Less coverage, higher costs, huge tax giveaways to those at the top. This took six years?
"This is a more of the same chaos, uncertainty, and half-baked ideas from Speaker Ryan's House and the Trump administration."
Donald Trump, Paul Ryan and Mike Pence. Photo from the Office of the Speaker of the House.
MADISON – Last evening, Speaker Paul Ryan and House Republicans proudly introduced a plan to throw millions of Americans off their health care and make health care more expensive for millions more. The real winners are the wealthy and insurance company CEOs who are set to benefit from the huge tax giveaways baked into the bill.
“No wonder Speaker Paul Ryan’s caucus has been trying to hide this plan – it’s worse than any American family thought it would be,” Democratic Party of Wisconsin spokesman Brandon Weathersby said on Tuesday. “Speaker Ryan and President Trump lied to us. This bill costs more money, insures fewer people, and provides big payouts to CEOs and insurance companies while leaving families and seniors in the dust.”
Here are the facts on the plan revealed by House Republicans last night:
- Ends Medicaid expansion: Makes it impossible for states to continue Medicaid expansion past 2020, meaning millions fewer would have coverage.
- Cuts regular Medicaid: Creates per-capita caps to Medicaid funding that will result increased costs for millions of additional seniors, low-income families, people with disabilities, and children.
- Defunds Planned Parenthood: Puts essential care at risk for millions of patients who depend on Planned Parenthood for their care.
- Reduces tax credits: Makes coverage unaffordable for millions of moderate-income families by reducing the size of tax subsidies. The Kaiser Family Foundation found that many would pay thousands more a year.
- Raises premiums and out-of-pocket costs – especially for older people: Premiums and out-of-pocket costs will rise, especially for older people, because the bill lifts caps on how much insurance companies can charge.
- Huge penalties for short lapses in coverage: Anyone who doesn’t have insurance for two months will be hit with a 30% premium hike – for a full year – if they try to obtain coverage. This provision would not only incentivize healthy people to stay out of the health insurance market, it would make it unaffordable for Americans who need coverage to obtain it again. It would leave more Americans without access to care and make the whole system more expensive for everyone.
- A big new tax giveaway for the wealthy: Health savings accounts are just another tax break for the wealthiest. For people living paycheck-to-paycheck, this doesn’t make health care more affordable or accessible.
- An even bigger tax giveaway for insurance company CEOs: Insurance companies will once again be able to count huge executive salaries as deductible business expenses.
“It took six years for Republicans to write a bill that focuses on huge tax giveaways for the super wealthy more than increasing access to affordable health care for American families,” said Weathersby. “This is a more of the same chaos, uncertainty, and half-baked ideas from Speaker Ryan’s House and the Trump administration.”
NOTE: This press release was submitted to Urban Milwaukee and was not written by an Urban Milwaukee writer. It has not been verified for its accuracy or completeness.
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