Republican Health Care Plan: Cut health insurance for tens of millions of working-class Americans

San José, CA – On Monday, March 13, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its report on the proposed American Health Care Act or ACHA. The ACHA is the House Republican bill that is supported by President Trump. The CBO report estimated that 14 million would lose health insurance the first year after the passage of the ACHA. This number will rise to 24 million people who would lose health insurance over the next ten years. This will basically double the percentage working-age adults who go without health insurance from 10% to 19%. This would save the federal government $1200 billion, most of which will go to tax cuts that mainly benefit the rich.

Of the 24 million people losing their health insurance, more than half, or 14 million low-income Americans, will lose their Medicaid coverage. This will reverse the expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act (ACA, commonly known as Obamacare). This will have a special impact on the disabled, which make up more than 40% of Medicaid spending.

The next biggest group of people losing insurance, totaling 7 million, would be workers who get health insurance from their employers. Before the ACA businesses had been cutting back on employee health insurance. The ACA led to 8 million more workers and their families being covered by employer insurance, as larger businesses were told to cover their workers. The ACHA would undo this aspect of the ACA, sacrificing millions of workers and their families to further boost corporate profits.

Only 2 million people who buy individual health insurance would have lost their health insurance at the end of ten years. While 9 million people would lose their individual health insurance as they lose government subsidies provided by the ACA, this would be largely offset by workers who lose their employer health insurance and are forced to buy individual health insurance.

The Republican/Trump ACHA cuts to health insurance save the federal government $1200 billion over ten years. Most of these savings would be used to give a gigantic tax cut that would come to an average of $200,000 a year for the top one-tenth of one percent (0.1%) of Americans by ending the ACA tax on investment income and on high-income households.