House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said more Americans will be in the market for health insurance after Obamacare is repealed while talking to reporters Monday.
Critics have expressed concern about keeping popular language in place would prevent premiums from coming down. Provisions under the microscope include allowing children to stay on their parents’ plans until the age of 26 and ensuring that preexisting conditions remain covered, which McCarthy said were originally Republican ideas. The GOP’s plan, which is still being constructed, will be crafted to achieve similar goals without government overreach, he said.
“The philosophical approach on what’s the best way to solve health care premiums, we have taken the approach of Obamacare, they said premiums would go down, we found that that’s not true. We also said there would be people who would go into the market, people have left the market because in the structure of how they put health care together,” he said. “I think you take the principle of it and the structure of what we write — we would be correct in the end that the principles would go down because there would be more competition, there would be more options and there would be more people in the market.”
Since the Affordable Care Act’s implementation, premiums have skyrocketed by double digits in more that half of the country’s states. Due to hefty losses, a number of insurance companies have opted to drop out of Obamacare marketplaces, leaving certain areas of the country with few or zero choices in terms of coverage options.
McCarthy argued that the increase in competition will drive down costs leading to an increase in buyers without a mandate.
“Well, you take one step back and you start with the principle aspect of it right, there’s a philosophical difference of a belief, in that we believe with more people in the market you get greater choice and the demand is higher,” he said.”If you allow those that can’t afford it to actually enter the same market where they have more options the price will go down.”
The Senate is expected to take up repealing Obamacare the first week of January, where it’s expected to use the reconciliation process, allowing the upper chamber to pass budget-related bills with just a simple majority.
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