Natural Gas Fill Rate And Gasoline Demand -- Weekly Update -- December 10, 2015; ObamaCare On Life Support -- Fiscal Times

Updates

December 15, 2015: Platts is reporting that there is an unquenchable thirst for gasoline in the US. The most recent data suggests that may not be completely accurate (see below), but this is what Platts is reporting:

Unseasonably strong gasoline demand is proving for US refiners to be the gift that keeps on giving this holiday season, as support from seasonal diesel demand is tamped down by record high temperatures across much of the US.

Gasoline prices are keeping margins healthy, as prompt pipeline unleaded gasoline in the US refinery hub along the Gulf Coast was assessed by Platts at $1.2752/g last Friday, up 15 cents/gal from the $1.1242/gal last Monday.

Original Post

 

Natural gas fill rate (dynamic link): -76. Second consecutive week with a negative fill rate.

Gasoline demand (dynamic link): flat; at last year's rate.

• one year ago: 9.106 million bopd
• this week (10/04/15): 9.160 million bopd

This single tea leaf is most prognostic of a sluggish economy, especially when gas is this cheap. Add this data point to surging claims for unemployment benefits, at 5-month high -- just in time for Janet Yellen to raise rates. 

******************************

The Writing On The Wall Ain't Graffitti

Of the 23 or so ObamaCare co-ops in existence last year, only one made money. Of the 23 or so ObamaCare co-ops, about one dozen have closed shop. The only one that made money last year is taking no new subscribers. At least I think I read this story correctly. The AP is reporting:

The lone health insurance cooperative to make money last year on the Affordable Care Act's public insurance exchanges is now losing millions and suspending individual enrollment for 2016.

Maine's Community Health Options lost more than $17 million in the first nine months of this year, after making $10.9 million in the same period last year. A spokesman said higher-than-expected medical costs have hurt the cooperative.

The announcement casts further doubt on the future of the cooperatives, small nonprofit insurers devised during the ACA's creation to inject competition in insurance markets. These co-ops immediately struggled to build their businesses. A dozen of the 23 created have already folded.

An Associated Press review of financial statements from 10 of the 11 surviving co-ops shows that they lost, on average, more than $21 million in the first nine months of this year. Those losses range from $3.9 million reported by Maryland's Evergreen Health Cooperative to $50.7 million booked by Land of Lincoln Mutual Health Insurance Co. in Illinois.

At least someone is paying attention even if mainstream American and mainstream media are not. Fiscal Times is reporting that ObamaCare is on "life support."

Still, as bad as the news has been over the past five years, the remaining illusions were shattered by the CBO and the White House itself this week. Obamacare didn’t make much of a dent in the uninsured rate, it has forced costs to rise faster than before, and it will kill millions of jobs that otherwise would be created.

“The labor force is projected to be about 2 million full-time-equivalent workers smaller in 2025 under the ACA than it would have been otherwise,” the CBO concludes in the latest analysis of Obamacare’s impact on the economy. Much of the reason — the CBO puts it at 75 percent — comes from the net increase of effective tax rates on labor, which will incentivize potential workers to stay out of the work force. Democrats claim that this is a feature rather than a bug, as people can choose not to work. However, even with that rose-colored glasses view, it means that the rest of the taxpayers will have to subsidize the health care of those who opt out, whether happily or unhappily.

The depressing impact on job growth is not the only illusion shattered, either. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) published a study on Obamacare’s impact on costs and on reducing the numbers of uninsured — and it fails on both counts. The CBO estimated after the passage of Obamacare that the number of uninsured would drop 19 million by 2014 from a 2010 benchmark. Instead, it has only dropped 12.6 million. As Avik Roy points out at Forbes , the 2010 level of uninsured was artificially high due to the impact of the Great Recession. Using 2008 as a benchmark, the number of uninsured has dropped by only 6.7 million.