Obama's Law

You can keep your health insurance plan...unless you can't;

Rising health-care costs and a climate of change brought about by the new federal health law are prompting American corporations to revisit the pact they've long had with employees over medical benefits.

Walgreen Co...is set to become one of the largest employers yet to make sweeping changes to company-backed health programs. On Wednesday, the drugstore giant disclosed a plan to provide payments to eligible employees for the subsidized purchase of insurance starting in 2014. The plan will affect roughly 160,000 employees, and will require them to shop for coverage on a private health-insurance marketplace. Aside from rising health-care costs, the company cited compliance-related expenses associated with the new law as a reason for the switch.

That's according to the Wall Street Journal's Christopher Weaver and Timothy Martin. Mor;

A long trend of rising health spending and a wave of changes to the health-care system are prompting many employers to rethink their roles in financing care for employees and their dependents.

Like the shift from pension plans to 401(k) plans beginning in the 1980s, the moves mark a transition in which employers are handing their workers more control over their benefits, some experts say. But as companies set their contributions at fixed amounts to limit benefits spending, workers could wind up shouldering a greater share of the burden if health costs increase. 

Which they will if we retain the model in which one party provides the service, a second consumes same, but a third party has to pay for it. That's a law too; the Law of Demand. It long predates Barack Obama's Presidency. Someone should point that out to him.