Running head: OBAMACARE

Why ObamaCare is Doomed to Fail

Final Project

Liza Kirkley
English Composition II
Ann Knowles
Brown Mackie College-Salina

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Abstract

ObamaCare appears to be a big judgment error that the president made in an attempt to
reform the American healthcare system. It is evident that ObamaCare is not sustainable. In its
attempt to attain universal health insurance coverage for all American citizens, ObamaCare has
not only weakened the U.S. economic recovery, but also antagonized millions of Americans. Its
major impacts include reduced care for the elderly, limited job creation, increased healthcare
costs, and high insurance premiums that only benefits insurance companies.

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Why ObamaCare is Doomed to Fail

It is now three years since ObamaCare was passed. The Democrats applauded this law in
reason that it is the best cure to the ailing healthcare system in the United States. The president
and Democratic Party leaders campaigned on the idea that ObamaCare would result in low
premiums and universal coverage for all Americans. However, the reality turned out to be
different. Millions of Americans have seen their healthcare premiums increase even with
premium assistance and federal tax credits. According to the Congressional Budget Office
forecasts, by 2014, 3 million Americans will lose their health coverage completely. This paper
discusses the major negative impacts of ObamaCare that will ultimately lead to its failure.
According to Dr. Stevens, a former physician at Irwin Army Community Hospital, while
ObamaCare is a conceptually a good idea, it has both bad and good elements. He argues that the
extra funding necessary to fund the program coupled with additional taxes will have a negative
impact on the elderly. More than 77 million began to retire in 2011. The high increase in retirees
is expected to create unprecedented demand on healthcare even in the absence of ObamaCare
effects. With ObamaCare, it is estimated that nearly $575 billion will be diverted from Medicare
to the program in the next decade. Medicare is already suffering from serious financial
challenges with approximately $38 trillion in unfunded liability. Nearly 25% of all seniors in the
U.S. are currently enrolled under the Medicare Advantage Program. These statistics support Dr.
Stevens views that ObamaCare is going to have a negative impact on the elderly. With time,
providers will not be able to sustain the expanding negative margins, and they will be forced to
stop serving Medicare beneficiaries.

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ObamaCare is not inclusive. According to Garson, (2010, p. 2015), any viable healthcare
plan for U.S. citizens should be based on universal coverage, where American citizens are
guaranteed a basic health plan of their choice as opposed to a healthcare maintenance
organization. As Dr. Stevens puts it, ObamaCare is code down and does not permit the best
practice to occur. Whereas it limits certain kind of problems, the need to take care of everybody
is very important. ObamaCare is like taking care of the soldiers; if they get an order to go to a
war, they do not really have a choice because that is their duty. It turns the key but really does not
drive the car (Dr. Stevens, Personal communication, September 14, 2013). The success of
ObamaCare is tied to its ability to persuade, if not force healthier citizens to enroll in the
program, even though they will pay higher insurance premiums compared to the healthcare they
will consume. While proponents of ObamaCare argue that watertight regulation on insurance
companies will offer consumers added protection and is therefore worth the increased cost, for
the plan to succeed, citizens who have no immediate demand for healthcare have to be persuaded
to join the plan. In fact, one of the popular elements of ObamaCare is the concept of individual
mandate where many citizens are pushed to purchase insurance or face penalties. This implies
that failure to convince healthy citizens would mean that only sick citizens would purchase the
new insurance pools, resulting in higher premiums. The individual mandate is a form of tax. In
addition, taxes levied on medical equipment and fees levied on insurance policies for
comparative effectiveness studies will all be passed over to healthcare consumers (Wear, 2011, p.
19). Under the current system, nearly150 million citizens accounting for 48% of the total
population obtain their insurance cover from their employers. The employers contribute 70% of
the premium, while the individual employees pay the reaming 30%. Of the remaining population,
nearly 28% (the poor, the elderly, and the disabled) receive healthcare coverage assistance

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inform of Medicaid at 13% or Medicare at 15%. According to Kaiser Family Foundation 2013, p.
1, those who have insurance on average pay $5,615 per annum as the cost of coverage. Family
coverage on average costs $15,745 per annum.
Insurance companies are likely to be the biggest benefactors of ObamaCare. The program
discriminates against the young working population in favor of the elderly population. Under the
present payroll tax regime, the young workers are already being discriminated, with the young
subsidizing both Medicare and Social Security benefits. ObamaCare compounds this problem by
pushing young citizens to purchase insurance premiums at artificially high premiums where
insurance comapnies will temporarily inflate insurance prices for the young with the objective of
subsoidizing for the sick and the elderly.
This according to Dr. Stevens is the major goal of ObamaCare - the need to take care of
the crack. Given the skyrocketing healthcare costs, one of the priorities that ObamaCare should
have considered is cost control by reducing the national health care spending. Instead of
addressing the rising healthcare costs, ObamaCare has worsened the problem because national
hralth spending is projected to increase from 18% of GDP at present to 25% of GDP by 2037
(Center for American Progreess 2013, p. 1). Given that the insured citizens consume more
healthcare compared to the uninsured, the plan will increase overall healthcare spending.
According to Corbett (2013, p. 18), the percentage of healthcare spending to GDP will increase
from 17.9% in 2010 to 19.9% by 2021. The increased healthcare spending will significantly
worsen the federal deficit. At present, Medicaid and Medicare drive healthcare accounts for more
than a quarter of the U.S. budget. With the new plan, by 2022 healthcare spending is projected to
increase by $1.76 trillion. In addition, employees may no longer be able to maintain their
coverage.

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ObamaCare is likely to increase hiring costs significantly for employers. This will in turn,
discourages employment creation because by making it mandatory that employers have to
purchase health insurance for their workers if they exceed 50 in number. Many companies will
prefer to hire only 49 employees or below to avoid incurring the costly health insurance expenses
for their workers.
In conclusion, based on the above analysis, ObamaCare appears to be an error of bad
judgment. If implemented as it is, the effects of the plan will be far- reaching to the economy,
American citizens and the country as a whole.

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References

Center for American Progress (2013). Cutting Health Care Costs. Retrieved on 11 September
2013 from:
<http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/healthcare/news/2012/08/02/11970/cuttinghealth-care-costs/>
Corbett, J. (2013). Doing Good and Doing Well: Corporate Social Responsibility in Post
ObamaCare America. Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, 41, 17-21.
Garson, A. (2010). The US Healthcare System 2010 Problems, Principles, and Potential
Solutions. Retrieved on 11 September 2013 from:
<http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/101/16/2015.full>
Kaiser family Foundation (2013). 2013 Employer Health Benefits Survey. Retrieved on 11
September 2013 from: <http://kff.org/private-insurance/report/2013-employer-healthbenefits/>
Telephone Interview with Dr. Albert E. Stevens (Former Physician at Irwin Army Community
Hospital) on ObamaCare.
Wear, S. (2011). Sense and Nonsense in the Conservative Critique of ObamaCare. American
Journal of Bioethics, 11 (12), 17-20.