Governor Christie has vetoed a bill that would have created health care exchanges in New Jersey under Obamcare
May 10.2012
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
(RIDGEWOOD -NJ) Governor Christie has vetoed a bill that would have created health care exchanges in New Jersey under Obamcare .The veto makes Chris Christie the first governor in the nation to veto such a bill, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Christie told reporters ,“I am concerned that a hastily created exchange in New Jersey will impose unnecessary obligations upon the state’s taxpayers,” Christie said in a statement. “The very constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act is cloaked in uncertainty, as both the individual mandate to procure health insurance as well as the jurisdictional mandate to establish an exchange may not survive scrutiny by the Supreme Court.”
The national health care law or Obamacare is currently the subject of a Supreme Court review; a decision from the nation’s high court on the constitutionality of Obamacare is expected at some time in the next few months.
New Jersey’s Legislature passed a bill that would establish health care exchanges that would help implement ACA’s questionable individual and employer mandates. A medical exchange is has been billed as a marketplace for people to purchase health insurance plans.
But critics like Cato Institute’s Michael Cannon over at the Daily Caller ; Obamacare gives federal bureaucrats a chokehold on New Jersey’s health insurance markets no matter who runs the exchange, because it requires state-run exchanges to do everything a federal exchange would do. Obamacare has already stripped New Jersey of its sovereignty. The only question is, should New Jersey also pay for the privilege?
The bill before Christie would also subject the state to a second unnecessary tax: Obamacare’s employer mandate. If employers fail to offer a government-defined package of health benefits, Obamacare whacks them with a tax of up to $3,000 per employee. When you tax hiring, you get fewer jobs.
Due to an odd quirk in Obamacare, however, that tax is only enforceable if a state creates an exchange itself. It disappears in states that don’t create exchanges.
