Last weekend 3M (MMM), makers of Post-it® Notes, optics, electronics and more decided to terminate health care plan access for its retirees beginning 2013. That news follows Thursday’s report of McDonald’s contemplating the end of its employee’s “mini-med” plan.
Investors.com reports that according to the Wall Street Journal,
“Health care reform has made it more difficult for employers like 3M to provide a plan that will remain competitive,” (3M said in a) memo. The White House says retiree-only plans are largely exempt from new health insurance regulations under the law.
3M currently has 23,000 U.S. retirees.
Americans become eligible for the Medicare insurance program at age 65. Starting in 2015, 3M retirees too young to qualify for Medicare will receive financial support through what the company called a “health reimbursement arrangement” and won’t be able to enroll in the company’s group insurance plan. The company described that as an account retirees can use to purchase individual insurance through exchanges that the health law will create in 2014. 3M didn’t provide details on the financial contributions.
Or, as opponents of ObamaCare predicted, they’re finding it cheaper to dump their retirees onto the exchange.
Also on Thursday, the Principal Financial Group (PFG) announced it would stop selling health insurance, which means 840,000 employees who receive Principal coverage through their employers will have to look elsewhere. Just the day before, President Obama said, “So there’s nothing in the bill that says you have to change the health insurance that you’ve got right now.” And he’s right: the bill doesn’t say it; it just causes it.
Read more: HERE
McDonald’s Health Care issue: HERE
Sesame Street Health Care parody: HERE
Obama uses religion and Church to sell Health Care: HERE
Best Health Care plan, ever: HERE
[...] http://sadhillnews.com/2010/10/05/3m-battles-obamacare-retirees-hang-in-the-balance This entry was posted on Thursday, October 7th, 2010 at 3:47 am and is filed under Obamacare, US News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. [...]
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