By Jack Strayer, Speaking from Experience

In March of 2010, the U.S. Congress passed and President Obama signed into law the Affordable Health Care Act (AHCA), also known as ObamaCare.

It was enacted without a single vote from the Republicans in the U.S. House and Senate.

The AHCA includes many badly needed and well-received insurance reforms.

It eliminates pre-existing condition clauses in health policies; it allows children up to age 26 to be included in their parents’ health coverage; it provides badly needed preventive care measures; and it eliminates lifetime limits on coverage.

All the provisions of the AHCA were to go into effect in January 2014, including the controversial employer mandate.

The employer mandate requires all employers with 50 or more employees to provide health insurance to all full-time workers or face a stiff $2,000 fine per employee. Big Business fought this mandate because it was too expensive and too burdensome.

On July 2, 2013, when no one was looking, President Obama delayed implementation of the new employer mandate included in the AHCA until after the 2014 general election.
This retooling is perhaps the smartest move President Obama has made during his five years in office. Had he not delayed this key provision of ObamaCare here is what would have happened in 2014:

• Employers would have slashed the number of hours their employees worked from 40 hours at good wages, resulting in part-time employees working less than 30 hours per week.

• Many businesses would simply reduce their workforce to below the mandate threshold of 50 workers, laying off millions of Americans.

• ObamaCare would have suffocated the economic recovery that is slowly easing the pain of the Great Recession of 2007-2011.

• The Democrats would have lost the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House would have picked up more Republican seats because of the harsh economic impact of the employer mandate.

President Obama has given the economy a reprieve from this looming economic calamity.

As the late dean of the White House Press Corps, Helen Thomas, would say (and most Democrats):

“Thank you, Mr. President!”