This wasn’t even a good way to do out and out welfare, which the Dems should confess was the real goal. Way more overhead than necessary, hires an army of bureaucrats to oversee it. Wait, that is also a welfare program.
“This wasn’t even a good way to do out and out welfare, which the Dems should confess was the real goal. “
My big disappointment with the GOP Congress is their failure to even attempt to make changes to O’care after their 40 show votes to end it.
We desperately need a national market for health insurance where economies of scale can be realized from the supplier side and the prospect of more customers will allow price competition. The state by state regulation of the industry, with a multiple federal bureaucracies overseeing the state regulators is the worst way to administer a system. Since the federal government already defines what the terms of bronze, silver, and gold policies must be nationally, why have state government bureaucrats involved at all? Dealing with 50 separate state government just drives up costs.
The GOP Congress should have passed a bill with some real market based reforms to the program. Perhaps even a voucher system for Medicare and Medicaid. There could have been a national debate on the issue. If the Dems blocked the reforms in Congress, or Obama had vetoed an actual reform bill, the Republicans could be hammering Democrats on the issue this year. Instead we are hearing virtually nothing about the collapsing healthcare system.
Of course the GOP failed to capitalize on the public’s dislike for Obamacare in 2014. They managed to nominate the one Republican politician who had zero credibility on the issue (Romney, the architect of Romneycare). The absence of Republican leadership on healthcare makes me suspect they want single payer as much as the Democrats. Certainly the multinational corporations funding GOP campaigns will appreciate having the government take over employer funded health plans.