JFlorio Loc: Seminole Florida

Obama gave congress and their staffs a 72% subsidy for their health insurance through the ACA. With a stoke of his pen Trump could undo this. I would think everyone on both sides of the aisle could get behind this. Congress needs to live by the same rules and regulations they write for us.

Super Dave Loc: Realville, USA

I still wonder why he hasn't done it.

America Only Loc: From the right hand of God

This should happen right now! Give elected officials a wake up call!

Super Dave Loc: Realville, USA

Unfortunately, I don't think the Obamabots would get behind it.

To get behind it, they'd have to admit that Obama and the Democrats were wrong to install the 72% subsidy to begin with... And that's going to be difficult for them.

Gatsby

There will be no camera time for anyone who backs anything that President Trump does.

kankune Loc: Iowa

Hear...hear. They need to live by the laws they create for us. They are elected to serve "we the people". They're not one bit better than us, or above us, as some feel they are.

Patsaco1

He needs to do it soon!!

Snoopy

JFlorio:

We can dream on . . . cut out that 72 percent subsidy, install term limits and knock off the pensions after serving only one term. A good start in cutting the budget.

Snoopy

kankune Loc: Iowa

Very good start in cutting the budget Snoopy. I'd like to see it done. : )

permafrost Loc: Minnesota

This is mostly wrong..

Yes, some subsidy is involved for congressional staffers etc..

but while the ACA requires that congress use the ACA..

In all the trump care bills, (they all failed) congress would have been exempted and gone back to the previous coverage by super insurance.. provided by the tax payers..

Another good deed by Obama..

Super Dave Loc: Realville, USA

Haha good deed?

You set the bar low for Obama, don't you?

Docadhoc Loc: Elsewhere

The taxpayers are paying for them now to the tune of 72% of the premium cost, the fact that they are more expensive due to the Cadillac no deductible benefit, and the $600 million per month still being paid to the carriers. That all is about to come to a screeching halt.

permafrost Loc: Minnesota

Republican Rep. Robert Pittenger is misleading his constituents by saying that he will decline the health insurance offered to members of Congress next year because it includes a “special subsidy” from the president that “exempted” Congress from the Affordable Care Act.
Congress isn’t “exempt” from the law. It wasn’t exempt back in 2010, when we first debunked such a claim; nor were lawmakers exempt in May when the bogus bit surfaced again. Three months later, they’re still not exempt. In fact, as we’ve said before, lawmakers and their staffs face additional requirements that other Americans don’t. And the “special subsidy” to which Pittenger refers is simply a premium contribution that his employer, the federal government, has long made to the health insurance policies of its workers.
The Affordable Care Act says that starting in 2014, members of Congress and their staffs can no longer get their health insurance through the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, as they have in the past. Instead, these federal employees will have to get insurance through the exchanges set up by the Affordable Care Act. Other Americans with work-based insurance aren’t subject to such a requirement. They can continue to get health insurance through their employers. Other federal workers, too, can continue to select health insurance plans through the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program. But not Congress.

That 72% is for all congressional staff and is old policy.. Congress go put into that group when they were put into the ACA.

Pittenger, a freshman representative from North Carolina, explained his stance on Aug. 26 to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in a radio interview in which their disregard for the facts was nothing short of absurd. Both the questions from Huckabee and answers from Pittenger were bursting with political mendacity.
Pittenger said he objected to a “special subsidy that Obama’s offering members of Congress to pay for our insurance,” saying this wasn’t “fair.” Huckabee called the “subsidy” a “little break” for Congress that “really exempted them from some of the pain of Obamacare.”
This “break,” however, is nothing more than a continuation of the premium contribution that the federal government has long made to its employees’ health insurance.
Just like other employers, the federal government pays a portion of premiums of the health plans it offers to its workers. There was concern on Capitol Hill this year, however, that the employer contributions wouldn’t be made to the health exchange plans when members of Congress and their staffs made the switch in January 2014 to their new insurance. The relevant provision in the law didn’t address the federal government’s employer contribution, which is currently 72 percent of premiums on average. So no employer contribution would be quite a blow to many congressional workers — just as it would be to other workers who get health insurance through their jobs. (While employer contributions vary from firm to firm, the overall average employer contribution was 82 percent for single insurance plans and 71 percent for family plans in 2013, according to the latest employer survey from the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research & Educational Trust.)

Docadhoc Loc: Elsewhere

You are correct in that they are not exempt. The crux is that is D.C. employees making $120k/year and up need any subsidy, let alone 72%, and at the same time are exempt from deductibles, how could the ACA possibly be affordable to Joe citizen?

The subsidy these D.C. people receive is contra to the spirit of the act, which supposedly is the lower the income the greater the subsidy. Not visa versa.

JFlorio Loc: Seminole Florida

Don't you just love liberals Doc?The workers are already getting paid on the tax payer dime. They get perks the rest of us never dream of. Yet we pay for them. Then they get an additional 72% tax payer subsidized Cadillac plan. I***ts like perm think we should thank Obama for being so thoughtful and fair with our money.