Quote:

 

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2015/02/19/supreme-court-obamacare-plaintiffs/23630611/

Supreme Court case against Obamacare faces obstacles

A legal challenge that threatens to unravel President Obama's health care law has been stricken by a series of ill-timed setbacks before next month's Supreme Court showdown.

The four plaintiffs' qualifications to bring the lawsuit have been cast in doubt because of their low incomes and potential eligibility for other government benefits.....

Quote:

 

http://www.hekebolos.com/2015/02/hcas-king-v-burwell-brief-notes.html

HCA's King v. Burwell brief notes dramatic success of ACA for women

Last week, I wrote about the amicus brief in the King v. Burwell case that was filed by Hospital Corporation of America, the nation's largest private-sector provider of medical care. The brief concludes that the arguments of the plaintiffs, who are attempting to strip federal exchange Obamacare subsidies from some 7 million people, defies logic. So far, so good.

A detail of the brief, however, elaborates on a specific policy success of the Affordable Care Act's federal exchange: demonstrable improvements in access to health care for women. As the original brief explains, one of the main goals of passing health care reform was to improve access to care for women. To support the claim that denying subsidies on the federal exchange would defeat the entire purpose of the law, HCA compiled data for its facilities operating in states served by federal exchanges, and noted just how much women with federal exchange insurance are benefiting compared to their uninsured counterparts. The data HCA presents is remarkable: for instance, 77 percent of the oncology care given to patients with federal exchange insurance goes to women. 65 percent of HCA's patients insured on the federal exchange are women, vs. 53 percent of insured patients--suggesting that uninsured women are forgoing care at a higher rate than male counterparts. And women with federal exchange insurance are three times more likely to get recommended breast ultrasounds than uninsured patients. So why does this matter? As Emily Crockett at RH Reality Check says:

• 
  
• The brief draws special attention to the health benefits for women insured through the exchanges because Congress also paid special attention to women’s health issues in the Affordable Care Act—like covering women’s health services as “essential benefits,” or banning the practice of charging women more for health insurance. The Supreme Court case determining the fate of Obamacare hinges on what Congress intended when it wrote the law. If Congress intended to benefit women’s health, HCA argues, it can’t possibly have wanted millions of women to go without the essential care they can only afford thanks to the federal exchange subsidies.

When arguing about whose interpretation of a law is correct, context and Congressional intent matters. The statistics HCA brings to the table prove just how successful Obamacare has been at achieving the intent of improving health care for women. CATO's Michael Cannon, by contrast, would apparently prefer to see poor women die slowly from cancer than allow them to afford insurance.[/i]

chatham

Feb 21 2015, 08:26 AM

kbp

Feb 21 2015, 08:22 AM

I never understood why there was a limited signup period.

Insurance companies require it to determine future costs.

LTC8K6

Feb 21 2015, 09:22 AM

chatham

Feb 21 2015, 08:26 AM

kbp

Feb 21 2015, 08:22 AM

I never understood why there was a limited signup period.

Insurance companies require it to determine future costs.

So what happens to their cost estimates now?

Quote:

 

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2015/02/william-levin-battle-station-alert-on-the-left.php

Battle station alert on the left

• 
  
• William Levin is a graduate of Yale Law School, former clerk on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals and former special assistant in the Department of Justice, Office of Legal Counsel. He writes to comment on developments related to the Supreme Court’s pending decision in King v. Burwell on the legality of Obamacare subsidies provided via exchanges established by the federal government. Bill assumes that the Supreme Court will get the case right; it’s not impossible. On the merits, it’s not a close case. Bill’s analysis of the forces arrayed is of interest regardless of the outcome:

Steven Hayward correctly spotlights the panic on the left as King v. Burwell enters its final phase, adroitly terming it working the refs. Others call it battlespace preparation. In all cases, it is establishing the Narrative, which in the case of King v. Burwell is dedicated to the simple proposition that ending Obamacare subsidies will hurt the poor, even resulting in public epidemics and possible deaths. The move is a concession that the case is legally hopeless and it is on to politics.

This makes for a worthwhile moment to pause, because the case is like a control in a science experiment. We can view in slow motion the steps in the game book.

