How many businesses have announced closings or layoffs since Obama won a second

[Buddhagirl]

Not sarcastic. I just want to read the reports.

I have a feeling that those business owners claiming to be hurt by Obama and needing to lay people off are full of it. Truly small companies do not have to worry about Obamacare. Period.

The company I work for (boss + 3 employees) is not affected in anyway by Obamacare. Since we handle our own insurance, Obamacare will open up more options for us as individuals.

My father is a small business owner and said he is in no way affected by Obamacare. He's actually expanding.

[Spider-Dan]

Maybe we should return to the Bush-era free-market principles that resulted in millions of jobs being lost.

That falls on our buddy Bill Clinton and yes I voted for him both times. He revised the CRA requiring banks to meet quotas for giving loans to low income people. He also increased the punishment for not doing so which forced banks to give out many unwarranted loans. My wife is a mortgage underwriter and this was big news when it happened in the business. The mortgage collapse is what got us to where we are today.

No, it is not.  Every subprime loan in the US could have defaulted and it would have been a drop in the bucket compared to the >$60 trillion dollars in legalized bets placed on these loans via credit default swaps.

The fact of the matter is that there were safeguards in place to prevent this sort of collapse from happening.  Prior to GOP financial deregulation, every single subprime loan could have defaulted and it would have been nothing more than a blip.  The collapse was caused by insurance companies participating in thinly-veiled gambling, where Party C takes out an insurance policy (otherwise known as a Credit Default Swap) on whether or not Party A will default on its loan from Party B.  Yes, you read that right: a third-party is taking out insurance on another party's loan.  This is like me taking out insurance on whether or not LeBron James gets in a car accident.

Have you ever wondered why one of the biggest part of the TARP bailout was rescuing AIG... an insurance company?  They don't make loans to homeowners, subprime or otherwise.  But they do (and did) issue out these incredibly corrupt Credit Default Swaps... and when the home loans started failing, AIG was on the hook to pay out billions of dollars that they didn't have.  That's what caused the collapse; not the homeowners (subprime or otherwise) defaulting on their mortgages, but the financial institutions that overleveraged themselves to insanity, resting on Credit Default Swaps as "backing" for their financial solvency.  Once some loans started failing and it became clear that no one had the money to pay out the CDSes, the entire operation was exposed for the Ponzi scheme that it is.

[bsmooth]

That falls on our buddy Bill Clinton and yes I voted for him both times. He revised the CRA requiring banks to meet quotas for giving loans to low income people. He also increased the punishment for not doing so which forced banks to give out many unwarranted loans. My wife is a mortgage underwriter and this was big news when it happened in the business. The mortgage collapse is what got us to where we are today.

His undying support for subprime lending created a wild race under Fannie and Freddie that we have yet to dig out of.

Actually the Federal Reserve did this in 1994 when they denied a merger between two banks based on the fact they were not carrying enough CRA type loans on their books.
Of course you ignore the repeal of the Glass-Stegall Act which prevented investment banks and commercial banks from merging.
Not one bank has ever gotten into trouble for denying a CRA loan. Also it has been shown that non CRA subprime loans made up the bulk of the loans that defaulted.
But why look at all the factors that caused the meltdown, when it is easy to place the blame on the CRA and the Dems solely and ignore what the GOP did to make the problem worse too.

[dolphins4life]

It was a tough call but I mean, I have a pre-existing condition, so do I want Obamacare to be repealed and have my own insurance go through the roof?

[badger6]

It was a tough call but I mean, I have a pre-existing condition, so do I want Obamacare to be repealed and have my own insurance go through the roof?

I can assure you that all insurance is going through the roof before too long. If Obamacare was repealed it would have been replaced with some other type of legislation that would have more than likely had a pre existing clause included.

[dolphins4life]

I could fully be misunderstanding of this and I fully welcome any rebuttal, but it seems the way Obamacare works is this:

Group of People A = preexisting condition

Group of People B = normal

Before Obamacare:

Group A = $800 a month for insurance

Group B = $300 a month for insurance

After Obamacare

Both groups pay $550

Naturally, Group B, who are people who have comfy jobs and are not struggling, are going to be upset and say, "everybody's insurance is going through the roof." 

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

That is not quite how I understand it. 

Group of People A = preexisting condition

Group of People B = normal

Before Obamacare:

Group A = $800 a month for insurance Unable to get insurance at all or if they can get some insurance it does not cover any of the expense related to the preexisting condition. 

Group B = $300 a month for insurance

[dolphins4life]

Hoodie, just out of curiosity, what party do you belong too?

And you may have a good point, however, my pre-existing conditions are ADHD and Asperger's, so I can get coverage.  In MA, I am not discrimminated against, so I can get the $300 plan.  However, if I lived in another state, it could jump to about $800 a month.  That's why I used those numbers as a baseline.

And you didn't complete your post with an after Obamacare part.

That left me a little confused.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

Hoodie, just out of curiosity, what party do you belong too?

I belong to neither party. I am technically an independant voter.  My registartion form has me as "unenrolled" allowing me to choose to participate in either the democratic or republican primary. 

[Phishfan]

I belong to neither party. I am technically an independant voter.  My registartion form has me as "unenrolled" allowing me to choose to participate in either the democratic or republican primary. 

I wish we had that. Rarely does the person I want to come through the primaries (at least in the first waves) come through and I have no say about it.

[dolphins4life]

^^^^

Same for me, actually.

I do, however, welcome any rebuttal from any conservative on this board.

[dolphins4life]

The arrows are meant to be for Hoodie's post, btw

[badger6]

 A small percentage of people may see a slight drop. Overall the majority of peoples premiums will go up on a continuous basis forever or until government insurance takes over. Talk to me in a few years and see if premiums under obamacare have not doubled or more from current levels.

[Spider-Dan]

I can assure you that all insurance is going through the roof before too long. If Obamacare was repealed it would have been replaced with some other type of legislation that would have more than likely had a pre existing clause included.

You cannot require coverage of pre-existing clauses without a mandate for everyone to be covered, or the insurance market will skyrocket virtually overnight.  Up until ~2009, conservatives understood this quite well, which is why both Romneycare and the Republican-backed alternative to Hillarycare had individual mandates.

A small percentage of people may see a slight drop. Overall the majority of peoples premiums will go up on a continuous basis forever or until government insurance takes over. Talk to me in a few years and see if premiums under obamacare have not doubled or more from current levels.

Premiums were already going up "on a continuous basis forever" before Obamacare, and it was never claimed that Obamacare will somehow result in coverage costs across the board going down (in real dollars).  The ACA was designed to dramatically reduce the coverage costs for people with pre-existing conditions (which it indisputably will), to reduce the medical costs for people with serious conditions (which would also be difficult to dispute), and to reduce the rate of healthcare cost inflation (which is much more fungible).

Even if we went to single-payer, healthcare costs would increase, forever; healthcare does not cancel out inflation.  The point of healthcare reform is to get the increasing costs under control.