Obama jobs death toll watch: More health care layoffs
Grim reaper photoshop credit: Manly Rash
I said yesterday in my Beltway Chainsaw Massacre column that the GOP needs to track the Obama jobs death toll and tell the victims’ stories far and wide.
But there’s no need to wait for the GOP. I’ll keep doing it right here.
The first story of the day comes from the Fort Worth Star Telegram in Texas, where a health insurer called Health Markets has laid off 70 workers and expects up to 180 more as it braces for the costs of Obamacare and other government mandates:
HealthMarkets, the North Richland Hills-based seller of health insurance, laid off 70 employees this month and expects to trim 180 more positions by the end of the first quarter of 2011, according to a recent federal filing.
In the Securities and Exchange Commission filing, HealthMarkets blamed the layoffs on “dropping enrollment levels experienced by the company’s insurance subsidiaries,” along with national healthcare reform and “related legislative developments.”
HealthMarkets provides insurance plans to the self-employed, individuals and small businesses.
The second story of the day comes from the Worcester Telegram in Massachusetts, where a local hospital will slash about 50 full-time jobs:
About 50 full-time jobs will be eliminated at the HealthAlliance Hospital — Leominster Campus, and one of two planned expansion projects may be cut back.
Mary Lourdes Burke, chief communications officer for the hospital, said yesterday the job cuts do not mean 50 layoffs, because some were vacant positions that will not be filled, and some were positions that had hours reduced. Also, she said, some union contracts required moving employees into other posts.
…Ms. Burke attributed the cuts to health care reform, with its reductions in Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements, along with cuts in private health insurance reimbursements and increasing co-payments for patients…David F. Duncan, hospital vice president for facilities, told the City Council earlier this year that the design may be scaled back because the new federal health reform law discourages emergency room visits.
…In addition, he said, health care reform is expected to result in the loss of $24 million in Medicare reimbursements, out of $170 million total, starting in five years. The state’s health insurance reform laws, on which the national model is based, have already resulted in at least that much in losses, Mr. Muldoon said.
Ho, ho, hey, hey. How many jobs did O destroy today?
See what others have said
Note from Michelle: This section is for comments from michellemalkin.com's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that I agree with or endorse any particular comment just because I let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with my terms of use may lose his or her posting privilege.
Comments
You must be logged in to post a comment.
 |
Choosing Life and Beating the Odds
February 11, 2012 11:50 AM by Doug Powers
27 CommentsObama’s fraudulent abortion mandate “accommodation” Updated: Prez condemns “cynical” opposition
February 10, 2012 10:05 AM by Michelle Malkin
244 Comments‘To Stop the Multiplication of the Unfit’
February 10, 2012 09:06 AM by Michelle Malkin
150 CommentsReport: Solyndra Sold Assets Cheap to Entity with Close Ties to Investors
February 9, 2012 10:08 AM by Doug Powers
49 CommentsFormer Democrat Rep. Regrets Vote for Obamacare Due to Contraceptive Coverage
February 7, 2012 03:40 PM by Doug Powers
75 Comments
Fisker Auto Announces Layoffs; Requests Expedited Access to Full Dept. of Energy Loan Guarantee
February 6, 2012 10:28 PM by Doug Powers
55 CommentsHow to Make a Liberal Politician Stand Up Against Intrusive Government
February 6, 2012 04:28 PM by Doug Powers
95 Comments
Your Friday IRS regulation dump: Obamacare’s job-killing medical device tax
February 3, 2012 04:21 PM by Michelle Malkin
58 Comments
Hiring Spree in NYC
February 1, 2012 02:47 PM by Doug Powers
43 Comments
Categories: Health care,Obama Jobs Death Toll
Patterico
» Rick Santorum and the two playbooksPundit & Pundette
» King Barack vs. the NonconformistsJustOneMinute
» Cat Blogging In A Harsh New LightNRO
» The Church of Obama
What if the federal government gave a healthKare plan and no one showed up?
