New York Post - USA (2020-10-25)

New York Post, Sunday, October 25, 2020

nypost.com

Percentage of

Americans who say

they support legal

same-sex marriage

lIceNse

to wed

Should not

be valid

But, somehow, in spite of controlling

both the White House and both

houses of Congress, they never quite

got it done. A total repeal would pro-

vide a cathartic political victory, but

Republicans have denied themselves

that big win because of two words:

“Then what?”

They don’t have a good answer.

Americans have not embraced a

larger government role in health

care because they are socialistic but

because they are risk-averse where

health care is concerned. Conserva-

tives too often ignore that or fail to

understand it. They spent the ACA

debate mulishly insisting that we

have “the best health-care system in

the world,” while many millions of

Americans disagreed. Millions still

disagree.

So, how do we fix it? Sometimes,

it is better to think small. Health care

is too complex to be “fixed” once

and for all by a single piece of legis-

lation, no matter how well-crafted

the legislation or generously funded

the program. Instead of a sweeping

but ultimately futile grand legislative

gesture, the GOP should focus on

discrete, narrow reforms that link

conservatives’ market-oriented

model with Americans’ workaday

anxieties regarding health care.

Work to make prices lower, work to

make coverage more predictable,

work to make health insurance work

more like any other product — but

don’t try to do everything at once.

Congress could give families more

control over their health spending

by passing Sen. Ben Sasse’s Health

Savings Account Expansion Act and

Qualified Health Savings Account

Distribution Act, which together

would make HSAs available to more

families, allow them to put more pre-

tax money into them, and keep them

from losing their saved funds at the

end of the year or when changing

jobs. HSAs are a great benefit for

those in high-deductible plans.

Sasse’s proposals may not satisfy the

crusading zealots, but they represent

real reforms that would make life

better for real people. Surely that

would count for something.

Because most Americans depend

on their employers for health insur-

ance, losing a job is a double catastro-

phe. Making insurance more portable

from job to job would require signifi-

cant changes to the federal tax code

and to the way insurance is regulated.

One possible reform would be to

allow all Americans to pay their in-

surance premiums with pretax dol-

lars, which would eliminate the tax

advantage for employer-based plans.

Allowing insurance purchases across

state lines would be a bigger legisla-

tive lift, but it is far from impossible.

Together, those two reforms

would go a long way toward the cre-

ation of a robust and competitive

market in health insurance rather

than the fragmented and less com-

petitive one we have now. And mar-

kets work wonders: Nobody loves

his cellular provider, but if it were

possible and as inexpensive to join

or change a health-insurance plan as

easily as a mobile-phone plan, many

Americans would be relieved. And

greater portability would eliminate

coverage interruptions caused by

job changes or unemployment — re-

lieving the main source of the preex-

isting-conditions problem.

Because the health insurance mar-

ket is complex, it is very difficult to

say with any accuracy how effective

any given policy initiative will be in

the long term. The truth is, we just

don’t know. We don’t have to. We

can’t fix it all at once, and should

stop pretending that we can. At the

same time, working to bring down

prices and improve portability and

flexibility are self-reinforcing re-

forms: an improvement in one rein-

forces the others.

Democrats failed to implement the

ACA. Republicans failed to repeal it.

The Supreme Court probably won’t

throw it out. But we can build a bet-

ter health-care system the way

Johnny Cash built his Cadillac: one

piece at a time.

Kevin D. Williamson is the author of the

upcoming “Big White Ghetto: Dead Broke,

Stone-Cold Stupid, and High on Rage in the Dank

Woolly Wilds of the ‘Real America’” (Regnery).

A NEW OPERATION

We need

to burn

the

Affordable

Care

Act

and

rebuild it

— piece

by piece

Both

Democrats

and

Republicans

have failed on

health care.

It’s time to

make small

changes.

NY Post photo composite

—Gallup

Should

be valid

31%

67%

Voters, on how they plan to
vote in the races for president
and House of Representatives

—Pew

sPlIttINg

the bIll

— New Yorker editor

Jeffrey Toobin, after

he was suspended

for allegedly

masturbating during

a company meeting

on video

“I believed

I was not

visible on

Zoom.”

Straight Republican

Straight Democrat

Split between Republican
and Democrat

Other split

Not sure/refused

T

he Supreme Court proba-
bly is not going to nullify
ObamaCare. Congress
should — one piece at a
time.
Democrats opposed to the nomi-
nation of Amy Coney Barrett to the
Supreme Court were very worried
— or at least pretended to be wor-
ried — about the upcoming case
challenging the constitutionality of
the so-called Affordable Care Act.
The case is based on a legal theory
considered pretty shaky on both
sides of the aisle — many conserva-
tive legal analysts who would like to
see the ACA repealed believe that
the Court is extremely unlikely to
throw it out. Some have gone as far
as to predict a 9-0 ruling against the
challenge.
But, in one meaningful sense, the
ACA already has been nullified — the
law never has been fully implemented
as it was designed, and it is almost
certain at this point that it never will
be. Republicans opposed some key
features — the mandates and the ex-
changes — while Democrats opposed
others, such as the “Cadillac” tax on
generous private health-care plans
and a tax on those medical-device
manufacturers who are so generous
to Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
And what was implemented did not
work as intended: One in ten Ameri-
cans, 32 million in all, still go without
health insurance. And while Presi-
dent Barack Obama promised Ameri-
cans a $2,500-a-year reduction in in-
surance premiums, premiums were
increasing at an average of 22 percent
a year by the end of his presidency,
according to US government figures.
Republicans tried — or pretended
to try — to repeal the ACA in one go.

kevIN d.

wIllIamsoN

35%

43%

4%

6%

11%

“People are

tired of hearing

Fauci and

all these

idiots.”

— Trump, claiming that

Americans are bored of

hearing about the coronavirus

from scientists and doctors

like Anthony Fauci (right)

“Nothing

personal,

strictly

business.”

— Fauci, quoting

“The Godfather”

in response to

Trump’s criticism

vIral commeNts