Shocker: Major corporations may dump health insurance, pay penalties instead

Who could have guessed? Um …

(By Ed Morrissey; Hot Air) - Well, well, well. Remember when Barack Obama said that under ObamaCare, people would keep their existing health plans and doctors? Remember when any suggestion that companies would find it a lot less expensive to dump employer-based health care and pay the penalties instead were cast as “myths” and “scare tactics,” even though the math was extremely easy to see? Welcome to Hope and Change:

The great mystery surrounding the historic health care bill is how the corporations that provide coverage for most Americans — coverage they know and prize — will react to the new law’s radically different regime of subsidies, penalties, and taxes. Now, we’re getting a remarkable inside look at the options AT&T, Deere, and other big companies are weighing to deal with the new legislation.

Internal documents recently reviewed by Fortune, originally requested by Congress, show what the bill’s critics predicted, and what its champions dreaded: many large companies are examining a course that was heretofore unthinkable, dumping the health care coverage they provide to their workers in exchange for paying penalty fees to the government.