AKA: 180 jobs destroyed or damned
Just out of curiousity, I wonder if Planned Parenthood is expanding or cutting back?
The government considers one employed if one works 1 hour a week or more. This ridiculous standard dates back to Reagan who lowered it from considering someone employed if they worked 2 hours or more a week to 1 hour or more a week. Thats how Reagan lowered the number of unemployed. Please tell me other than a postal worker who can support a family working one hour a week? The jobless/unemployed numbers are meaningless.
I don’t think your logic shows how meaningless the job numbers are, it shows how vastly understated they are.
9.5% is actually more like 19.5% and growing by the day.
None of the job killing measures are unintentional, OBambi is America’s enemy, and he is doing precisely what he and his associates intended to do, harm or murder the USA.
I used to work for a medical device manufacturer until I was laid off in June. There’s plenty of work out there–if I’m willing to take a 20% pay cut and work 50% more.
What idiot didn’t figure out that if you set a goal of reducing the amount of GDP spent on health care you would reduce the number of people employed in that sector?
Of course, it took a real Democrat-savant to make health care costs explode AND decrease employment in the health care sector simultaneously.
We all know people scattered across the country that are/have been unemployed for months – some approaching years now. There were reports several weeks ago that companies are not even looking to interview those out of work for more than six months. I’m guessing they may have credit problems, ya think? More and more jobs require spanish too, as isolated pockets require other languages. Couple that with the use of H1-b’s and you’ve got a disaster for the American worker. We’ll never dig out of this hole until we put the talented in this country back to work.
Actually, we’ll never dig out of this hole until we get rid of the people digging the hole!
Oh, and I do mean every single Democrat, all RINOs, and those in the media and corporate America that empower them.
Right there is one of the key, irreconcilable conflict points with the opposite worldview-holding, America-hating, arrogant socialists/statists/collectivists/fascists/elitists that are in power now:
The talented must not be allowed to have an advantage in competing for a job just because they’re…you know, talented.
Everybody – except the know-better-than-you elitists and their minions, of course – must be equally miserable…that’s only fair, after all….
Hell, I would not be surprised if these dangerous, evil clowns in power try to pass laws making it illegal for individuals to be attracted to, and prefer spending more time with, more attractive members of the opposite sex.
I recall reading something about “lookism” a number of years ago.
In fact, I just found 37,700 hits on an internet search of “lookism”.
What more evidence is needed that Obowmaoscare needs to be repealed?
I can’t think of one program the gubmint runs which isn’t rife with corruption, so why not give even more power to the guys who run such a tight ship that medicare scams like $10,000 motorized wheelchairs are advertised on tv. I’ve heard of 250 buck hammers, but ten grand wheelchairs with a battery drive? I just bought my grandson a little motorized car at Walmart which goes 5 mph for $200. On the other hand, I recently bought a new Scion car for $16,000. Who’s kidding whom.
***
HI TARPON–#1. The Gubmint doesn’t care if you come to their “healthKare” party or not. They will tax you and fine you either way. It’s not about health–it’s about converting the U.S.A. into the United Socialist States of Amerikka.
***
And Comrade Obama (PBUH), SanFranNan, Dingy Harry Reid, Maxine Waters, Bawney Fwank, Sheila Jackson-Lee, and their ilk don’t mind a little (or a lot!) of collateral economic damage.
***
REMEMBER IN NOVEMBER.
***
John Bibb
***
You haven’t seen anything yet. In the coming future (months to years), you are going to see hospital closings, busineeses that shut down as they can’t afford the health insurance, business that will not open because of health care mandates, doctors that quit because they don’t like the regulations and low pay, I could keep on. But the end result is the nation is screwed. I am hoping that my region, the South, will leave again.
If the GOP were as smart as the Dims on messaging, they’d be able to show America once and for all how descructive Liberal/Progressive/Democrat policies are to the nation, and the Dims would be forever a minority party. But, I don’t think the GOP could clearly articulate an order to evacuate a burning building.
