Your Mandarin was fortunate enough to receive this message from the owner of a business that details the impact Obamacare will have on his employees:

Rarely if ever have I expressed my political views to Company X Employees, but I thought this was an appropriate time.

Come November, If the President is re-elected, it is highly likely something will happen that will have a great impact on most of you – the full implementation of Obamacare. I thought the best thing to do was to give you the facts on how it will affect Company X and our employees and let you make your decisions based on that. Obamacare will officially affect you and your family starting in 2014.

One of the funding engines for paying for Obamacare is called “The Shared Responsibility Penalty” or Cadillac Plan tax. Company X has hired a consultant to help us navigate and understand Obamacare. It is the conclusion of our consultant that the majority of all of our employees will fall under the Cadillac Plan tax. What that means to you is your health plan provided by Company X is too good! What you have worked for and earned provides you with too much value. So as the name “The Shared Responsibility Penalty” implies, your Health Care benefits will be assessed a 40% tax. Obamacare calls it a penalty, but it is a tax. The value of the benefits provided by Company X range in value from $8000 annually for single individuals to $16,000 for married with family coverage. So simple math will tell you 40% of $16000 is a tax of $6400 per year. In addition Company X’s cost to administer Obamacare will cause our cost to rise over 9%. Our consultant’s analysis also computes a 6% increase in cost to our employees, again not including the Cadillac Plan tax. All of this just to have exactly what you have today!

Another fact – both the House and the Senate of the United States as well as all Organized Labor Unions across the country realized that this Cadillac plan was such a bad idea for them that they are exempt from it!!! Don’t have to pay it! Doesn’t apply to them! Some pretty clever last minute negotiations went on behind the scenes on that one.

Last week you saw Sears announce it will no longer provide Health Insurance as we know it for their 90,000 employees. Instead they will join a government sponsored insurance exchange, provide employees with a fixed dollar amount for insurance and force employees to buy their own insurance. To me this is a very scary concept. I appreciate having my own doctors I have picked and appreciate going to the Health Care facilities that are close to my home. I also appreciate having an expert I trust pick the insurance plan that will cover me from year to year. Picking Health Insurance is complicated, and I am not an expert even though I am exposed to it constantly due to the nature of my job. If I did not at least have that experience, I would be totally unqualified to pick insurance for myself and family. Expect more and more companies to go this route in the near future.

I don’t deny there is a need in our Country for better Health Care for those that do not have it. Obamacare, as it is written today, is not the right plan. It will force companies to change how they will provide insurance. The cost will be too great to continue the plans we have today. All of us will pay a significant price! We need Congress to get together and create a better plan.

Please research Obamacare and the provisions revolving around the Cadillac Plan tax and make an informed decision in November. Your life is about to change, make sure you understand how and why. At a minimum, understand that your Healthcare is going to change, and I am not sure many of you are going to be happy with the change.

I will be happy to discuss Obamacare and how it will affect you and your family. Stop by my office, it is worth a discussion.

The Obama campaign keeps insisting without any clear evidence that Mitt Romney will raise taxes on the middle class. The truth of the matter is that the Obama administration will be taxing the middle class to the tune of $6,400 per year, because the fact of the matter is that the majority of the middle class work for companies like the one listed above.

The Mandarin

The Mandarin, whose real name is 吏恆, joined the order in 1309, and introduced the Gormogons into England during the 18th Century.

The Mandarin enjoys spending time with his pet manticore, Βάρἰκος, or Barry (who can be found in the Bestiary). When not in the Castle…well, frankly, nobody is quite sure where he goes.

The Mandarin popularized the fine art of “gut booting,” by which he delivers a powerful kick to the stomach of anyone that annoys him. Although nearly universal today, the act of gut booting or threatening someone or something with a gut boot is solely due to him.