Category — Business

Obamacare Will Pay Health Insurers $336 Billion. So Why Is the President Calling Them Evil Profiteers?

“Health Insurers will keep on doing this for as long as they can get away with it. This is no secret,” the president said. “They’;re telling their investors this – ‘We are in the money. We are going to keep on making big profits even though a lot of folks are going to be put under hardship,’” the President told supporters at a stop in Pennsylvania today.

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, meanwhile, wrote to insurance company executives demanding that they justify premium hikes.

Neither mentioned that the Senate health reform bill, which is the basis for Democrats’ last best chance at comprehensive reform, would give the insurance companies millions of new customers required by law to buy health insurance. It would also require insurers to cover everyone, regardless of age, gender or pre-existing condition.To help pay for the new insurance requirements the government would give to people money to buy insurance – $336 billion over the next ten years. That money, ultimately, would have to go to… drum roll… insurance companies.

via A Complicated Enemy: Obama Seeks to Vilify Health Insurers, Give Them $336 Billion Check – The Note.

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Olle Johansson, a scientist at Karolinska Institute in Sweden, submitted testimony saying that “very serious biological changes” that include cancer risks have been noticed for years from exposure to low-frequency magnetic fields like those emitted from cell phones.

via The Associated Press: Maine panel weighs cell phone cancer warning.

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Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the head of the International Monetary Fund, suggested Friday the organization might one day be called on to provide countries with a global reserve currency that would serve as an alternative to the U.S. dollar.

“That day has not yet come, but I think it is intellectually healthy to explore these kinds of ideas now,” he said in a speech on the future mandate of the 186-nation Washington-based lending organization.

via Head of IMF Proposes New Reserve Currency – ABC News.

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The sales decline in January marked the third straight monthly drop following decreases of 3.9 percent in December and 9.5 percent in November.  January’s weakness was evident in all regions except the Midwest, where sales posted a 2.1 percent increase. Sales were down 35 percent in the Northeast, 12 percent in the West and almost 10 percent in the South.

The drop in sales pushed the median sales price down to $203.500. That was down 5.6 percent from December's median sales price of $215,600, and off 2.4 percent from year-ago prices. New home sales for all of 2009 had fallen by almost 23 percent to 374,000, the worst year on record.

via New home sales hit record low in January – Yahoo! Finance.

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Healthcare advocacy groups are looking to the White House proposal and next Thursday’s summit to shore up public support, and Democratic votes, in the push to get comprehensive legislation to Obama this year.

“As soon as the president and (congressional Democratic) leadership are totally together on substance and a strategy, I think the votes will be there,” said Ron Pollack, who heads the Families USA healthcare advocacy group.

The administration, congressional Democrats and advocacy groups have been turning up the rhetorical heat on health insurers that have in recent weeks announced huge premium increases against the backdrop of sizable profits and growing numbers of uninsured people.

“The premium increases are a powerful reminder that the healthcare problems are not going away,” said David Kendall, a senior health policy advisor at centrist think tank Third Way.

via Obama to spell out new healthcare plan – Yahoo! News.

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The US must fix its growing debt problems or risk a new financial crisis, Thomas Hoenig, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, warned on Tuesday, adding a mounting deficit could spur inflation.

Mr Hoenig said that rising debt was infringing on the central bank’s ability to fulfil its goals of maintaining price stability and long-term economic growth. “Stunning” deficit projections were putting political pressure on the Fed to keep interest rates low, infringing on its independence at the risk of inflation, he said.

via FT.com / US / Economy & Fed – Lone voice warns of debt threat to Fed.

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David Cameron:”If I am elected for as long as I am prime minister the United Kingdom will never join the euro.”

via Greece debt bailout: EU leaders split over euro crisis | Mail Online.

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Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, mounted stiff resistance tonight to any swift bailout of Greece, as a rift opened up between European capitals over how best to tackle the risks posed to the euro.

Despite a show of Franco-German unity on the crisis and the first statement from EU leaders pledging to safeguard the currency's stability, hopes on the markets of a German-led rescue plan to shore up Greece’s critical public finances were dashed by Merkel, who repeatedly emphasised that Athens would need to put its own house in order and brushed aside all questions of financial support.

“Germany is stepping totally on the brakes on financial assistance,” said a senior EU diplomat. “On legal grounds, on constitutional grounds and on principle.” Another senior diplomat said of the Germans: “They’re not waving their chequebooks.”

via Angela Merkel dashes Greek hopes of rescue bid | Business | The Guardian.

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Modern society, needless to say, is in the grip of wireless technology. All you have to do to understand this is step outside your door. “It just so happens,” [Allan] Frey had told me, “that the frequencies and modulations of our cell phones seem to be the frequencies that humans are particularly sensitive to. If we had looked into it a little more, if we had done the real science, we could have allocated spectrums that the body can’t feel. The public should know if they are taking a risk with cell phones. What we’re doing is a grand world experiment without informed consent.”

via Warning, Your Cell Phone May Be Hazardous To Your Health: Gear + Gadgets: GQ. by Christopher Ketcham

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Greek tax collectors and customs officers walked off the job on Thursday, kicking off a spate of strikes against government austerity cuts designed to halt a financial crisis caused by massive debt.

Both groups embarked on a two-day walkout ahead of industrial action called by civil servants, doctors and Communist-backed workers on February 10 and a general strike called by Greece’s main umbrella union on February 24.

“We have already made sacrifices and will accept no more cuts,” the chairman of the customs officers’ union Argyris Sakellaropoulos told Flash Radio.

The unions are on the warpath over a government austerity programme that they say has progressively become harsher under pressure from the European Union and market speculation that has hurt Greek finances and rattled the euro.

via Greece faces strike barrage over austerity cuts – Glock Talk.

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