keepthefaith

Another vote for individual choice. If you had that, you might be able to reduce your $5K annual cost.

Simple. I run a company and we provide health insurance to our employees now at ZERO cost to them. That's about 10 people. This "reform" will not lower our premiums, will mandate the levels of coverage we have to provide to employees and will significantly raise my tax bill. Based on a back of the napkin calculation, the annual tax increase will be equal to what we spend now to cover 7-8 people. In other words, it isn't enough that we pay to cover 10 people (not in my family) now, we have to also pay to cover a bunch of others that we don't employ. So, as an employer, what will we do? We will look at ways to cut costs which include reducing our benefits, reducing wages or not providing increases that we might otherwise offer, cutting hours for some employees or even reducing our headcount or not hiring. If we were growing we might look at this differently, but our business has been flat the past 2 years with a revenue decrease expected this year. Our health insurance carrier sold the company to Blue Cross a few months ago (shocking) which means we have fewer choices among the better providers. Without competition across state lines, we're simply encouraging the monopolistic character of the health care industry.

People who are out of work now were in every income bracket. Wouldn't suggest that those YOU refer to pick tomatoes. The point is that tomatoes should be picked by citizens and compensation for that job will be determined by the market for labor. The employers will have to offer a rate of pay at which enough people will take the job. There are plenty of people to take the jobs. I'm surprised that Obama and this Congress haven't seen the obvious opportunity to unionize all the fruit and vegatable pickers at a nice wage plus benefits.

We will always have Americans in a lower wage pool and that's better than having them in the unemployment line. Labor is a commodity of supply and demand. Wages rise when fewer people are out of work. Fewer people would be out of work today if we didn't have millions of illegal immigrants here now, and entitlement expense would be lower.

No, it's common sense.

I'm in love with capitalism and practicing it all day.

I've done plenty reading on the cost of illegal immigration. You can do the same. The return on the investment (benefit) of illegal immigration is easily to calculate. Start at zero and you're near the finish line.

I'm all for immigrants coming here if the environment at the time is such that we can provide opportunity for them and not at great expense to citizens. We're just not in a period now where can do that. Frankly we should have an immigration budget (in terms of headcount) and need to fix the leaky borders. I'm actually a descendent of Edward Fuller who came here on the Mayflower so go ahead and lob your bombs at me.

Doesn't matter what you and I think. The numbers (cost vs return on investment) clearly show that we can't afford the influx of people that we're experiencing.

Agree. We should fine the **** out of employers that hire them, but that's no excuse for not tightening the borders.

Labor is a supply and demand market. If illegals will pick mushromms at $8/hour, but Americans won't do the work for less than $10/hour then the rate to pick mushroom has to rise to $10/hour and the price of mushrooms in the super market has to rise. It's that simple. Right now, there is an ample supply of labor among Americans to pick mushrooms. You can't be pro jobs and pro illegal mmigration unless you also want higher unemployment.

You can't be serious.

Then: Immigrant can't find work = risk to the immigrant Now: Immigrant can't find work = risk to taxpayers due to entitlements Now: Illegal immigrant finds work, takes job from an American and raise cost to taxpayers who are now funding unemployment benefits and other entitlements for out of work American. Now: Illegal immigrants give birth to "US citizens" and immediatley become consumers of services (school, health care, etc) at huge cost to taxpayers. Now: Illegal immigrants grow in numbers and demand rights. Blood relatives of illegal immigrants that are US citizens vote in elections for candidates that support the cause for their families even though it violates US law. Group as a whole shows no respect for US laws. Near future: Congress and Obama give path to citizenship for illegal immigrants which will increase published unemployment rate and result in huge entitlement cost increases to taxpayers. It is forecasted that we need to generate 100,000 new jobs per month in our economy just to keep pace with numbers of people entering the workforce. US economy cannot generate this number of jobs and absorb new citizens into the workforce.

Well said on both points. Especially the second one. Does Conner work? Does his employer make a profit? If not, for how long can he expect to have a job?

No comparison from then until now.

Before everybody jumps all over Wisconsin, what this really highlights is the impact of illegal immigration over the years. The American culture and way of life is substantially different than the hispanic way of life. The huge influx of people with low levels of skills, low levels of education, low expectations and quite often low morality is not good for our country IMO. With a lack of jobs we're simply growing another huge entitlement class. The job numbers even in better times really say that we should work to remove illegal aliens from this country and put limits on immigration. Immigration reform will soon be at the top of Mr. Obama's list. Can't wait for that.

For sure the Israeli's and the rest of the world for that matter have done their homework and know that Biden is considered a dope in this country. They won't take him seriously especially with the conditions for peace being crummy with the Palestinians and much of the Middle East.

Believe it or not, lots of people that don't have coverage pay the bill after services are rendered. Those treated without insurance coverage or Medicare/caid are not funded with taxpayer dollars.

You're right on getting what your employer offers without much choice. There's a very good argument for health insurance to be removed entirely from the grasp of employers and left up to each person to pick exactly the coverage they want from the carrier they choose. We could transition away from employer based coverage to individual coverage through tax credits which could be funded by employers.

Read your policy, it will tell you what coverage you have. So if you have government health care and the government denies you coverage, you'll accept that? If the government decides that certain treatments are too expensive or you are too old to bother with (like they do in the UK) you're OK with that?

Doesn't matter what effect it has on our lives if we can't afford it or if the cost is too high. We know from the CBO numbers that it's going to be very expensive and add to the deficit even with all of the new taxes it includes. We know it uses 10 years of taxes to fund 6 years of benefits and we know that the "doc fix" price tag of about $250 billion is not in the bill. It's like somebody buying a new Ferrari that they can't afford (with aplologies to Ferrari). It might have a nice feel for the very short term but eventually you have to pay the bill and if you can't it goes away. This health care bill as written simply loads more debt onto the backs of American taxpayers for the benefit of a few. It's not sustainable, that's what the numbers say. Anyone that supports this bill as written as the best or even a good solution to reform health care is a complete jackass. If it was truly about expanding coverage and reducing costs, it wouldn't include a huge price tag for taxpayers (those who actually pay taxes). If in a business you had to solve a problem and presented a solution such as this to those that requested your input, you'd get laughed at, scolded and thrown out on your ass. Only in government can you piece together such an ugly solution to a big issue and get people to support it. Nobody in their right !@#$ing mind would look at what needs reform and come up with this piece of ****. Democratic citizens should be embarrassed to support this absolute piece of **** legislation. It's garbage. Stinking rotten garbage. We can and should do much better.

Any level of education is only meaningful if it actually improves job performance. Another degree alone does not necessarily make that person a better teacher or accountant or whatever unless they actually put the knowledge to work and there is a measure of improvement.

He's not too happy with Rahm. http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/03/08...ss-health-care/

They are not going to take him at #9. There is zero chance of that. Zero.

What I want to know is: why in most states do we still have laws that allow 16 & 17 year old kids to quit high school?