Which Companies have dropped their insurance plans so far?

After inquiring with Trader Joe's I received this interesting reply
Hello Steve,

Thank you for writing to us. It's possible you have been misled, at least to some degree, by the headlines in some articles regarding our reasons for implementing the ACA in January. We'd like to take this opportunity to clarify some facts.
For over 77% of our Crew Members there is absolutely no change to their healthcare coverage provided by Trader Joe's.

The ACA brings a new potential player into the arena for the acquisition of health care. Stated quite simply, the law is centered on providing low cost options to people who do not make a lot of money. Somewhat by definition, the law provides those people a pretty good deal for insurance...a deal that can't be matched by us-or any company. However, an individual employee (we call them Crew Member) is only able to receive the tax credit from the exchanges under the act if we do not offer them insurance under our company plan.

Perhaps an example will help. A Crew Member called in the other day and was quite unhappy that she was being dropped from our coverage unless she worked more hours. She is a single mom with one child who makes $18 per hour and works about 25 hours per week. We ran the numbers for her. She currently pays $166.50 per month for her coverage with Trader Joe's. Because of the tax credits under the ACA she can go to an exchange and purchase insurance that is almost identical to our plan for $69.59 per month. Accordingly, by going to the exchange she will save $1,175 each year...and that is before counting the $500 we will give her in January.
While we understand her fear of change, at her income level this is a big benefit that we will help her achieve.

Clearly, there are others who will go to the exchanges and will be required to pay more. That is usually because they have other income and typically a spouse who had a job with no benefits and they do not qualify for the subsidies under the ACA. One example of that we had yesterday was the male Crew Member who worked an average of 20 hours per week but had a spouse who is a contract consultant who makes more than $200,000 per year. The Crew Member worked for the medical benefits and unfortunately for them they are likely to have to pay more because of their real income.
We understand how important healthcare coverage is to our Crew Members and we are pleased to be able to provide and support this program.

We do hope this information helps, and we appreciate your interest in Trader Joe's.

I wish they had stated why there would be no change to their coverage. Cynical little me considers the possibility that 77% might be ineligible for coverage anyway.

I don't think so but I emailed them back.

You're probably right. These thoughts come from just a few people and business that were very deceptive in their way of stating facts.

BOOKMARK.

You do understand that Obamacare is not a single payer healthcare initiative, right?

Is there a handbook out there with this stuff in it? I'd sure like to know what I am supposed to think before I actually think it. Sure would make my life easier.

Will Your Employer Drop Coverage Under Obamacare?

The promise from President Obama was straightforward enough: "If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan. Period. No one will take it away," he said.

That was four years ago, during the build-up to the passage of the Affordable Care Act. Today, just months before several major provisions of the law take full-effect, many Americans still aren't sure whether to believe him.

And for good reason. Wildly conflicting predictions are being reported almost daily.

Last month, the consulting firm Towers Watson released a survey in which 98 percent of employers reported they will keep "active medical plans for 2014 and 2015." But as the conservative Heritage Foundation points out, the same study found that 92 percent of employers said they would likely change their health insurance options by 2018, the year the law's "Cadillac" tax on high-cost plans takes effect, with 47 percent saying they "anticipated significant or transformative change."

Meanwhile, a new report from PricewaterhouseCoopers found that in Massachusetts -- where the model for the federal plan was enacted seven years ago -- employer-sponsored coverage rose rather than fell. "The number of people covered by insurance through the workplace increased by about 1 percentage point, running counter to the rest of the nation, which saw employer-based insurance decline by 5.7 percentage points," the report said.

But will that hold true on a national scale? Maybe not. Many companies are heavily considering forcing retirees and part-time workers onto the exchanges after the ACA kicks in, according to a survey by the National Business Group on Health.

And just last month, UPS announced that it will stop offering coverage to the spouses of 15,000 workers because they will be able to find coverage elsewhere. The company wrote in a memo to employees that rising medical costs "combined with the costs associated with the Affordable Care Act, have made it increasingly difficult to continue providing the same level of health care benefits to our employees at an affordable cost."

Whichever way it goes, the stakes are high, as analysis published Monday in the journal Health Affairs points out. Tom Buchmueller, a professor of risk management and insurance at the University of Michigan, explains why in four simple bullet points:

"The [health reform] provisions affecting employers directly ... all increase the likelihood that firms will offer coverage."

But if that doesn't happen, "a reduction in employer coverage might increase federal outlays if it led to more workers' receiving premium tax credits in the exchanges or enrolling in Medicaid."

"If the employers that dropped coverage had relatively less healthy workers, that change would worsen the exchange risk pool and drive up average premiums as a result."

"Finally, the Affordable Care Act was presented to the American public as a reform that would not seriously disrupt existing employer-sponsored coverage. To the approximately 170 million Americans who have such coverage and are for the most part satisfied with it, a large-scale dropping of coverage by employers would be an unwelcome surprise."

So what's Buchmueller's prediction? When it comes to large firms, very little will change, he said. For smaller firms, all bets are off. To find out why, the NewsHour spoke with Buchmueller late last week.

Interview can be found at link. It's interesting.

Think whatever you like. Are you saying that you don't like the fact that companies are paying their employees to buy health insurance on the exchanges than providing health insurance themselves? If not, why not?

Keep screwing around with Obamacare at your great political peril, tea partyites.

Cherrypicking biased surveys

I can cite a survey that shows the majority of uninsured Americans believe that Obamacare will make their lives worse.

It's amazing, in my opinion, when someone, who is uninsured, thinks that health insurance would make his life (sic!) worse.

Finn said he "could" show such a survey, but he chose not to. I have no idea if such a survey exists or not, but I can understand the rationale. Folks who live paycheck to paycheck without insurance pray they never get sick. When they do their only option (currently) is to find a clinic or an emergency room. Clinics are far and few between, so it usually means a trip to the ER.

Under the new law premiums of up to 9.5% of your income is considered "affordable". The law was intended to expand Medicaid eligibility so that people living paycheck to paycheck without insurance would qualify for Medicaid. Unfortunately, many states have chosen not to do that. Medicaid is a state-run program, supplemented by the Feds. The states determine their own eligibility limits - some of which decided not to take the candy offered by the Feds to pay for the first three years of increased costs. So, you're left with a group of people who are looking at 9.5% of their income being deemed "affordable" when they're already trying to get by on what they earn.

What happens after 3 years? Who foots the bill for the insurance after that? I'm sure those states that didn't move forward with the exchanges are going to be better off after the 3 years then the states that used them. If they Fed's are only helping with the first 3 years, who picks up the tab after that?

The states do, of course, which is why those states (primarily red states who don't like to pay for social services of any kind) have chosen not to join the program. It's a philosophical difference on the proper role of government. Should the Feds support the cost of every American (single payer), should it fall to the states, or is it not a role of government at all? People differ in how they would answer that question. I come down on the side of single payer at the federal level, but I understand that others disagree and they tend to be living in red states.

I suppose that I'm caught in our system: visits to an ER/ED/A&E are covered by the (private and/or mandatory) health insurgence here (and ER's in Germany are for medical emergencies; for other medical need, there's always an out-of-hours service by GPs and specialists).

In the mandatory system, we pay 8.2 %, the employer 7.3%.

If your friend could hire 12 more people and I assume make more money as a result, not doing it because of govt paperwork is a poor excuse. And, I doubt the 'paperwork' is that excessive. Bottom line, workers need health insurance.

That's true and not Obama's fault.

If you're talking about the congressman from Arkansas and his 'little' helpers, that is a poor reference.

I heard the federal government was going to continue to pick up 90% of the tab.