Sigh. Another day, another grim Obamacare update.
Actually, we have two updates on the never-ending disaster of government-run healthcare.
Our first story comes from the Washington Times, which reports that the company hired to fix the failed Obamacare website is way behind schedule and way over budget.
Fixing the Obamacare website to get it ready to handle a second round of enrollments will cost the federal government $121 million… The deal, which Accenture announced on its website Tuesday, costs more than the $93.7 million it took to build HealthCare.gov in the first place. It’s also $30 million more than the government projected for fixes just a few months ago… “There doesn’t seem to be a light at the end of the tunnel for Obamacare website expenses,” said House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell E. Issa, California Republican.
I’m mystified, by the way, why taxpayers always have to cough up more money on these contracts.
If some company promises to do X in exchange for Y amount of money, shouldn’t that contract be binding?
Instead, this is just the latest chapter in the endless book of government cost overruns.
Our second story comes from the Washington Examiner, which reports that there are some big problems with Obama’s supposed success of bribing and coercing people into Obamacare.
…officials from President Obama down have touted 8 million Americans signing up for coverage through the program’s exchanges. But, among other things, they haven’t revealed how many of those individuals formally completed their enrollment by paying their premiums. …>what the committee heard back was that just 67 percent of individuals signing up for health insurance through the federal health exchange as of April 15 paid their first month’s premiums and actually completed enrollment.
Gee, if that’s a success, I’d hate to see a failure.
And the story also notes that the White House has been unable to trick sufficient numbers of young people into overpaying for healthcare. That’s very bad news for the insurance companies that put their trust in government.
In addition, just 25 percent of enrollees were between the ages of 18 and 34, according to the report. The administration had been aiming for roughly 40 percent of enrollees to come from this younger demographic to help offset the cost of providing coverage to older and sicker participants.
I guess this means stupid birth control ads weren’t enough to get young folks to flush away their dollars.
Geesh, no wonder I’m tempted to feel sorry for the President.
But let’s not forget that there actually are some people who are benefiting from Obamacare. It’s too bad, though, that we can’t all be corrupt DC insiders.
Let’s close with some cartoons from Townhall. Since we’ve already talked about the absurdity of counting coerced enrollments as an indicator of success, we may as well share a funny Glenn McCoy cartoon that makes the same point.
If you like this cartoon, Ted Cruz’s office put together a satirical – yet accurate – look at the “success” Obama has achieved. And this Eric Allie cartoon has the same message.
And here’s Henry Payne on Obama’s mission-accomplished moment. Reminds me of the low-expectations theme Lisa Benson used in another very amusing Obamacare cartoon.
Yup, the mission has been accomplished. A few million more Americans are now more dependent on government (which Mark Steyn explained was one of the left’s main goals) and the political class has made it harder for people to achieve the American dream.
P.S. Switching topics, I can’t resist sharing this Michael Ramirez cartoon.
That’s because it reminds me of this joke about what would happen if Noah tried to build the ark today.
[…] If you want a disgusting example of how taxpayers are victimized by consultants, contractors, and other beltway bandits, just recall the Obamacare websites that turned out to be complete disasters. […]
[…] when politicians take control of specific sectors of the economy. Just consider the failures of Obamacare and the U.K.’s government-run healthcare […]
Regarding Mr. Dan’s question about a company promising “to do X in exchange for Y amount of money”, the company probably only agreed to work N hours at an hourly rate of R.
I am an Information Technology project manager, and it is exceedingly difficult to do a fixed bid contract because the control of what “X” is, exactly, remains in the hands of the customer (in this case, the ever so flexible Obama administration). No company, in its right mind, would agree to a fixed “Y” without a fixed “X”.
Reblogged this on Taking Back America.
It is a great success, as expected – but it depends on your metric.
If your goal is to redistribute billions, flatten a bit more the American effort-reward curve to the point where effort vs. reward in America offers the same prospects as in other parts of the world (such as Europe), a point where America no longer offers the most motivated environment to success and exceptionalism, and triggers a vicious cycle of American decline,… then Obamacare has been a great success story towards that goal.