Some of them are trying very hard to get that message out. But you have to have people who are willing to listen. Progressives will not listen and will not hear. Their minds are closed. They are blind to the truth and it will never penetrate into their ideologically screwed up brains. That is the real problem.
What this means is that…especially coupled with the VERY high taxes on businesses in the U.S….money, businesses, and jobs are leaving. They are flowing to LESS HOSTILE places, where the rule of law is more stable and certain. They won’t be back any time real soon, either. Not as long as Obama “has the keys”.
This is why responsible politicians and bureaucrats need to be investigated and jailed. With unlimited power and no accountability this will only continue until we are bled dry.
We need Constitutional reform, one with real teeth.
Even Time magazine notices that ObamaCare is going to cause serious economic problems, including layoffs, in the insurance industry, especially to small insurance brokers.
Unelected elites imposing their out-of-touch values on the masses are just as desctructive… if not more so.
Oh, how I agree, we need to punish all those working to destroy America…next congress with enough conservative legislators we have punish these perps and punish them hard, setting examples as why one would never want to try that again…that includes RINO’s. America before any party.
The GOP has so many opportunities too. We need to be watching those who chose not to get that message out. Thank goodness for all the blogs out here!!
Wow, what a tremendously racist photo…
How so, max?
I guess His Massively Royal Highness of the World and Beyond just hasn’t figured out how any economy works. It takes more than his beliefs, policies, hidden agendas, words or fairy pixie dust.
So, they have to fire someone already doing a job to make room for a union employee who has probably never done that job and whom they CAN’T fire, but whose job is being eliminated.
Got it.
A friend of mine got word that because Obamacare raises the age for covered children to 26, their employer’s health care plan is expecting a 10% increase in the number of people covered by the health plan. That is a cost of business, and that cost will of course be passed on to the employees in the form of higher premiums.
Also, Obamcare increases taxes on non-generic prescription drugs, and since approximately 25% of the employer’s health care plan costs are for prescription meds, those new taxes also mean higher costs, which will again be passed on to the employees.
Also, Obamcare changes the rules so that over-the-counter meds will no longer be eligible for purchase with pre-tax dollars. In other words, you will get hit with a tax increase on your over-the-counter meds purchases.
“Free” Obamacare ain’t free.
It will cost you a lot…
Answer to question posed in post #4: Teachers’ Union Official.
And that’s “Massively Royal Hiney of the World and Beyond,” FIFY.
Compare and contrast what the MSM puts forth as salient issues. The big news today is about an attack on a Muslim cabbie in New York as a hate crime. Not that Muslim cabbies should be attacked, but really, the US economy is becoming a massive growing sinkhole and one faux hate crime dominates the news.
Socialists have never learned that the end user is always the source of income to cover any new cost.
What does it matter? It’s like asking Chef Ramsay how many eggs he broke today, you’ll just get a blank stare in return. It’s just what he does.
If you want to make America into Europe, one of the prerequisites is an unemployment rate permanently fixed at 9-10 percent. That, and an attitude that while a single lost job may be a tragedy (hence the liberal fondness when campaigning for trotting out people to tell their particular sob stories), a million is a statistic.
Destroying the system of private health insurance will of course mean the sacrifice of jobs. But if single-payer is the omlette you’re working toward… well, sacrifices have to be made, don’t they?
Bottom line is, libs are comfortable with the prospect of America reduced to a banana republic — as long as they’re the ones calling the shots. Whether they’re in charge of a super-power or a has-been shell of a nation, the point is they’re in charge.
All other considerations are secondary.
….Followed by the economic axiom: The customer always pays. Artificially higher prices and a even more crippled economy. These people in DC are Marxists not idiots. This is part and parcel of the strategy to dismantle America. What did the patriots of the American Revolution face by comparison?
Consider the matter.
