Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Unions Now Say Obamacare Will Cause 'Nightmare Scenarios'

Tuesday, 16 Jul 2013 01:09 PM
By John Morgan
Labor unions fought successfully for the passage of Obamacare, but now their solidarity is broken and the unions are among the loudest critics of the pending national health insurance program.

Last week, heads of three of the nation's largest unions sent a letter to the top Democrats in Congress who spearheaded the passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

The letter claims that Obamacare will "shatter not only our hard-earned health benefits, but destroy the foundation of the 40 hour week that is the backbone of the American middle class," according to Forbes.

The unions say they fear Obamacare's employer mandate is leading smaller companies to shift their workers to part-time status in order to avoid the health coverage requirement on full-time employees.

"The unintended consequences of the ACA are severe. Perverse incentives are causing nightmare scenarios," said the letter from the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, United Food and Commercial Workers International Union and UNITE-HERE, a union representing hotel, airport, food service, gaming and textile workers.

The unions are also disgruntled that Obamacare affects multi-employer health plans, also called Taft-Hartley plans, that are arranged between labor unions and small employers in particular industries.

According to Forbes, Obamacare's regulatory requirements in the small-group insurance market will drive up costs by requiring coverage for such items as adult children dependents up to the age of 26 and eliminating limits on annual or lifetime coverage.

Even worse from the unions' viewpoint is that Obamacare will give small employers a less expensive alternative to Taft-Hartley plans — they can drop those plans and simply sign their employees up for the new Obamacare healthcare exchanges.

"That gives workers less reason to join a union; a big part of why working people pay union dues is because unions play a big role in negotiating health benefits," Forbes noted.

As a result, the unions are also demanding that their workers with Taft-Hartley plans gain eligibility for ACA subsidies that will be available for some individuals in the exchanges.

Political campaign-style tactics are being used by both political parties in the implementation of Obamacare, even though it is already law, NBC News reported.

The conservative group Americans for Prosperity is running a TV ad campaign against Obamacare. In the other corner, Organizing for Action, a spinoff of the Obama presidential campaign, launched its pro-Obamacare ad blitz last month.

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