Republicans’ Obamacare repeal is starting to look like Medicaid repeal
“Republicans have made a big change to their health-care plan: Instead of increasing costs for the poor and sick to lower them for the rich and healthy, it would lower costs for the rich and healthy to increase them for the poor and sick. See the difference? No? Well, you must not be a Republican senator then. Now, all kidding aside, it is true that the Senate’s latest health-care plan would depart from its earlier versions in a few key ways. Where it wouldn’t, though, is in its results. Those would be the same as ever: insurance would become much more expensive for the sick, slightly more affordable for the healthy, and appreciably worse for everyone in the form of higher out-of-pocket costs. The other constant, of course, is that Republicans would use repealing Obamacare as an excuse to eviscerate Medicaid. That doesn’t get as much attention since it isn’t ‘new’— it’s been the cornerstone of every Republican plan so far — but it should. Those cuts, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, would make 15 million people lose their insurance over the next 10 years.”