The following is an excerpt from OpinionJournal’s “Best of the Web” at WSJ written by the editor, James Taranto.
News of the Tautological
“Mythbusters to End With Final Season”—headline, Entertainment Weekly website, Oct. 21
Bottom Story of the Day
“Iran Nuclear Deal Wins Tepid Endorsement From Ayatollah Ali Khamenei”—headline, New York Times, Oct. 22
Another ObamaCare Success
The New York Times has an update on ObamaCare:
The Affordable Care Act’s employer mandate, which requires employers with more than 50 full-time workers to offer most of their employees insurance or face financial penalties, was one of the law’s most controversial provisions. Business owners and industry groups fiercely protested the change, and some companies cut workers’ hours to reduce the number of employees who would be eligible.
ObamaCare propagandists kept insisting the employer mandate wouldn’t kill jobs, and now there’s evidence suggesting they were right:
10 months after the first phase of the mandate took effect, covering companies with 100 or more workers, many business owners say they are finding very few employees willing to buy the health insurance that they are now compelled to offer. The trend is especially pronounced among smaller and midsize businesses in fields filled with low-wage hourly workers, like restaurants, retailing and hospitality. . . .
“Based on what we’ve seen in the marketplace, we’re advising some of our clients to expect single-digit take rates,” said Michael A. Bodack, an insurance broker in Harrison, N.Y. “One to 2 percent isn’t unusual.”
Making insurance so unattractive that nobody wants it turns out to be an effective way to cut costs and ameliorate the effects of destructive mandates. Plainly ObamaCare was much better thought out than anyone had dared believe.
For more “Best of the Web” click here and look for the “Best of the Web Today” link in the middle column below “Today’s Columnists.”
