[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 6]
[Senate]
[Pages 8922-8923]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            A SECOND OPINION

  Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, I come to the floor again today, as I 
have week after week since the health care law has been passed, with a 
doctor's second opinion about the health care law. As you know, I have 
practiced medicine for 25 years in Wyoming, taking care of Wyoming 
families.
  I have great concerns about this health care law that has been passed 
by this body as well as the House, signed by the President. The 
American people continue to learn more and more about this health care 
law, and the more they learn, the more concern they have about this law 
being bad for patients; bad for providers, the nurses and doctors who 
take care of the patients; and bad for the payers, the taxpayers of 
this country who are going to get hit with an incredible bill.
  The main subject I wish to talk about today is a new report that has 
come out that says to me that the taxpayers are going to get hit with a 
bill much higher than they initially thought. It is a report from the 
McKinsey Quarterly called ``How U.S. health care reform will affect 
employee benefits.''
  In the debate and speeches the President had given in the runup to 
the election and the vote on this bill, he said that if you had care 
you liked, you could keep it; that the American people, if they had a 
plan they liked, would be able to keep it. It was a promise he made to 
the American people, a promise the American people wanted to believe. 
But now this report shows that the American people were right in being 
skeptical, and, as we see, the more the American people learn about the 
health care law, the less they like it and the more they oppose it. 
What this report says is that a shift away from employer-provided 
health insurance will be vastly greater than expected and will make 
sense for many companies and lower income workers alike.
  When we work our way through this report, what we see is that more 
and more private companies that today--today--provide health insurance 
for their employees will be much less likely to be willing to provide 
that insurance in the future. Why? Because it is going to be a lot more 
expensive to provide the insurance. The mandates, the quality, and the 
high level of expense involved with providing that insurance is going 
to be a significant burden to those companies. And if they don't 
provide the insurance at all, there are going to be other chances for 
those employees and it will actually be cheaper for the business to not 
provide insurance, give the people a raise, and pay the penalty of the 
health care law and leave people without the insurance.
  When we take a look at this overall health care law, we see it as one 
where this body and this President raided Medicare. They took $500 
billion away from our seniors on Medicare, not to save Medicare but to 
start a whole new government program. With the President's Payment 
Advisory Board, he additionally wants to ration Medicare--ration 
Medicare. They have raided Medicare and rationed Medicare. Is it any 
surprise that people on Medicare are having a much harder time finding 
a doctor as doctors refuse to see patients on Medicare?
  So with all of this, now we get this report. This report says--and 
this is a very reputable national consulting firm. This report says 
they did a survey of 1,300 employers across the country--different 
industries, different geographies, different employer sizes--and the 
results ought to be a huge wakeup call for all workers and all families 
across the country, because what this group has seen from this study is 
that overall, 30 percent of all employers--30 percent of all 
employers--will either definitely or probably--so likely--stop offering 
employer-sponsored health coverage in the years after 2014. That is 
when ObamaCare goes fully into effect.
  Among employers with a high awareness of how the program actually 
works for health care reform--who have actually studied what the law 
says--in that group, those who are most well informed, they are saying 
more than 50 percent and upwards to 60 percent will pursue other 
options. They will likely stop offering their employees health 
coverage. At least 30 percent of the employers would gain economically 
from dropping coverage even if they completely compensated the 
employees for the change of losing their insurance. This is very 
alarming for our country.
  There was a well-written editorial in yesterday's Wall Street Journal 
by Grace-Marie Turner, and I ask unanimous consent that it be printed 
in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. BARRASSO. Grace-Marie Turner is president of the Galen Institute 
and coauthor of a book called ``Why ObamaCare Is Wrong For America.'' 
Having read the book, I will tell my colleagues a lot of the things I 
have been talking about during the debate leading up to the vote on 
ObamaCare and that I have been talking about afterwards as a doctor's 
second opinion are included in her book. She specifically writes that 
no, you can't keep your health insurance. There are about 150 million 
Americans who get their coverage at work. We are not talking about 
people on Medicare; we are talking about nonelderly Americans who get 
their coverage at work.
  The Congressional Budget Office, when we were debating the health 
care law, estimated that maybe 9 million, 10 million of those people, 
or about 7 percent of the employees who currently get their health 
insurance through work, may lose their health insurance at work, in 
spite of the fact that the President said if you like what you have, 
you can keep it. But this survey of 1,300 different companies--
organizations that provide health insurance--30

