Another Obamacare Casulty: Boeing Employees To Pay Significantly More

Look for a major congressional inquiry into Boeing. The Aerospace company is joining others such as McDonalds, 3M , AT&T, Verizon, Caterpillar and John Deere in accidentally exposing lies we were told about Obamacare. In this case its the lie about Obamacare reducing what you will have to pay for healthcare.

Last week Boeing sent a letter to its 90,000 non union employees informing them that, thanks to Obamacare, their heath insurance is going to cost significantly more beginning next year.

"The newly enacted health care reform legislation, while intended to expand access to care for millions of uninsured Americans, is also adding cost pressure as requirements of the new law are phased in over the next several years," wrote Rick Stephens, Boeing's senior vice president for human resources.

The villain is the new tax on "Cadillac health plans," meant to discourage companies from giving its employees  plants with better than average coverage, and picking up much of the cost.

Spokeswoman Karen Forte said the Boeing plan is more generous than what its closest competitors offer, and the company was concerned it would get hit with a new tax under the law.

The tax on so-called "Cadillac" health plans doesn't take effect until 2018, but employers are already beginning to assess their exposure because it is hefty: at 40 percent of the value above $10,200 for individual coverage and $27,500 for a family plan.

"We want to manage our costs so this tax doesn't apply to our plan, but that's down the road," said Forte. "If this health care law hadn't passed, would we be making changes to the health care benefit? Absolutely. For competitive reasons."

But obviously the changes would not have been as severe as they will be as the company tries to avoid the Obamacare taxes. According to St. Louis Business Journal:

Workers companywide learned last week that Boeing is raising employee-only deductibles from $200 to $300 next year and family deductibles from $600 to $900, company spokeswoman Karen Forte said. The plane and fighter jet maker, which has about 15,000 employees in the St. Louis area, last raised deductibles in 1999, she said.

Boeing also plans to require employees to pay co-insurance. Right now, the company covers 100 percent for most services. In 2011, Boeing will pay 90 percent and ask employees to chip in 10 percent. In 2012, the split will be 80-20. Boeing pays about $2 billion a year on health care and expects that to rise 7 or 8 percent in annual inflation, Forte said. If Boeing hadn’t asked its employees to shoulder more of the costs, the company would have to pay $3 billion on health care in five years, she said.

According to Forte Those changes will reduce the value of the Boeing plan, but it's unclear whether that will allow the company to escape the tax looming in 2018.

"It's certainly going to help," said Forte. But "we are still slightly above market in what we offer to our employees."

Nancy Pelosi was correct when she said we won't really know about Obamacare until it gets signed by the President.  Since it's been signed we are learning that much of what we have been told about the bill is false. The Boeing example is just one more indication that the "pig in a poke" known as Obamacare is harmful to the health and well being of Americans.