First, delegitimize the law. This is by now the basic requirement of the Obama era, seen in full force in the unauthorized delays in Obamacare implementation and most recently, immigration amnesty by executive decree. In King, Jeffrey Toobin seeks the most ridiculous incarnation by claiming at this late date that plaintiffs lack standing. Not a single court accepted this argument in the court cases below, nor is the government even arguing the point to the Supreme Court. The explanation is not difficult to find.

Plaintiffs are from Virginia, where only the federal exchange operates. They do not want to participate in Obamacare and, due to low income, would properly be exempt from the ACA individual mandate to buy compliant insurance. But due to the subsidy, their cost of healthcare falls below the exemption line, set at 8 percent of disposable income, and they must either purchase unwanted insurance or pay a penalty. Both outcomes constitute a financial injury specifically and directly owing to the IRS regulations in dispute.

And yet here is Toobin farcically arguing that this clearcut case of standing is part and parcel of the conservative effort to thwart worthy liberal challenges to government actions, from the environment to welfare rights. Not surprisingly, Toobin fails to mention the real culprit in standing abuse represented by cases such as Massachusetts v. EPA, where petitioners sought to compel promulgation of new car standards based on greenhouse gas emissions.

There a true difficulty existed in finding a party who was specifically harmed. Under Supreme Court jurisprudence, since the founding of the Republic, no such party existed. Yet five justices found a novel solution, in two parts.

They articulated a doctrine, without textual language or precedent, that Massachusetts is not subject to the same showing of harm as all other litigants heretofore in federal court. And they accepted the following claim of causation and redress as not speculative: new cars emit carbon dioxide and other emissions; these new car emissions contribute to global warming (80 percent originating outside the U.S.); but no matter how small the total contribution to world emissions (tiny), or how complex the causal path (utterly unproven), it is reasonable to conclude that in the absence of new car standards, the specific harm Massachusetts will suffer is a loss of coastal land, redressable by issuance of the proper new car standards (hilarious and unproven).

And no one is supposed to notice when such a rule conveniently applies for global warming, but not, according to liberals, when it comes time to challenge Obama’s immigration amnesty in federal court, or as in King, when specifically injured plaintiffs file suit in the ordinary course to protect their rights.

This gives rise to a subpart of the playbook. Even if it is logically, legally and practically inconsistent, scream bloody murder like Toobin whenever you lose, or break the law apart, as in the EPA case, if it serves your immediate aims. Much the same dynamic is at work in the Democratic use of the Senate filibuster, tyranny one day, majority rule the next.

Second, ignore the facts. Obamacare was passed in 2010. The IRS regulations creating a subsidy for the federal exchanges were promulgated in 2012. Had the IRS not intervened, the law would have worked as intended. States would have been pressured to establish exchanges so that its citizens would receive subsidies. But by passing the regulations, the IRS eliminated the pressure on the states and in due course 36 declined to set up an exchange.

In a normal world, the guilty party would be the IRS for interfering with a federal statute by offering a false promise. Instead, we will get a steady stream of stories that simply assume a world of horrible injustice. The heroic tale of a successful challenge by low-income plaintiffs to restore the law as written will have to wait for a suitable, politically correct cause, preferably dramatized on Scandal.

Third, create victims. At least 33 amici briefs have been filed on behalf of the government’s position. For the most part, they are unapologetic policy briefs that do not even pretend to consider the legal issue of an unauthorized subsidy. The identity of the filing parties gives a sense of the field day in the offing for the modern lobby state.

Aside from the obvious briefs from insurers and hospitals, consider the range of special pleadings, including, just to name a few, the American Academy of Pediatrics (always the children), AARP (or the elderly), Jewish Alliance for Law and Social Action (religious minorities), Professors of Health Law and Constitutional Law (the benefits of tenure), American Cancer Society (the sick), AFL-CIO (union employees), Asian American Advancing Justice (okay Asians specifically), Bipartisan Economic Scholars (not just for law faculty), Eskridge, Ferejohn, Fried, Manheim, Strauss (okay, specially self-regarding law professors), and, just to round out the list, Former Government Officials (seriously).

