Recently, the media has done extensive reporting on the problems involved with the new health care website and the cancellation of certain health care policies by private health insurance companies. The Republican Party intends to use these recent deficiencies in Obamacare to attack it over the coming months. Yet the Republican Party has no viable health care plan alternative. The Republicans’ plan to politically undermine Obamacare disguises the real issue at hand: when will the federal government enact a single-payer health insurance system?
Since congressional Republicans were unable to prevent the Affordable Care Act from becoming the binding law of the land, they have tried every tactic to stop or slow its implementation. Illustrative of this is the fact that the Republican-controlled House of Representatives has voted 46 times since taking over the House in 2010 to repeal it — fully knowing that such an effort would neither pass the Senate nor be signed by Obama.
Since congressional Republicans have not been able to repeal Obamacare outright, they have transitioned their strategy to attacking it politically with an eye on the 2014 midterm elections — including attacking the problems associated with the health care website and the cancellation of health care plans. As the New York Times reported, “Republican strategists say that over the next several months, they intend to keep Democrats on their heels through a multilayered, sequenced assault [on Obamacare].”
First, the problems with the health care website are probably short-term. The administration has significantly improved the website from when it was first launched — although more work certainly needs to be done. Second, there has been controversy over private health care insurance companies canceling people’s health care insurance policies. This isn’t a fault of Obamacare. As Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research writes, “The plans being terminated because they don’t meet the minimal standards [under the ACA] were all plans that insurers introduced after the passage of the ACA. Insurers introduced these plans knowing that they would not meet the standards that would come into effect in 2014.”
Obamacare was proposed as a politically moderate solution to health care reform. In fact, the individual mandate (which is the most controversial part of the ACA) was advocated for by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, back in the late 1980s. Not only that, but as governor of Massachusetts in 2006, Mitt Romney signed health care reform legislation into law that included an individual mandate.
Yet, it seems likely that the U.S. will one day have a single-payer health care system (i.e., Medicare for all). As Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said in August, “What we’ve done with Obamacare is have a step in the right direction, but we’re far from having something that’s going to work forever.” He further noted he supported a health care system that did not rely on private health insurance.
Not only is the United States likely to enact a single-payer health care system in the future, it is the most efficient way to provide every citizen with health care. As the Government Accountability Office concluded in 1991, “If the U.S. were to shift to a system of universal coverage and a single-payer, as in Canada, the savings in administrative costs would be more than enough to offset the expense of universal coverage.”
There has been controversy surrounding the new health care website and private health care companies cancelling people’s health care policies. The Republican Party plans to uses these controversies in order to make advances in the 2014 midterm elections. Yet, this strategy serves only to disguise the real issue: when the federal government will enact a single-payer health care system. Ultimately, only time will tell.
Aaron Loudenslager ([email protected]) is a second year law student.
