TO THE EDITOR
The recent Concho Observer column Pfluger plan won’t fix healthcare had numerous falsehoods. I’ve selected a few to respond to:
“Every healthcare expert in the nation, and reports from industry leaders, are all in agreement; healthcare premiums for about 24 million Americans are expected to double or triple in 2026, due only to changes in the Republican’s ‘Big, Beautiful Bill.’”
Completely false. Insurance premiums have been going up since Obamacare was implemented. Premiums are up on average 67% for single coverage and 74% for family coverage since, despite President Obama’s political promise of premium decreases.
If the author is referring to the current debate around expiring COVID credits that has nothing to do with Republican-led changes to the tax code last summer. Some Americans will no longer receive COVID credits toward their insurance premiums because the Biden Administration set the program to expire at the end of 2025.
The COVID public health emergency is over. Why would taxpayers again foot the bill to extend COVID credits and pump more money to insurance companies? After all, the Government Accountability Office estimates that $21 billion of the credits went completely unverified, 58,000 deceased beneficiaries in 2023 received benefits, and another 275,000 Americans in 2024 were involuntarily enrolled. Keeping fraudulent subsidies would not be sound public policy.
The expiration of extra COVID credits is now exposing the ugly truth to some that the real cost of their health insurance under the Affordable Care Act is in fact totally unaffordable. No longer masked by a government plus up, we all see the real costs.
“But anyone with a memory stretching back a few decades knows it wasn’t Barack Obama or ‘The Democrats’ who turned American healthcare into what it is today. It was capitalism. Pure and simple. And it had the broadest-possible bipartisan support.”
Anyone with a memory does in fact recall that Democrats and Obamacare turned American health care into what it is today. Prices have skyrocketed, coverage has plummeted, market consolation has chased government incentives rather than market incentives and patient outcomes have worsened since its inception. On top of that, the system has been proven to be riddled with fraudulent activity. And recall PolitiFact named President Obama’s famous line about the program, ‘If you like your health care plan, you can keep it,’ the Lie of the Year for 2013.
The author and I agree on corporate greed. The insurance companies agree with Democrats and want the COVID credits extended because it’s fantastic for their bottom line – Democrats and insurance companies want these credits extended with zero reforms. That’s not political spin. Democrats have proposed a three-year extension of the status quo. It’s Republicans who are saying let’s cap the income level, let’s fully pay for it, let’s address the root causes of why prices are so high, and let’s ensure there are no phantom accounts – all things the insurance companies oppose.
“The idea that every problem in America was caused by somebody other than Republicans is feeble and childish.”
This sort of deeply partisan statement is so hyperbolic you see how divided our country has become. Really? Every single thing is the fault of Republicans? Good grief how does one have a good faith debate with someone like that who ignores 12 of the last 17 years were the Obama and Biden policies.
“Despite constant opposition to Obamacare, the Republicans have never actually proposed any credible legislation to replace it, or fix everything in American healthcare, despite having more than a decade to do so.”
Not only is Rep. Pfluger leading a commonsense bill to lower prices, expand care, and increase price transparency, but Congress also just passed the Lower Health Care Premiums for All Act which would lower health care premiums by 11%. Nearly every single Democrat opposed this legislation claiming it was a cop-out from just renewing the COVID credits. But just renewing the credits does nothing to drive down costs. It means taxpayers pay more to mask the actual cost of the premium. It means you go to work every day and pay taxes so the government can pay the insurance premiums for unused accounts.
John Byers
Chief of Staff
Congressman August Pfluger
2 Comments
You pay insurance companies because you want insurance: you want health care that has some shared risk across a large population (yes, socialized risk). It’s a weird logical fallacy to think that this isn’t how the credits should work – “pump more money to insurance companies.” Yes, you can buy care directly from a doctor or other provider, but what percent of the population do you think can do that more than a little bit?
Note that Obamacare has helped people with ‘preexisting conditions’ get into the insurance market, and this has been good for a lot of America.
Do you, Mr. Angry Congressman’s Chief of Staff, think the lapse in credits will make insurance companies better somehow? More efficient? More ethical? No, they’ll chase profits in other ways, like gouging private insurance that companies offer to employees. If you don’t want insurance companies to get more money that has been touched by the government, well, you can put legislatively some serious limits on executive pay and denials of care and slow payment of claims. The ones that want the money will improve. The others will be much less popular with the public, and the market will adjust to this.
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