RIGHT SPEAK: OBAMAmess's Three-Legged Stool Of Deception Regarding Employer Health Plans

Anyone who has listened to the Gruber tapes has heard Prof. Gruber’s repeated references to the “three-legged stool” that forms the core of Obamacare.[1] However, those who pay close attention to his remarks–variously characterized as “arrogant” (Charles Krauthammer), “ careless” (New York Times), “dumb” (Ezra Klein) “ ill-advised and indefensible” (Times Argus), “offensive” (New York Times), and “stupid” (David Axelrod)–may have detected that Gruber enthusiastically endorses (and Obamacare contains) a more sinister three-legged stool of deception regarding employer health plans.

The first leg is that the Cadillac tax is paid by insurance companies, when in reality it is paid by employees. The second leg is that the Cadillac tax is aimed at “lavish” high cost plans, when in reality it is designed to eventually hit virtually every employer health plan (even those with lower-than-average costs). The third leg is that the Cadillac tax is functionally equivalent to a reform long championed by conservatives: a cap on the tax exclusion for employer-sponsored health insurance. For reasons explained below, that is the most pernicious deception of all.

This carefully designed three-legged stool of deception was crafted to achieve the greatest deception of all: that Obamacare “would support and sustain the employer-based system, not erode it.” In fact, Obamacare is designed to slowly but surely erode and eventually eradicate the employer-based health system.