This has been the case, forever. They are so afraid of taking long-term views and principled stands because they love their positions of power and think that principle will kill their careers. And they are right, given the well-oiled MSM propaganda apparatus that stands ready to launch media offensives against any threat to their Marxian Socialist masters. This is a hard row to hoe.
Conservatives need their own Saul Alinsky to map a strategy of winning back the American mind. If we don’t succeed and soon, we will likely need some George S. Pattons.
What about the death of 300,000 construction jobs, courtesy of Harry Reid?
With his single-handed prevention of a vote on SA 239, he personally ensured that 300,000 construction jobs, paid for with the taxpayer-funded stimulus, went to illegal aliens.
Read it all, with links to Michelle’s and others’ stories on this:
http://therealharryreid.org/
Just turn Alinksy tactics back at them. Works quite well frankly. Obama has been pretty well demonized and his credibility is shot. Hence instead of campaigning he is golfing and reading books.
Let me guess the are trying to reduce the wait times for illegals by reducing the amount of insured from being able to use the ER…typical liberal logic.
As I recall this ObamaCare was suppose to save money. The only thing I see it has done is save a lot of people from getting up in the morning and going to work.
The only way bhocare will save money is if there is no money anywhere to pay for health care, we all die and there is nothing but the earth left.
Cross reference the list of people being laid off in health care with those who voted for BHO. THAT would be an interesting bit of data!
I still can’t understand how Obama can thumb his nose at us like he does, by vacationing, partying, living high and mighty and not caring who he upsets. The video of him schmoozing with the folks in town while getting his shrimp and ice cream disgusted me. He bobs his head around as he walks, like a bobble head doll…have you noticed that? I think he must think it is a really cool Chicago thug kind of thing. No POTUS in my memory has had so much disrespect for the people of the country he is supposed to love and lead. He is the worst POTUS we have ever had, and that is saying something when you consider Woodrow Wilson, FDR and Jimmah Cahtah. As far as I’m concerned, he can just continue on with his golfing for the next two years and never come back.
ThackerAgency,
I’m curious to hear your thoughts on this.
Also, the folks at HotAir were asking about you on this headline.
happyscrapper,
In case you didn’t go back and see it, I left a thank you for you here.
Thanks, RedPill!! I am not able to do a lot, but I certainly can pray!! I also plan to be on my knees a lot on Saturday during the 9/28 rally in DC!!
*Harry Reid is going to get stopped in his tracks one way or the other, either by Sharron Angle, or by being in the minority come January; I mean it when I say the Democrat Party is the “Death to America” Party; Everything they do is against the will of the people, and borders on treasonous.
*As an aside, having worked in automotive manufacturing for 33 years, both parties are guilty of exporting jobs we NEED, and importing people we don’t WANT; They must be stopped, they will be stopped.
*I’m hoping and praying for a grand turnout for the Beckster; He is trying to go about it the right way, and I commend him for that, but I believe we will have to change approx. 95% of the faces in D.C. over the next 2 years to enact even a fraction of the changes that are required; It is that bad; Failing that, we WILL be faced with the economic death spiral Glenn has talked of.
And now we have the Department of Energy coming out with bloated figeures for “Lives Touched”. These are people who got jobs, even if part time for an hour like Census Workers or standing on the Gulf beach for a photo op.
How about numbers for “Lives Touched” for those who are unemployed, are upside down on their mortgage, lost their homes, divided famlies, or do not have and cannot find a job. These are the true “Lives Touched”.
Another desparate and transparent attempt to fool the American People. Those of us with a brain aren’t buying it. Who do they think they are kidding? It is insulting that they think this kind of crap will pass the stink test. Good grief, they look stupider every day!!
Seen any pics of Obama with white-coated doctors lately????
In related news; Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis/St. Paul MN will layoff 250 employees because of insufficient reimbursements from Medicaid for children’s care. The government only covers 80 percent of the costs.
http://www.twincities.com/ci_15894824?nclick_check=1
I am sure that will improve greatly under ØbamaCare. /s