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Unemployment Numbers are a Hoax

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Did you ever consider why our unemployment numbers seem so low despite the fact that government subsidies are at an all-time high? With the marked increased usage of food stamps, Medicaid, WIC, section 8 and disability among others, how do any of these trends correlate with a thriving economy?

First, the unemployment number represents only the percent of legal Americans who are ACTIVELY looking for work who can’t find a job. It does not represent the unemployed who simply can’t find an adequate job and simply gave up looking. As the above graph shows, the working participation rate has hit a 35-year-low of 63.2 percent in the United States in 2013, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)—clearly identifying that less Americans are working. Ironically, this percentage has not been so low since when Jimmy Carter was in office.

Plus, the number of people considered working also represents those who are forced to take underemployment or part time because they can’t find an adequate job. It should not come as a surprise about the increase in part time employment. Due to Obamacare, this number continues to increase by the day because the law penalizes low-wage employers for hiring full-time workers while encouraging workers to prefer part-time jobs. In fact for those in the bottom quintile of income, the average workweek has shrunk by more than an hour since the recession began. Also the proportion of those in this same quintile with full-time jobs also dropped significantly. In some industries and occupations, the decline amounts to losing five weeks of work a year.

Worse yet, here is a passage form a recent article by the Daily Signal: Obamacare also encourages many low and moderate income workers to prefer part-time jobs. Employees generally work full-time for two reasons: to make more money and to get health benefits. Under the ACA, the government now subsidizes health benefits, but only for workers whose employers do not offer them it. Many workers can now make as much working part-time without health benefits, taking all their compensation in cash, and collecting exchange subsidies as they would by working full-time and taking part of their compensation as employer-provided health coverage. Consequently Obamacare will put downward pressure on both the supply of and demand for full-time jobs. The Congressional Budget Office estimates Obamacare will appreciably shrink total hours worked in the economy over the next decade, finding the largest declines “will probably occur among lower-wage workers.”

This downward trend will make it difficult to become finally independent and create more people on the federal dole by the day. Ironically, that is what Obama wants, and the law is set up in such a way to make it happen. Unfortunately, we are creating a generation of Americans dependent not on themselves but on government. Remember, the American dream represents life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness–not a shorter life expectancy under Obamacare, no liberty under the NSA and the pursuit of the next government handout.

Where is this economy headed?

 

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Where VA Money is Going Instead of to Veterans

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As many of our honored veterans languish on fake waiting lists or are denied needed medical care, one must ask if the VA is properly using its funding provided by taxpayer money. Just like any business, expenditures should be evaluated on a regular basis to ensure solvency of the company. Unfortunately, unlike private businesses, the government is not accountable for its taxpayer dollar spending and has little accountability. However, when our veterans are suffering as a result, I think that it should be of the utmost priority to ensure that every taxpayer dollar allocated to veterans go directly to their health and wellbeing.

Recently, I read an analysis by Free Bacon about frivolous VA spending which is both an affront to our veterans and all those legally paying taxes in the United States. On the government’s official spending website, it showed the VA spent $1.3 billion in the past five years for “support” and “professional services.” When you read further and find out what these services are, you will be dumbfounded by the wastefulness of these programs.

First, millions were spent on PR for the VA to make them look more positive in the public eye. For example, in a series of 10 transactions, the VA awarded Woodpile Studios $5 million on 9/29/10, $1.7 million on 7/15/10, $1.7 million on 7/14/11 and another $1.8 million on 6/27/12 for the message campaign; while another contract for $2.9 million was awarded in 2010 for “marketing and advertising” to another company. The commercials ran in major cities during 2011 ESPN College bowl games and the Country Music Awards. They were designed to “increase awareness and confidence among the U.S. veteran population of the value and extent of VA services available to them.” It urged “family members to send their warriors to the VA.”

Plus millions of millions of dollars were spend for bureaucratic peer reviews. For example, a $6.3 million contract awarded in 2011, another $5.9 million contract in 2013, and another $1.7million contract in 2013, all of which were awarded to Ascellon Corp. during the past five years to conduct surveys to ensure Compliance. And these examples were just the tip of the iceberg.