America haters throughout the world would be well justified to have their greatest celebration in a couple of generations. America’s trajectory to decline has been set, and American voter-lemmings haven’t even begun to realize it yet.
Because most voter-lemmings do not understand compounding, and the deterministic trajectory towards decline that lower growth inevitably implies. And even for the few who do understand, or merely suspect it, a dollar of redistribution today is irresistible, even when compared to five growth dollars perpetually growing and compounding into the future. Amongst the electorate, the Krugmanesque notion of prosperity through flatter effort-reward curves remains “the great hope”. The great hope, that America has finally found a way to make the low motivation welfare state productive, growing at a rate that matches average world growth (and thus staves of decline), and is also sustainable.
Such electoral mistakes are of little consequence to already stagnant continents such as Europe which are already on a decline path by any metric that compares their growth trajectories to average worldwide growth. But this will be a new experience for Americans, as they will undergo something they have never had to go through since the formation of their nation: Decline. Their naiveté is understandable. They were born in the wealthiest country on earth, and throughout their increasingly whining life took such prosperity for granted, assumed that it would last forever, even after they implemented a flat effort-reward, high-tax, all basics are guaranteed, little motivation to work for much more, welfare state , and thus got on the same motivational trajectory as Europe.
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For whatever is worth, here is what will happen to American healthcare:
– Present: Millions got their subsidy redistribution, and many growing up and deciding on their future careers are starting to realize that they can relax a little bit more into mediocrity as they will never have to worry about ever earning the cost of their lifetime healthcare, at some point through their lifespans. They will be secure in knowing that all they’ll have to do is put up with a somewhat frustrating website, which will eventually be fixed after a few more hundred million are taken from taxpayers to fix the portal that redistributes hundreds of billions. Less of a reason to get an exceptional education, less of a reason to try to save (oh my! you mean accumulate “capital”) for a rainy day. Definitely not contribute enough to accumulate much capital, lest they become the targets of the inevitably approaching French-style taxation that must support all the new euro-welfare programs.
– Phase 1a: In the first phase, the almost free healthcare given through the exchanges (the redistribution portals) will become increasingly rationed, as insurers try to remain profitable serving the high cost consumers prevalent in the exchanges. Younger people will continue to shun the exchanges. They would correctly calculate that the health insurance subsidies they would be getting from taxpayers do not really offset the subsidy they must support for older and sicker people inside the exchanges. They can wait for the small probability they become ill in young age, and then sign up at the exchanges once that happens.
– Phase 1b: Premiums in the exchanges will have a great tendency to increase, and so will the subsidies that taxpayers must provide, suppressing business activity, thus making more people poorer, stagnant or even outright unemployed, and thus great new refugees for the exchanges. On the other hand, government pressure will suppress rate increases below pricing equilibrium inside the exchanges and thus precipitate further rationing of medical services provided by the exchanges (the best, most expensive, doctors and providers dropped from networks and higher cost/benefit treatments denied).
– Phase 2a: The increasing number of people in the exchanges will revolt against the lower quality care offered via the public exchanges. “Second tier” medical care will come to forefront of political discussion.
– Phase 2b: In response to the outcry, politicians will respond with the introduction of a new insurance carrier, a principled “carrier of the people, by the people, for the people (and managed by politicians)”, a more direct government health insurance provider, perhaps something like Fannie-health but with an immediate taxpayer funded lifeline.
– Phase 3a: Funded by the much deeper pockets of taxpayers, Fannie-health will initially provide superior coverage compared to the rationed narrow network, high procedure denial rate, private plans on the exchanges. Private plans will withdraw from the exchanges, leaving Fannie-health to reign supreme in the health insurance arena, together with Medicare.
– Phase 3b: Fannie-health quickly becomes the only option in the exchanges.
– Phase 4a: Hospitals and the healthcare industry, recognizing that most health dollars now come from the government, will lobby the Washington politics portal, to extract as much money as possible from Fannie-health.
– Phase 4b: Outrage grows at how the unscrupulous healthcare industry milks the government and taxpayers through Fannie-Health and its careless staff of secure, uninterested, naïve and captured bureaucrats.
