have to provide coverage for dependents of employees who don’t have access to other employer-based health care coverage ’till age 26 with the exception of a few states which mandate this coverage until age 28 or 29, she said.

Watts said this measure could raise costs for companies, depending how many workers they have with dependents this age.

“This measure goes into the ‘cost increase’ column for employers and could potentially result in higher premiums for employees overall,” she said.

No lifetime dollar limits: Many employer-based health insurance plans have lifetime maximum limits on insurance of $1 million or $2 million. The new law eliminates all lifetime caps, said Watts.

“This is a very good benefit for employees,” said Watts. “In the event of a catastrophic accident or illness, employees no longer have to worry that their benefit will run out.”

No reimbursement for over-the-counter drugs: Currently, employees can get reimbursed for the money they use to buy over-the-counter drugs from their flexible spending accounts (FSA) or Health Savings Account (HSA) to buy over-the-counter medications.

These accounts typically enable individuals and families to pay for out-of-pocket medical expenses not covered by their insurance plans with tax free dollars.

The new law removes reimbursements when the accounts are tapped for buying non-prescription drugs, said Watts.

Higher penalty for misusing Health Savings Accounts: Under the new law, employees who use their HSA money for a non-qualified medical expense will face a higher penalty, said Watts.

“The most frequent example of a non-qualified expense is if you use your HSA money to buy a flatscreen TV,” said Watts.

Report health coverage on W-2 forms: Employers will have to report the value of an employee’s health care plan on W-2 forms.

“This is not the value of your claims but the value of the coverage you elected,” said Watts.

Cap on Flexible Spending Account contributions: Although this change does not kick in until 2013, the new law will limit employee contributions to FSAs to $2,500 a year.

These accounts enable individuals and families to pay for out-of-pocket medical expenses not covered by their insurance plans with tax free dollars.

Many employers have their own caps on FSA contributions and the cap for federal employees is $5,000.

“This seems like a significant change but our surveys shows that the average amount put into an FSA is typically $1,500 a year,” said Watts.

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With Health Care Reform on the ropes isn’t it obvious that the Administration is just trying to change the subject? If Obama can get Bush in the news instead of town hall meetings where angry Americans are fighting for their rights then that will relieve some of the pressure.

This isn’t Hope and Change. This is blame Bush for everything and then try to sneak another Bill past the American people. It has the stench of Rahm “dead fish” Emanuel.

By Changing the subject, Obama can drum up angst over the supposed torture carried out by the Bush Administration over the last 8 years which will provide cover for his cronies as they twist a few arms in the Senate and get the Health Care Reform passed. Of course NBC, MSNBC, ABC, and CBS will follow their marching orders and show nothing about the Health care takeover and do nothing but Bash Bush 24/7.

Its nothing more than a cheap political manuever. This is why you don’t vote for a politician promising change and hope. Its all bull crap.

Wake up America! This guy is transforming our country into an authoritarian nightmare and WE need to stop it.

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The big story, for me, is that there is a huge outcry of negativity for the health care proposals put forth by the House. Congress is on a break and the town hall meetings are filled with angry citizens who want the government to back off their health care.

But what’s being said about these people in the town hall meetings? Oh, they’re nothing but a bunch of corporate sponsored political hacks. Or they’re a bunch of loud, angry idiots who are trying to shout down free speech by talking louder than everybody else. They’re just a bunch of thugs.

Think about it for a second. It makes no sense to even say that. There is no evidence of it. There is nothing that would indicate that it is even remotely true. So why even say it?

Saul Alinsky, that’s why. The Saul Alinsky method of dealing with opposition is to “isolate and ridicule” any opposition to the radical liberal cause. That’s why these legitimate citizens are being trampled on by the media and the Democrats in Washington.

If you look back at how they handled the Tea Party protestors you’ll remember they were called “tea baggers, ” a derogatory term for a type of sexual conduct. This fits right into the Alinsky model of thinking. The only thugs here are the Dems in Washington and the people pulling their strings.

Glenn Beck has done a wonderful job at exposing this methodology. He has shown us that while the “Community Organizer” tag that was used to try and ridicule Obama was much more powerful than anyone could have thought. Community organizers have lots of money, and lots of mindless willing foot soldiers. Community organizers are not afraid to throw their own under the bus in order to propel the cause onward. Community organizers use the Saul Alinsky method of reaching their goals and they will bulldoze anything and anybody in order to do it.

So, while the news and the Dems in Washington are ridiculing the people who disagree with them, the people must be strong and stay loud, obnoxious and be heard. The only way to beat these people is to beat them into submission. And if that doesn’t work, then we can beat them right out the door in 2010.

http://boortz.com/blogging/mt-tb.cgi/39333

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Well it has been a busy week for all of us!!

The Counter Protest was another great success for the 9-12 Project and Northern Colo. Tea Party!! There were approx. 100 Organizing for America (OFA) protesters and 450 9-12/Tea Party protesters at Mulberry and College in Ft. Collins on the 29th. The OFA folks were to march down to Markey’s office which when they lined up to march and then saw us line up to march, they simply left and went home. So Tom Buchanan led the way and we all marched down to Markey’s office and many went inside and expressed to her staff how they felt about health care reform bill HR 3200.

For a few moments it was intense inside the lobby but I must give Credit to Ms. Markey’s staff Ken Bennett and another staffer who listened and answered questions which is want everyone wanted. There were many people there that I did not know but the 9-12ers were respectful even though emotions were running high. GREAT JOB everyone!!!

