House Republicans Are Taking Another Shot At Reforming America's Healthcare

Michael F. Cannon

Economics,

Is this the right policy for Americans?

The Republican Study Committee, a group of conservative House Republicans, has issued a health reform proposal. It's not the first thing on the RSC web site, but scroll down and you'll find it. The proposal has much to commend it.

Freeing Consumers from Harmful Regulations

Notably, it would repeal the Affordable Care Act's consistently unpopular preexisting-conditions provisions, which not only make coverage worse for the sick but leave every ACA enrollee with inadequate coverage. (Can you say, "junk insurance"?) One of the reasons Republicans suffered losses in the 2018 mid-term elections was their failure to expose how those supposed consumer protections are harming the very patients they purport to help. Had they done so, they could have turned independents and even many Democrats to their side.

Ironically, after launching a full-throated denunciation of those provisions, the RSC plan then turns around and proposes to apply a modified version of them to consumers who switch from one private health insurance plan to another.

One can perhaps forgive this harmful inconsistency, though, because the RSC plan would codify the Trump administration's rules regarding short-term plans. Embedding those rules in statute would free consumers to avoid the RSC plan's harmful regulations; allow consumers to purchase affordable, renewable term health insurance; and improve the functioning of that market by providing regulatory certainty to insurers.

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