It is possible that Republicans don't really want to repeal Obamacare at all, and wouldn't if a Republican president is elected in 2016.
Remember back to how the Obamacare legislation came about.
Democrats have always wanted universal health care, with a single payer plan the most popular. However, Republicans, first in the Clinton administration and then in the Obama administration, forced Democrats to compromise, dropping single payer, and replacing it with the Republican forced mandate for people to buy insurance from private insurance corporations.
Republicans promise things for votes, but mainly work for the large corporations. So what have large corporations wanted in the past decade.
Corporations have wanted to reduce or drop health care benefits for employees, but they couldn't just do it without a serious backlash. Therefore, Obamacare is perfect for the corporations. The fine is much less than the cost of employee health insurance, and they have even managed to have the fine put off for a year. They no doubt think they can get the fine for not providing employee health insurance eventually rescinded.
Obamacare is also what the health care corporations want. Remember that health care businesses quietly work together to set prices. Therefore, by working together on prices, they can make more money with Obamacare by raising prices than with the system before Obamacare. There have already been some news stories that the healthcare insurance companies might be "forced" by financial problems to raise prices on the health exchange next fall. Those kinds of news reports are often predictive of what is going to happen. The healthcare insurance companies could instead reduce what they pay to doctors, hospitals, etc., but of course they won't do that.
So with Obamacare being in the interests of both health insurance companies and other corporations, probably the Republicans in Congress have no intention of actually rescinding Obamacare. They say they plan to do that in order to get votes. But in the end, they will write bills which the corporations want but which won't actually end things like the mandate.
How could it be otherwise? Obamacare is financially profitable for the nation's corporations.
Jim
Remember back to how the Obamacare legislation came about.
Democrats have always wanted universal health care, with a single payer plan the most popular. However, Republicans, first in the Clinton administration and then in the Obama administration, forced Democrats to compromise, dropping single payer, and replacing it with the Republican forced mandate for people to buy insurance from private insurance corporations.
Republicans promise things for votes, but mainly work for the large corporations. So what have large corporations wanted in the past decade.
Corporations have wanted to reduce or drop health care benefits for employees, but they couldn't just do it without a serious backlash. Therefore, Obamacare is perfect for the corporations. The fine is much less than the cost of employee health insurance, and they have even managed to have the fine put off for a year. They no doubt think they can get the fine for not providing employee health insurance eventually rescinded.
Obamacare is also what the health care corporations want. Remember that health care businesses quietly work together to set prices. Therefore, by working together on prices, they can make more money with Obamacare by raising prices than with the system before Obamacare. There have already been some news stories that the healthcare insurance companies might be "forced" by financial problems to raise prices on the health exchange next fall. Those kinds of news reports are often predictive of what is going to happen. The healthcare insurance companies could instead reduce what they pay to doctors, hospitals, etc., but of course they won't do that.
So with Obamacare being in the interests of both health insurance companies and other corporations, probably the Republicans in Congress have no intention of actually rescinding Obamacare. They say they plan to do that in order to get votes. But in the end, they will write bills which the corporations want but which won't actually end things like the mandate.
How could it be otherwise? Obamacare is financially profitable for the nation's corporations.
Jim