Plus, costly “peer reviewed” programs included such monetary tallies as one for $15.3 million, one for $11.7 million, another for $12.5million, and still another for $12.2 million. Other contracts awarded during the current administration under “office support/professional service” included millions spent on “energy program development.”  Due to an executive order signed by Obama in October 2009, the VA is required to make its facilities more energy efficient and sustainable.

By 2020, the VA’s goal is to increase its renewable energy consumption to 20 percent; a total of 183 green energy projects were awarded for VA facilities across the country. One such contract was for a Washington D.C.-based VA facility for nearly $1 million.

When you look at these expenditures, it makes you sick to learn that a recent VA audit showed over 100,000 Veterans are experiencing long wait times over 3 months for their healthcare. Obama once boasted the VA a triumph for government-run healthcare and used it as a model for Obamacare. If this is what we should expect from Obamacare, our health system is doomed.

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Failure of Obamacare Evidenced by Overcrowded Emergency Rooms

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As a physician, I can attest to the recent article I’ve read in the Courier Journal about more people using the emergency rooms due to Obamacare. Unfortunately, under this new law, the newly insured Americans were supposed to be utilizing their primary care physicians instead of the emergency room. However, that has turned out certainly not to be the case.

With the number of visits to the ER soaring by the day, most ask why this rise is happening if more Americans are supposedly receiving coverage through Obama’s Affordable Care Act. The answer is actually simple. The health insurance that well over 50% people now covered by Obamacare received is Medicaid. Because there are too few primary care doctors actually accepting this insurance, these newly insured patients have no other place to go to see a physician other than the ER.

As stated in the Courier Journal article: “It’s a perfect storm here,” said Dr. Ryan Stanton of Lexington, president of the Kentucky chapter of the ER physician group. “We’ve given people an ATM card in a town with no ATMs.” In short, Obamacare provided millions with Medicaid, but there are no doctors accepting Medicaid.

The article went on to use Kentucky as an example. A workforce capacity study conducted for the state by Deloitte Consulting last year found that Kentucky needed 3,790 more doctors, including 183 more primary-care physicians, to meet pre-ACA demand. Under the law, it said the state may need to add an additional 284 primary-care physicians by 2017. Complicating matters, a quarter of Kentucky’s primary-care doctors could be ready to retire within five years, the report said. The report also said roughly 56 percent of the state’s primary-care physicians, and 22 percent of all physicians, accepted a Medicaid payment in 2011, which Deloitte said was its best estimate for figuring out how many physicians accept Medicaid.

While primary care may be difficult to find, emergency rooms cannot turn anyone away. Stanton said every patient who comes in must have a medical screening, and most doctors do more; “the vast majority … do treatment to decrease medical and legal risk.”

The problem gets even larger when you realize that Medicaid reimbursements are a fraction to that of Medicare. The physician reimburse is so low that a private practice doctor would go bankrupt if they only saw Medicaid patients. Between their overhead and malpractice, Medicaid reimbursements would not cover even the basic costs of doing business. In the end, there is no incentive for any private practice physician to accept Medicaid patients. Then, when you realize that reimbursements by the federal government for Medicaid are being cut, you will quickly realize that the number of physicians who accept it will also be dwindling.

So where does that leave those patients now? Worse off than they were before.

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Obamacare is a Financial Disaster

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As Obamacare continues to decimate the American healthcare system, few media outlets highlight the facts about this ever growing problem. Though Obama claims his new law (which he enforces on an imperial, piecemeal basis) is a success, the truth is much different. When you break down the over 8 million enrollees signed up by the plan, you will quickly realize that over 5 million of them are on the federally funded Medicaid program. Then, with regard to the remaining 3 million, it is uncertain how many actually paid their premiums and how many needed this insurance because they were kicked out of their previous health plans due to the Affordable Care Act. A recent article in The Business Insider sums up the economics of Obamacare: Of the 5.45 million people who signed up through the federal exchange, 5.18 million (or 95%) applied for financial assistance in their insurance plans. As a businessman and physician, I can sum up these numbers in a very easy way:

  1. Only a very small percentage of patients enrolled through Obamacare are actually paying for it

  2. Our government has created a new and massive bureaucracy to manage Obamacare

  3. We can’t afford the Medicaid program which has been expanded another 5 million people

  4. Few doctors actually accept Medicaid, leaving the “newly insured” without true access to the healthcare system

  5. We can’t afford the Medicare program

  6. Where do we get all this money needed to pay for 2 programs we can’t afford and a new program, Obamacare, that is financially unsustainable?