[[Page 8923]]

percent of them say I don't think we are going to follow that route. We 
are talking about a significantly larger number than the Congressional 
Budget Office had even anticipated. The numbers are astonishing.
  In a study last year, Doug Holtz-Eakin, who is the former director of 
the Congressional Budget Office, estimated not what the current CBO 
said--maybe 10 million--he thought maybe 35 million workers would be 
moved out of employer-covered plans into subsidized coverage, paid for 
by the taxpayers, and he thought by getting to that number, it would 
add an additional $1 trillion to the estimate of what the real costs 
were going to be for the President's health care law. If these numbers 
are true, this newer, higher number of 30 percent pulling out--and 
maybe 50 percent once they find out what is actually in the law, in the 
mandates on these businesses--the additional costs, at a time when we 
are looking at 9.1 percent unemployment in this country, are going to 
go even higher with the significant subsidies that exist for families 
making up to $88,000 a year.
  So I come to the floor to say that the more we learn about this 
health care law, the more unintended consequences we find; that many of 
the predictions made about this health care law from this side of the 
aisle are now coming true.
  I have spoken in the past about waivers. We now are at a point where 
3 million people who get their health insurance through work--3 million 
people covered with health insurance in this country--have gotten 
waivers. Whole States have gotten waivers so they don't have to live 
under the mandates of the health care law, and they are going to be 
back for waivers again next year and the year after that.
  We see additional concern with what is in this health care law. As 
Nancy Pelosi said, first you have to pass it before you get to find out 
what is in it. As more and more people find out what is in it, we are 
finding that more and more people who maybe had coverage they liked are 
not going to be able to keep that coverage and are going to lose that 
coverage, and the taxpayers are going to get stuck footing the bill.
  That is why I come back to the floor week after week with a doctor's 
second opinion, because there is new information that comes out week 
after week, as this McKinsey & Company study and report came out this 
week. That is why I continue to say we need to repeal and replace this 
terribly broken health care law.
  Thank you.
  With that, I yield the floor.

                               Exhibit 1

                     [From the Wall Street Journal]

                No, You Can't Keep Your Health Insurance

                        (By Grace-Marie Turner)

       A new study by McKinsey suggests that as many as 78 million 
     Americans could lose employer health coverage.
       ObamaCare will lead to a dramatic decline in employer-
     provided health insurance--with as many as 78 million 
     Americans forced to find other sources of coverage.
       This disturbing finding is based on my calculations from a 
     survey by McKinsey & Company. The survey, published this week 
     in the McKinsey Quarterly, found that up to 50% of employers 
     say they will definitely or probably pursue alternatives to 
     their current health-insurance plan in the years after the 
     Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act takes effect in 
     2014. An estimated 156 million non-elderly Americans get 
     their coverage at work, according to the Employee Benefit 
     Research Institute.
       Before the health law passed, the Congressional Budget 
     Office estimated that only nine million to 10 million people, 
     or about 7% of employees who currently get health insurance 
     at work, would switch to government-subsidized insurance. But 
     the McKinsey survey of 1,300 employers across industries, 
     geographies and employer sizes found ``that reform will 
     provoke a much greater response'' and concludes that the 
     health overhaul law will lead to a ``radical restructuring'' 
     of job-based health coverage.
       Another McKinsey analyst, Alissa Meade, told a meeting of 
     health-insurance executives last November that ``something in 
     the range of 80 million to 100 million individuals are going 
     to change coverage categories in the two years'' after the 
     insurance mandates take effect in 2014.
       Many employees who will need to seek another source of 
     coverage will take advantage of the health-insurance 
     subsidies for families making as much as $88,000 a year. This 
     will drive up the cost of ObamaCare.
       In a study last year, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a former 
     director of the Congressional Budget Office, estimated that 
     an additional 35 million workers would be moved out of 
     employer plans and into subsidized coverage, and that this 
     would add about $1 trillion to the total cost of the 
     president's health law over the next decade. McKinsey's 
     survey implies that the cost to taxpayers could be 
     significantly more.
       The McKinsey study, ``How US health care reform will affect 
     employee benefits,'' predicts that employers will either drop 
     coverage altogether, offer defined contributions for 
     insurance, or offer coverage only to certain employees. The 
     study concludes that 30% of employers overall will definitely 
     or probably stop offering health insurance to their workers. 
     However, among employers with a high awareness of the health-
     reform law, this proportion increases to more than 50%.
       The employer incentives to alter or cease coverage under 
     the health-reform law are strong. According to the study, at 
     least 30% of employers would gain economically from dropping 
     coverage, even if they completely compensated employees for 
     the change through other benefit offerings or higher 
     salaries. That's because they no longer would be tethered to 
     health-insurance costs that consistently rise faster than 
     inflation.
       Employers should think twice if they believe the fine for 
     not offering coverage will stay unchanged at $2,000 per 
     worker. ``If many companies drop health insurance coverage, 
     the government could increase the employer penalty or raise 
     taxes,'' according to the new study, authored by McKinsey 
     consultants Shubham Singhal, Jeris Stueland and Drew 
     Ungerman.
       The case for repeal of ObamaCare grows stronger every year. 
     The massive shift of health costs to taxpayers thanks to the 
     disruption of employer-sponsored health insurance will add 
     further to the burgeoning federal budget deficit. Congress 
     can and must develop policies that allow the marketplace to 
     evolve and not be forced into ObamaCare's regulatory 
     straitjacket.

  Mr. BARRASSO. I note the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Franken). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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