Most Important Things They Don’t Want You to Know About a Health Care Bill
Good morning! Remember that health care bill that was so terrible that even the people who were in favor of repealing the ACA couldn’t pass it? He returned , and today he will vote.
Remember, the latter failed because it put Republicans in the House of Representatives with an impossible choice : vote no and disappoint their party, or vote yes and ensure the death and ill health of thousands of people in their constituency. (This is not an exaggeration; I will give some numbers below.)
Last night, lawmakers made a few lipstick-like changes to the law: things they hope will make it prettier and ward off some criticism, but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s a terrible law, and they all know it. This interview with Pennsylvania Republican Mike Kelly provides little insight: he admits it breaks his promises to voters, but he votes for it in the name of Republicans working together. He assumes that the Senate will magically solve all of its problems.
Anyway. Here are the most important parts of the bill that supporters hope you won’t notice:
- You don’t need to be on Obamacare for your insurance to become worthless. Because states can waive basic benefit requirements, insurers in those states may offer unwanted insurance plans that look good on the surface – hey, cheap premiums! – but if you get hit by a bus, you might have to pay for your own surgery, hospitalization, etc., or anything they don’t cover. Even if you have insurance at work, your employer may end up choosing one of these plans to save money. Reminder: Buses can run over even healthy, lucky, and privileged young people (the group most advocating for cheap, shitty insurance).
- Without substantial benefits, there is no limit to the amount you pay out of pocket . Even if you have a good insurance policy, if hospitalization is not deemed necessary, the law does not set limits on how much you may have to pay for it.
- Insurance premiums can go up to $ 4,000 for people with asthma and up to $ 140,000 for people with metastatic cancer . These are annual premiums for people who buy insurance on their own who had a coverage gap. There will be a lot of people in connection with other provisions of this bill. The House of Representatives is holding this vote without a CBO estimate , so there is no official data on how much premiums will increase. Instead, however, we have these estimates from the guerrilla Center for American Progress, based on government data , that show how much more these plans will cost insurers. And since healthy people don’t have to buy insurance, insurers have every incentive to keep their cheap plans cheap and expensive ones expensive.
- A security system for uninsured people will not be able to do its job . Lawmakers talk about “high-risk pools” where the government pays for the care of people who cannot afford insurance. But high-risk pools are indeed very expensive and the law does not allocate enough money. The account lacks $ 19 billion . High risk pools were in the past, and then they didn’t work either .
- The real goal of the bill is to “save” $ 880 billion, which can be used to reduce taxes. A last-minute replenishment of $ 15 billion for lower premiums and $ 8 billion for pre-existing conditions does not change the big picture. The bill for the $ 880 billion came primarily from the evisceration of Medicaid, a program that provides insurance for the poor, disabled, or those in need of long-term care. Almost half of all births in this country are covered by Medicaid. The money saved goes in part to abolish the 3.8 percent tax and the 0.9 percent tax that the rich currently pay ; the rest allows a future “tax reform” bill to provide even larger cuts that are likely to benefit the rich far more than the poor.
- Yes, people will die . This is usually laughed at; Are people really dying of poor access to healthcare in our wonderful country? Here is one small fact that confirms this. When Obamacare allowed states to expand Medicaid to reach more people, expanded states saved thousands of lives . The states that abandoned the expansion had 2,840 more deaths in each state than those that did. Based on the broader picture, the best estimates suggest that if 20 million people lost their health insurance (a conservative estimate for this bill), 24,000 would die unnecessarily .
If you want to explore everything in detail in a bill, the best exposition is from Vox . The bill, without a CBO assessment and late-night amendments that representatives did not necessarily have a chance to read, the bill will reportedly go to a vote at 2:00 pm ET today. [ Update: passed. ] Are they calling our bluff again? Difficult to say, but call your representative anyway.