Fourth, make it easy for the press. The amici are dripping with the material needed for the leads in the days following the King decision ending federal subsidies. For a random heading setting the tone of the debate, see the brief from the Harvard Law School Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation arguing that “Reversal of the judgment below would deprive millions of recently insured Americans of new-found access to health insurance, seriously threaten health outcomes, and undermine the nation’s ability to address epidemics and other public health threats.”

It matters not that the allegations have no relationship to the law passed by Congress, the legal controversy committed for review by the Supreme Court or the continuing harm done by the government itself to workable alternatives. Nor to be missed are the amici briefs as self-serving calls for interviews by the press, led by prominent lawyers and institutions, with throngs ready to help on background, and the full resource of notes listed in the citations of sources. Petitioner amici briefs offer the same, but except in rare occasions, their services will be duly ignored as partisan.

President Obama likes to pride himself on his faux news realism that if it bleeds it leads. In truth, the adage has been permanently updated. If someone of prominence or reputation, or more simply an unnamed administration insider, says it bleeds, or could have bled, or should have bled, so long as the cause is just, it leads.

They don’t call it the Narrative for nothing.

Quote:

 

http://kaiserhealthnews.org/news/obama-administration-disallows-plans-without-hospital-coverage/

Obama Administration Disallows Plans Without Hospital Coverage

The Obama administration has blocked health plans without hospital benefits that many large employers argued fulfilled their obligations under the Affordable Care Act.

Companies with millions of workers, mainly in lower-wage industries such as staffing, retailing, restaurants and hotels that had not offered health coverage previously, had been flocking toward such insurance for 2015.

Plans lacking substantial coverage of hospital and physician services do not qualify as “minimum value” coverage under the law and so do not shield employers from fines of $3,000 or more per worker, the Department of Health and Human Services said late Friday.

The move closes what many saw as a surprising loophole, first reported by Kaiser Health News in September, that let companies bypass the health law’s strictest standard for large-employer coverage while at the same time stranding workers in sub-par insurance. Employees offered such plans would have been ineligible for tax credits to buy more comprehensive coverage in the law’s online marketplaces.

The agency did decide to allow such plans for this year only if employers had signed contracts by Nov. 4.

However, it also granted relief to workers offered such coverage, saying they may receive tax credits according to their income to buy more comprehensive insurance in the online exchanges. Ordinarily, employees offered coverage qualifying as minimum value aren’t eligible for the subsidies.

[...]

The Affordable Care Act does not specify “essential health benefits” in large-employer plans, such as hospitalization and drugs, as it does for individual and small-business insurance. Instead, the minimum-value test requires large companies to cover at least 60 percent of expected medical costs.

One way to certify a plan as minimum value is to plug its components — benefits, deductibles and so forth — into the official calculator. Many were shocked to learn that the calculator gave passing scores to plans with no inpatient hospital coverage.

Now HHS is saying: Ignore the calculator. Large-employer plans must pay for substantial amounts of hospital care no matter what.

[...]

Quote:

 

http://kaiserhealthnews.org/news/supreme-court-case-may-be-a-wake-up-call-for-republicans/

Supreme Court Case May Be A Wake-Up Call For Republicans

Republican efforts to replace the federal health law have been given new urgency by the Supreme Court.

As soon as this spring, the court could invalidate health insurance subsidies available to millions of Americans if it rules for the challengers in a case called King v. Burwell.

Republicans who hate the Affordable Care Act are rooting for the court to do what they have been unable to accomplish – dismantle a key part of the law. But as the party that controls Congress, some Republicans also fear the potential for a backlash if they don’t have a plan to help those who would effectively be stripped of coverage, many of whom are voters in Republican-led states.

There’s another reason to agree soon on a replacement for the law, instead of continuing their long campaign to repeal it. If Republicans present a reasonable alternative, it could help swing a justice or two who might otherwise worry about the possible ramifications of cutting off the subsidies. Or so the reasoning goes.

“The Republicans would love to give the justices some comfort that if they rule against the Obama administration, there will be something there to deal with the fallout,” says Dean Clancy, a Republican strategist and former aide to House Majority Leader Dick Armey.

