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Predictions On How US Supreme Court May Vote On Obamacare

ABA Journal: The U.S. Supreme Court hasn’t agreed to review the Obama administration’s health care law, but that hasn’t stopped the pundits from making some predictions.

The swing voters may be Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, Reuters reports. At issue is whether Congress had the constitutional authority to include a provision requiring Americans to buy insurance or to pay a penalty.

The court’s four liberal justices are likely to vote to uphold the law, constitutional experts told Reuters. But they disagree on likely votes by some of the others.

Rights to Song “YMCA” Sought By Village People Singer Under Obscure Copyright Law

ABA Journal:  The Village People had one word of advice for a young man in need of some dough and somewhere to go: Y.M.C.A.

Now the man who wrote the song is a little older and seeking to cash in through a little-known copyright provision that allows musicians and songwriters to regain control of their work after 35 years, the New York Times reports.

Victor Willis, the Village People’s original lead singer, has filed papers to regain control of the rights to “Y.M.C.A.” and 32 other songs, the story says. The termination-rights provision applies to work registered with the U.S. Copyright Office after Jan. 1, 1978, too late for the group’s other big hit, “Macho Man.”

Time To Retire?

Yahoo! Finance: The first wave of Baby Boomers turned 65 earlier this year. Once, that was the official retirement age, the birthday after which you could spend entire Tuesdays on the golf course with no judgment. It was also the age at which people would start to look askance at the office.

Indeed, a broad swath of older workers once faced mandatory retirement age policies, and until this spring, Great Britain had a “Default Retirement Age” (DRA) of 65. Past that, an employer could dismiss an employee simply because she was getting on in years.

But Britain’s DRA has now been largely phased out, and social norms are changing. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in the U.S., the labor force participation rate among people aged 65 to 74 rose from 16.1% in 1988 to 25.1% in 2008. To be sure, the increased participation among older workers is at least partly due to financial necessity — though the increase began during good times, rather than simply spiking during the recent recession. But even if you are financially comfortable, or if you can be flexible with living expenses, this increase in working seniors raises different questions: in the absence of social norms or laws, when is the right time to retire? What are the signs that you should stay, and what are the signs it’s time to move on?

 

Retirement Planning – For Your Parents

CBS Boston:  As an adult child you may have begun to worry about the physical decline in your parents.

They can’t maintain their garden without some help. Dad needs you to help him put in the air conditioners. Mom is having trouble balancing her checkbook.

All signs of normal aging. Nothing to be concerned with. But what if they need more than a Saturday afternoon of your time?

What if they need financial help to stay in their home? Are you prepared? Are they?

Obamacare’s Individual Mandate Struck Down By 11th Circuit

CNN:  A federal appeals court has tossed out key provisions of the sweeping health care reform bill championed by President Obama, setting up a likely election-year showdown at the Supreme Court over the landmark legislation.

A 2-1 panel of the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Atlanta on Friday found that the law’s “individual mandate” section — requiring nearly all Americans to purchase health insurance by 2014 or face financial penalties — was an improper exercise of federal authority.

“The individual mandate exceeds Congress’s enumerated commerce power and is unconstitutional,” Chief Judge Joel Dubina wrote. “This economic mandate represents a wholly novel and potentially unbounded assertion of congressional authority: the ability to compel Americans to purchase an expensive health insurance product they have elected not to buy, and to make them re-purchase that insurance product every month for their entire lives.”

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