2011 was supposed to be a bad year for President Obama’s Health Care Law, with House Republicans taking aim and federal lawsuits snaking their way through the judiciary. And although the House of Representatives has had limited success in dismantling the overhaul, key portions began to unravel all by themselves.
Here’s a look at the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act’s year in review.
– Jan. 14: Kansas announces its intention to become the 26th state to file suit against the federal government to stop implementation of the Health Care overhaul.
– Jan. 19: The House of Representatives votes to repeal the health care law.
– Jan. 26: Illinois-based pharmaceutical company Abbott Labs cuts 1,900 jobs “in response to changes in the health-care industry, including U.S. health-care reform and the challenging regulatory environment.”
– Jan. 31: A second federal district judge ObamaCare-unconstitutional/">rules that the law is unconstitutional.
– Feb. 2: All 47 Republican senators vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act, but the measure fails.
– Feb. 16: Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius testifies before the Senate Finance Committee and admits that the CLASS Act, a key portion of the law that was touted as a $70 billion savings, is “totally unsustainable.” But not to worry: Sebelius says her department has the authority to rework the legislation to make CLASS tenable.
– Feb. 18: The House votes to block federal funding to implement the Affordable Care Act. The Congressional Budget Office also estimates that repealing the law would add $210 billion to the combined federal deficits from 2012 to 2021.
– Feb. 22: A federal judge tosses a lawsuit claiming that the Affordable Care Act violates the liberties of those who choose to rely on God to protect and heal them instead of buying Health Insurance.
– March 3: The House votes to end an unpopular tax paperwork-filing requirement for businesses tucked into the health care law.
– March 23: The law turns one year old. On the same day, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce finds that the temporary Early Retirement Reinsurance Program will spend its allotted $5 billion far earlier than its Jan. 1, 2014 expiration date.
– March 30: The CBO estimates that health care reform will cost $1.1 trillion, an increase of $90 billion from its February estimate.
– May 17: The Daily Caller reports that 20 percent of new waivers from the law have gone to gourmet restaurants, nightclubs and fancy hotels in former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s district.
– June 8: A McKinsey & Company survey of over 1,300 private sector employers found that 30 percent of employers would definitely or probably stop offering insurance to their employees after the law is implemented in 2014.
– June 18: HHS announces that it is axing waivers from the law.
– June 21: A glitch in the law, discovered after Obama signed it, would allow middle-class Americans to get subsidized health care intended for poor people, the Associated Press reports. Medicare’s chief actuary says the policy “doesn’t make sense.”
– June 29: In the face of a constitutional challenge, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals rules in favor of the law.
– July 18: An Employment Policies Institute report finds that the Affordable Care Act would incentivize employees to switch to a government-subsidized insurance exchange even if employers were to continue their health care coverage, costing taxpayers “significant[ly].”
– July 19: The bipartisan “gang of six” puts forward a debt-reduction plan that would repeal the CLASS Act.





Pingback: Michele Bachmann’s Crusade against Obamacare
Pingback: Obamacare’s Year in Review | A Plebe's Site
Pingback: Obamacare’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Year | National Federation of Republican Assemblies (NFRA)
Pingback: Obama campaign promotes health care law – USA TODAY | Financial News
Pingback: Obama campaign promotes health care law – USA TODAY | Financial News
Pingback: Obama campaign promotes health care law – USA TODAY | Financial News
Pingback: Obamacare | 2011 Year In Review | Health Care Law | The Daily Caller | CPR: Seeing Politics Right.
Pingback: Obamacare’s lousy, no good, really bad year – By Paul Conner «
Pingback: Rheumatology Matters - News » Rheumatology Matters
Pingback: Must Know Headlines — ExposeTheMedia.com