[...]

Baldo

Feb 23 2015, 12:15 PM

Obamacare Is Punishing Working-Class Americans

Employees at Staples will soon get a little bit more vacation — thanks to Obamacare. Unfortunately, that time off will be unpaid — and in most cases, unwelcome.

The retailer, which employs 85,000 people, has limited part-time work to 25 hours a week to avoid Obamacare’s fines for not providing insurance to those who work 30 or more hours a week.

President Obama refused to acknowledge that his healthcare law played a part in Staples’ decision. “I haven’t looked at Staples stock lately or what the compensation of the CEO is, but I suspect that they could well afford to treat their workers favorably,” he said of the company during a recent interview. “Shame on them.”

But if Obamacare had never become law, scores of working-class Americans would be logging more hours and making more money. The president’s health law has effectively taken money out of their pockets.

The main culprit is Obamacare’s employer mandate. This year, companies with 100 or more employees must provide all who put in 30 or more hours a week “affordable” insurance that meets Obamacare’s generous coverage standards. Next year, the rule will apply to companies with 50 or more workers.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/sallypipes/2015/02/23/obamacare-is-punishing-working-class-americans/

Baldo

Feb 23 2015, 12:15 PM

Obamacare Is Punishing Working-Class Americans

Employees at Staples will soon get a little bit more vacation — thanks to Obamacare. Unfortunately, that time off will be unpaid — and in most cases, unwelcome.

The retailer, which employs 85,000 people, has limited part-time work to 25 hours a week to avoid Obamacare’s fines for not providing insurance to those who work 30 or more hours a week.

President Obama refused to acknowledge that his healthcare law played a part in Staples’ decision. “I haven’t looked at Staples stock lately or what the compensation of the CEO is, but I suspect that they could well afford to treat their workers favorably,” he said of the company during a recent interview. “Shame on them.”

But if Obamacare had never become law, scores of working-class Americans would be logging more hours and making more money. The president’s health law has effectively taken money out of their pockets.

The main culprit is Obamacare’s employer mandate. This year, companies with 100 or more employees must provide all who put in 30 or more hours a week “affordable” insurance that meets Obamacare’s generous coverage standards. Next year, the rule will apply to companies with 50 or more workers.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/sallypipes/2015/02/23/obamacare-is-punishing-working-class-americans/

Quote:

 

Staples responded that the part-time policy is more than decade old and has nothing to do with the insurance requirements under Obamacare.

"Unfortunately, the president appears not to have all the facts," spokesman Kirk Saville told CNNMoney.

He said the initial BuzzFeed report is misleading, and that Staples has many opportunities for hourly workers to advance into full-time and management positions.

"It's unfortunate that the president is attacking a company that provides more than 85,000 jobs and is a major tax payer," he said.

Staples had 46,361 full-time workers and 36,647 part-time workers, as of its most recent regulatory filing, made about a year ago. That is about the same percentage of part-time workers as in 2008, prior to the passage of the Affordable Care Act.

Quote:

 

http://www.vox.com/2015/2/24/8092515/republicans-king-obamacare

If SCOTUS kills Obamacare subsidies, Republicans don’t have an exit strategy

If the Supreme Court rules for the plaintiffs in King v. Burwell, the decision would eliminate billions of dollars in subsidies received by Americans who bought coverage on Healthcare.gov. And Republicans, fresh off a victory of knocking a major hole in Obamacare , would face a vexing question: what now?

During a panel discussion at the American Enterprise Institute, Bloomberg View's Ramesh Ponnuru gave an especially helpful overview about the options in front of Congressional Republicans should the Supreme Court rule against Obamacare in King v. Burwell. It was the best run through I've heard, so far, of how legislators could react — and underscores why a victory in the courts might become a problem for Republicans on Capitol Hill.

[...]

1) Acquiesce to President Obama's demands

[...]

2) Strike a deal with Obama

[...]

3) Do nothing

[...]

4) Repeal and replace Obamacare

[...]

5) Build an "exit ramp" from Obamacare

[...]