Robert Young, a 29-year old independent filmmaker in Lansing, had his health insurance plan canceled. In Sherman Oaks, Calif., meanwhile, Anthem Blue Cross has canceled 64-year old Yale Goodman\u2019s policy after 20 years, offering him a replacement plan with a $1,129 monthly premium, up from $594.<\/p>\n
From young to old, from heartland to coast, millions of Americans are feeling the effects of President Obama\u2019s fraudulent Affordable Care Act that promised lower costs and no loss of coverage.<\/p>\n
But in crisis there is opportunity, and Obamacare\u2019s pain has created a Republican opening for a workable alternative that actually addresses the twin problems of high costs and the uninsured. Despite a conservative consensus on free-market health care reform, Republican leadership has so far been content to point out the ACA\u2019s flaws. But if America is to be rescued from Obamacare\u2019s botched, centrally-planned surgery, Republicans must pivot to a positive solution.<\/p>\n
Like Young and Goodman, the policies of some 15 million people in the individual health market are threatened (ironic since the ACA remade the entire health system to address\u00a0an estimated 12-32 million uninsured<\/a>). But they are just the first wave of ACA casualties. An estimated 129 million Americans will ultimately see their plans canceled or premiums hiked,\u00a0finds Duke University economist<\/a>\u00a0Christopher Conover, due to mandates on employer-provided insurance. But what is also clear is that a return to the pre-Obamacare status quo is unacceptable.<\/p>\n Fortunately, GOP-sponsored plans are shovel ready and straightforward in implementation.<\/p>\n Michigan representatives Dan Benishek, R-Crystal Falls, and Mike Rogers, R-Brighton, are at the forefront of legislative proposals that build on President Bush\u2019s 2007,\u00a0consumer-based insurance reform<\/a>. Indeed, Dubya\u2019s plan would likely be the law of the land today had he not been weakened by his own over-reach into Iraq. As it was, his health reform was DOA in Nancy Pelosi\u2019s Democratic House.<\/p>\n The Galen Institute\u2019s Grace Marie-Turner, a health care expert who recently met with GOP leadership on health reform, says the GOP plans share three basic elements:<\/p>\n – Federal dollars to incentivize states to create high-risk pools\/exchanges for individuals with pre-existing conditions (Utah already had implemented<\/a>\u00a0a state exchange for small business and\u00a0scholars<\/a>\u00a0like Shikah Dalmia at Reason have advocated deregulating Obamacare\u2019s exchanges to include Medicaid and Medicare recipients).<\/p>\n – Extending employer-based tax credits to individuals so that health tax benefits follow the individual, not the job (most uninsured are between jobs).<\/p>\n – Allow states to create interstate insurance pools, broadening the individual and small business marketplace.<\/p>\n These reforms are at the center of the Empowering Patients First Act, co-sponsored by physicians Benishek and Rep. Tom Price, R-Georgia, a comprehensive alternative that Price first introduced in 2009. The bill extends health tax credits to individuals, which would grant consumers the same buying power as businesses.<\/p>\n \u201cDr. Benishek has consistently argued in support of replacing Obamacare with patient-centered reforms like allowing insurance to be sold over state lines (and) making health insurance portable,\u201d says a spokesman.<\/p>\n Rep. Rogers\u2019 reform, the 2009 American Health Care Solutions Act, includes similar provisions and echoes Bush\u2019s plan in directing federal health dollars to the states to set up high-risk pools covering pre-existing conditions.<\/p>\n