The financial truth about Obamacare is that it is an economic disaster. Many think the Tea Party and Conservatives are against it just because they are displeased with Obama. The truth is, most of them understand that the health insurance programs created by our national government are financially unsustainable and will eventually bankrupt our country. We are in 18 trillion dollars of debt already. Where will this madness end?

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Healthcare Systems Going Bust

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There is a growing and disturbing trend occurring now across the country as Obamacare implementation takes hold. It is like a domino effect that will eventually lead to both the disembodiment of our healthcare system and its eventual economic collapse. With Medicare reimbursements declining, uninsured patients rising, and  high Obamacare deductibles going unpaid, hospitals are hanging on for dear financial life.

I’ll go further into some basic economics but first one of the scary trends going on in medicine is that hospitals are laying off employees. About 250 Crozer-Keystone Health System employees, including physicians and managers, were laid recently following the announcement that the health system has lost almost $16 million in the last seven months, according to system officials. This statistic may seem almost unbelievable or just to be an anomaly, but the truth is that most hospitals are watching their profits disappear.

You may ask how is that possible. Even on the Mike Church show, he was talking about the greed of the hospitals and some physicians. The simple truth is that because a large portion of patients entering a hospital are elderly and on Medicare and due to significant Medicare reimbursement cuts, an inpatient admission for a Medicare recipient is a money losing endeavor the the hospital. Plus, if the Medicare patient returns for any reason within 30 days, the hospital does not get paid for that admission.

Secondly, there has been a definite rise in the uninsured patient. Whether they are illegal aliens or just people down on their luck because of the bad economy, the numbers are rising. Again, the hospital ends up losing money for each of their admissions. Lastly, with the initiation of Obamacare, the hospitals are collecting even less. Because of the high deductibles, patients with this insurance are unable to pay for their hospital bill, creating another loss in the hospital’s overall revenue.

Taken together, hopefully you understand why we are now witnessing hospitals either going bankrupt or having massive layoffs. It’s not because the business isn’t there. As the population grows older, there is in fact a greater need for both hospitals and physicians. However, in a few years, will there be any physicians or hospitals left to take care of anybody?

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The Truth About Obamacare

Obamacare is a complete affront to each of our Constitutional civil liberties. With over 2000 pages of new laws, stipulations and intrusions into our rights the bill essentially gives the United States government a mandate to take over our economy. How could the most successful country in the world knowingly give away everything that our soldiers fought so hard to preserve? It spits not only in their faces but also in the faces our Founding Fathers. I think this video above nicely sums up the intrusive nature of this bill.

Ronal Reagan said, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”
Where is the ACLU in all of this? If they really cared about our civil liberties they would have organized mass marches against it and not slept until it was repealed. This bill takes away more of our civil liberties than anything ever passed before in the United States, yet they do or say nothing. I guess the only thing they really care about is their own political agenda, and if something doesn’t fit into it, then it doesn’t matter to them. Well, it matters to me.
As a physician it is my hope that everyone receives proper medical care. Every week I either donate my time to the free medical clinic or provide care to the uninsured, underinsured or illegals for free in this country. However, I don’t believe the government has a right not only to mandate healthcare for everyone but also oversee such a massive economic goliath. Plus, where are the funds for such plan. Every day I learn the cost of it is rising. No matter what news station you listen to they all agree that the plan is over budget and that there is no way to pay for it. The plan both underestimated the amount of people who would be covered and also the funds needed to support it. I don’t know about you but this is a recipe for disaster. And the worst part about it is that Obama wants to proceed, despite the economic devastation it will create for America’s economy.
Capitalism has made America great. It won us the Cold War and continues to make our country great. Why? Capitalism allows the people to take charge of their destiny and gives them the opportunity to make a better living for not only themselves but their children. It allows for initiative and creates an environment so that anyone has the potential to succeed. That is why Capitalism has proven to be the greatest economic system the world has ever seen. I’m not saying it’s perfect, but has there ever been any socialist, communist or fascists utopias? Just look at North Korea, where the government runs everything. How are they doing? Their people are starving and they are living in complete poverty. Now look at South Korea.
Have we not learned anything from history? Obamacare needs to be repealed for our sake and the sake of our children.

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