Here is a link to a short video I made of the protest which gives a general idea of how many of us were there: http://www.loveland912project.org/videos it is the one labeled “counter protest”

Also here is a link to photographs of the protest taken by Jerry Long of J & K Photography: http://www.jandklongphotography.com/health-care-rally/index.html

Thanks Nancy!

So about 100 people showed up to rally IN FAVOR of national health care but 450 people showed up AGAINST IT! This was amazing! Yes more people showed up to the COUNTER protest than the actual protest. And the people IN FAVOR of it just WENT HOME! HA! that’s dedication for you!

This is what can happen when WE ORGANIZE and show up and express our opinion. The radical leftists do NOT have a monopoly on protesting and organizing. We need to keep at it folks and not let them pass a public option in health care reform. If congress DOES pass it, it will be the beginning of the END!

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1. Allow insurance companies to make “a la cart insurance plans.” This will allow the individual to customize their insurance plans based on costs that THE INDIVIDUAL is comfortable with. This will allow many of the poor and lower middle class to purchase basic coverage for themselves and for their families.

2. Allow individuals to purchase plans from out of state companies. This will allow for competition among the many different companies and will help drive costs down for the consumer.

3. Tort reform! America has so many lawyers that everybody is suing the pants off everybody! Doctors pay outrageous malpractice insurance rates that drive costs up. Limit the amount that can be awarded in malpractice suits so that doctors can worry about saving lives and less about getting sued.

4. Reform Medicare and Medicaid! over a third of their payments are fraudulent! This abuse is driving up health care costs as well as our national deficit! By eliminating the fraud, prices will start coming down due to efficiency and cost management. (Fraudulent payments drives prices higher because: 1. they are using up resources. 2.They are artificially Increasing demand. Basic economics: if supply decreases, price goes up… if demand increases, price goes up)

5. Start eliminating mandates by the government on what has to be covered by insurance companies. Or at least let the consumer opt out of certain types of coverage in order to obtain a cheaper rate.

These are just a few free market solutions to our health care problem. In none of these solutions is the government expanding its control over the industry or the people. In fact, people would be offered more health care choices and more affordable plans.

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5. Bioethics professor argues for rationing and discrimination in healthcare

Professor Singer, a professor of bioethics at Princeton University has an article in the New York Times that lays out his case in favor of government rationed health care.  His arguments are based on that rationing is going to happen, one way or the other.

For example he cites Sutent a drug used in Kidney Cancer patients that costs $54,000 and only extends a person’s life by 6 months.  He argues that while a man who could afford that would probably pay that amount to extend his life; a man would be upset to know that his insurance paid for that treatment for another person and therefore made his premiums go up as well. And while this may be true, he fails to explain WHY the insurance company would even consider paying for this treatment.  In fact, the reason why is the same reason health insurance in the U.S. is so expensive.

Professor Singer fails to comprehend, or intentionally omits the fact that government (either Federal or State) has implemented mandates to the health insurance industry.  Some of those mandates include the coverage of highly expensive, low result treatments like the Sutent drug.  These mandates number around 2000 these days.  With these 2000 mandates, the insurance industry has been forced to offer coverage that it would normally not cover due to high expense and low result.  Because of these higher expenses (mandated by the federal and state governments) insurance companies are not able to offer lower-coverage products that healthier and less wealthy people would be willing to purchase.  Instead, those people are left WITHOUT health insurance because they are not willing or able to pay.  He calls this rationing by price, but in reality the government has made it too expensive for people to purchase the insurance that they want or need.

Professor Singer also writes in favor of rationing by discrimination.  He assigns different value to life based on a person’s age, disability, and the cost of care.  He says that a teenager is more valuable than an 85 year old.  Or that public health insurance should only pay a certain amount to extend life one year. He claims that this happens already in an unseen fashion within the private sector.  But what Singer proposes is that a government body will do the rationing in place of the private sector.  This is evil.  When governments assign differing values to human life based on a set of criteria that the person cannot change (like age, disability, or cost of care), and then uses that criteria to assign the benefits of life saving care we no longer have a free society.  We would have an oppressive, discriminatory society; an evil society.  We would also lose the title of health care, we would have DEATH CARE.  Government would then determine who lives and who dies based on these criteria.   But this would not apply to the super rich, or the political elite.  They would of course, have a different set of rules.

Governments cannot be trusted to properly ration health care to the masses.  They will be influenced by special interest and their political ambitions.  It is their political ambitions that they feed now by proposing this health care public option.  Their actions over the many years have made health insurance so expensive that 45 million people cannot afford it.  When things are rationed in the free market it is done through efficiency which in the end brings costs DOWN.  In the long run the private health care system would make things more affordable if left alone.  The government mandates on health insurance are what brought the costs to skyrocket. 

So you see, the government has made health insurance more expensive by mandating coverage of certain items.  Then it demonizes the insurance industry for not covering the 45 million people that had to go without coverage while failing to mention that it was their own mandates that lead to them not being able to afford insurance in the first place.  Then they will offer a public plan that is supposed to bring the cost of coverage down while in reality it will undercut the private sector and drive costs up to the point where everyone will opt for the public plan.  Then they will begin rationing health care based on discriminatory criteria. And voila! We have an oppressive totalitarian regime, regulating every aspect of our life under the guise of “bringing down health care costs.”

So it is not the unseen rationing that we oppose, it is the government imposed rationing.  Government rationing of healthcare is cruel and inhumane and we cannot allow this to happen.

If this is what you get from a professor of bioethics at Princeton, I’d have to say… SAVE YOUR MONEY AND TAKE ONLINE CLASSES!!!!

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