Health Care Industry Prepares Assault on Obamacare

http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/313-17/16639-health-care-industry-prepares-assault-on-obamacare

Eight months before President Barack Obama's health care law goes prime time, a confederation of industry and business groups is ramping up its lobbying apparatus for an 11th-hour assault on the web of new taxes and regulations.

Medical device makers, health insurers, retailers and restaurants are waging what lobbyists call a coordinated effort to gain Senate Democratic support for overturning $130 billion in taxes that will be used to fund the new law, and repealing a mandate requiring employers to provide insurance coverage for full-time workers or pay a fine.

The campaign is backed by two of the business world's lobbying powerhouses: the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Federation of Independent Business, or NFIB. The latter had a leading role in 2012's failed attempt to overturn the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in the Supreme Court.

Known as Obamacare, the 2010 law will bring sweeping change to the $2.8 trillion U.S. health care industry starting January 1, 2014, including bringing health insurance to millions more Americans.

But with Congress mired in partisan gridlock, lobbyists are gearing up for a battle against the law's costs that is likely to intensify as lawmakers shift attention to the 2014 congressional elections and the campaign donations they may need.