Blog
March 12, 2017
What the Republican talking points REALLY mean
They say: We want to allow the sale of health insurance across state lines.
The Reality: Selling insurance across state lines will let insurance companies move to the states with the weakest regulations, which could destroy coverage protections and threaten other patient safeguards. It’s a giveaway to insurers-basicly allowing them to pick and choose which rules to follow, creating a race to the bottom. While it will lower monthly premiums for people in perfect health, it will DRASTICALLY increase premiums for everyone else, particularly older people, and those with health conditions. The Congressional Budget office (CBO) found this would increase premiums for those with pre existing conditions and lead to more of these individuals going without insurance. If you couple this with the provision in the new Trumpcare proposal to allow insurance companies to collect a permanent 30% penalty if there is a lapse in coverage of more than 60 days, you have created a perfect storm. The National Association of Insurance Commissioners, a bipartisan body representing all states’ top insurance regulators, opposes allowing insurers to sell across state lines and has said this policy won’t work for states’ markets and residents.
They say: We want to end all job killing taxes contained in the Affordable care act. We also don’t want to force people to get insurance if they don’t want to and the individual and business mandate does both.
The Reality: If you end the individual mandate, premiums will skyrocket. You can’t require insurers to cover people with pre existing conditions without also bringing healthy people into the insurance pool. The balance of both healthy and sick people in insurance plans is needed to even out the costs for everyone.
Immediate repeal of the individual mandate will cause immediate harm to insurers, insurance markets and consumers. The urban institute estimates that the number of uninsured would immediately increase by 4.3 million people, not including any losses due to the cut of Medicaid, and that insurers would suffer close to $3 billion in losses. At least some (if not most) insurers would leave the market mid-year, leaving consumers with fewer (or potentially no) plan choices, thus adding to the Republicans self fulfilling prophecy.
Repealing the Employer mandate for businesses over 50 people would also decrease the number of healthy people and total people insured.
Research shows that women routinely face financial barriers to affording care-particularly before the ACA. Unmet healthcare needs, because of cost, are significantly more common among women than men. Asking women to increase the amount of money they put toward premiums will only create new and additional barriers for getting the care they need