Darden Restaurants Cut Workers' Hours to Avoid Paying Health Care Coverage

People on both sides can say what they want about the Affordable Care Act, but one thing is obvious: it was written by people with feminist leanings at best, and misandrist leanings at worst. Case in point: the blatant sexism in the act. Check it out for yourself. Go to http://www.healthcare.gov/news/factsheets/2010/07/preventive-services-list.html#CoveredPreventiveServicesforAdults and see what preventative measures are covered. Notice anything strange? There are three categories of coverage - Adults, Women, and Children. Men do not have their own category of preventative care, as if men do not have gender-specific health concerns. Women get screenings for 22 services, including screenings for gonorrhea, Hepatitis B, Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), and Human Papillomavirus (HPV). Men do not get the same screenings, which is ludicrous, since women get the diseases from men. While women get services for female-specific medical concerns like breast cancer and cervical cancer, men are not offered screenings for prostate cancer or testicular cancer. Women are screened for osteoporosis - men are not. Women - but not men - even get screening and intervention for tobacco use, although men are more likely so smoke. Women get contraceptive procedures, including tubal ligation, but men do not get vasectomies. How does that make sense? There's not a woman alive who can impregnate another woman - and yet the only source of impregnation is not offered contraception. Women get screening and counseling for domestic violence, but men do not, although most credible studies show that men are victims of domestic violence AT LEAST as often as women.

Whether you are a male Democrat or male Republican, this should outrage you. Why are men being discriminated against in ObamaCare?

What all of this shows me is that the Affordable Health Care Act was more concerned with playing political handball than it was offering health coverage to all Americans.

To sign a petition asking to have sexism removed from the act, go here: http://www.change.org/petitions/the-president-of-the-united-states-stop-sexism-in-the-affordable-care-act

What "ENG Tech" and "HolySmokes" conveniently ignore in their posts is that we (i.e., THEY) will be paying for the health care needs of those workers cut to 28 hours when they show up in clinics, doctors' offices, and hospital emergency rooms with no insurance. Health services will be provided and the costs "written off" by the providers. The result is that the providers' general fees for services are raised across the board to recover the "non-recoverable" costs of providing care to the uninsured and underinsured.

Now, if ENG Tech and HolySmokes have employer-provided health insurance premiums or even partial insurance premiums paid by their employers (presumably, based on their posts and attitude, they are employed and enjoy some form of employer health insurance benefit), the next thing to happen is that their own health care costs will rise, and consequently the cost of their health insurance premiums will rise, and consequently again, just maybe their own employers are going to say, "we can't afford to cover you to the extent as in the past. We're going to reduce our contribution to your health insurance premium and you will have to pay more, or just maybe cut your hours to 28 per week. How do you like them apples?"

ENG Tech and HolySmokes, there ain't no such thing as a free lunch. The macro bundle of health care costs is a closed system, i.e., everything is in it, and one way or another it gets paid for, as it has for the past hundred years. The question is how do you want to pay for it? Because you're going to pay for it anyway.

Just to cite an example of only one piece of the problem: Know any cops or firemen or hospital workers? Ask them how many uninsured people get hauled off to ERs every day of the year, often via expensive ambulance services, be they private or more often than not, government provided. Ask how many of those people pay a stinking dime toward their bills, which can easily total in the thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of dollars. And that's okay with you? Is it okay with you that YOU are paying for it right now, already, without that dreaded Obamacare?

I'm tired of it. I'm tired of individuals ducking their responsibilities, companies ducking their responsibilities, and everyone else. The Affordable Care Act is an attempt to rectify that. For Darden Restaurant's part, they're quite happy to duck their responsibility so you can contribute to their corporate bottom line.

I'm sure you can't (won't) understand that because you simply dislike Obama, to the point that you are unable to think rationally about how the system is not working.

Ah yes, just another one of those hidden surprises in the bill that had to be passed before we could see what was in it... no thanks to Harry Reid and Nancy "the scag" Pelosi. Never a dull moment with this bunch!

Obama is ruining us. He should think about things before cramming them through on us like they did on the healthcare bill. He promised to be non-partisan but didn't do that. No wonder the Repub's. got ornery on him, and now we could all suffer do to this mess -- a mess where Pelosi said they needed to vote for it so they could find out what's in it? Stupid!