– Phase 5a: To address the outrage of phase 4b, politicians offer the alternative of a few new hospitals. New honest hospitals. Hospitals “of the people, by the people, for the people (and managed by politicians)”, a direct government hospital network perhaps something like the Freddie-Hospital-Network (FHN)”.
– Phase 5b: Backed by the much deeper pockets of taxpayers, the preferential legislative treatment it receives as a Washington child creation, and fueled by an enthusiastic public holding other people’s wallets, FHN will gradually overtake private hospitals.
– Phase 6: FHN becomes a public hospital monopoly, providing free healthcare for all and then gradually increasing mismanagement, degradation of service and inevitable rationing of procedures and quality. Preferential legislation will ensure the continued preferential treatment for “the people’s FHN”, so that private entities cannot rise and give a black eye to the protected Washington child.
By the time Phase 6 comes around, as the US converges culturally and thus also economically with Europe, Americans will have ridden a couple dozen quarters along a euro-like stagnation lackluster growth trendline. Something less than the old Cowboy capitalism 3%-3.5% growth trendline and closer to the 1-2% euro-stagnation trendline — in any case, a modest fraction compared to overall worldwide growth rates. In other words, American per capita GDP will have gotten significantly closer to average worldwide GDP, driving Americans into a position of further malaise and lower significance in the world.
Hence, we may never get to Phase 6. Long before that, a moderate size crisis will be precipitated, first by international doubts over the risk of taking on American sovereign debt at such low return, from a nation of citizens which are becoming increasingly demotivated to exceptional work and thus risk more and more ultimately reneging on a portion of their debts. That initial moderate but sudden crisis will be originally diffused by hurried and frantic congressional sessions where something like VAT will be imposed in a hurry, in a little contested response to the national emergency. The higher taxation will solidify the American population’s demotivation to European levels. Comparable levels of euro-stagnation growth will become endemic, triggering an eventually much bigger eventual and indomitable correction. If the correction is sudden then we may never even get to phase 6 on healthcare. If the correction is mostly in the form of a controlled wretched decline (like Europe for now) then we may get to phase 6 on healthcare, like the other stagnating nations of Europe did some time ago already. The fact that Europe may collapse in the meantime will not be enough to change America’s course. It will be explained in terms of creative narratives, like Krugman’s capitalist conspiracy theory against France.
P.S. Don’t think for a moment that a Republican victory will change much. They may upgrade, rename or even repeal and replace Obamacare with something like RomneyCare, just to put their mark on it and claim they did something. The redistribution engine will live on. The redistribution engine of ObamaCare was approved by the American majority even before it had any dependents. Now with seven million solidly dependent voters — and rising — any significant repeal is a pipe dream. The redistribution engine may be relabeled and remarketed but will keep growing until it drives individual motivation and economic growth down to euro-style levels. That is because ObamaCare will not be the last redistribution engine. The more growth stagnates, the more a desperate electorate will cling on to redistribution for hope. The vicious cycle closed already some time ago; the day in 2008 when Americans decided to address the problems created by government by seeking refuge and hope in the deadly embrace of coercive collectivism. That was the day that marked definitive entrance into the vicious cycle, the day Americans solidified their trajectory into decline.
P.P.S. You may derive some consolation in this little enclave of freedom hosted by Mr. Mitchell, but, in practical terms, you would be well advised to place some good put options against America’s continued prosperity dominance in the world. Americans have stepped on the Euro–banana-peel, and their fall will be swift. Precipitous on a historical timeframe. By the time a significant number of HopNChangers start realizing this; it will already be too late. The escape chutes will be jammed in the stampede.
more red meat…………
“Taxpayers will pay over $53,000 per each person newly insured under Obamacare, according to a Daily Caller News Foundation analysis of the Congressional Budget Office data.”
“Taxpayers Spending $53K for Everyone Insured Under ObamaCare”
http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/dgreenfield/taxpayers-spending-53k-for-everyone-insured-under-obamacare/
Reblogged this on Public Secrets and commented:
I’m shocked –shocked!!– that the company that promised to fix the the barely functional Obamacare web site is, wait for it, behind schedule and over budget.