this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2023
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I've been voting regularly for 20 years and the ACA was a massive move in the correct direction...until Republicans gutted the individual mandate and refused federal funds for Medicaid expansion. It's always the Republicans ruining any semblance of progress that we make. I find Dems most guilty of trusting SCOTUS to do their jobs for them.
I want to see Dems again get a solid, undeniable majority in both chambers in 2024. Then push the priority passage of voting rights and anti-gerrymandering legislation. Those are concrete fixes to the system.
Even with the ACA I'm too afraid to use my health insurance lest I go bankrupt. I fell and hit my head and the ER bill, even with "good" insurance, was over $3,000. I would have been better off if I set my nose and sealed the cut with super glue myself. I'm paying $600 a month for insurance I can't use without going bankrupt.
Health care is still broken after the ACA, and will continue to be broken until we get rid of the rent-seekers in the health care industry. But Democrats seem to like those folks so I guess I'll just buy my meds from Tractor Supply and invest in a good needle and thread.
The ACA was only ever meant to be a first step. It was never intended to be the end goal. The Republicans gutting the individual mandate is what stole that momentum because it leaves simply being uninsured as an unfortunately viable financial option for enough people that it reduced pressure to reform the rest of the system.
The end goal is single payer. But it's difficult to the point of bordering on impossible to shift from what we had instantly into single payer in the third most populous country on the planet. It's estimated that single payer will put nearly 400,000 private insurance middle-people out of jobs. That's not a negligible problem. We're going to need a way to address that in the process of making the shift.
The ACA open markets have allowed me to leave jobs that I otherwise would not have been able to leave because I can't afford to go 30-90 days without health insurance. That open market didn't even exist when I was a young adult 20 years ago. Insurance gaps between jobs were simply a fact of life that a lot of people couldn't abide
I am highly doubtful that the end goal is single payer.
Single payer is the only actually viable option. The more change we make, the more obvious that will become. Probably single payer with private supplementation is where we'll end up because America will never settle for rich people not being able to buy nicer lives than the rest of us.
I agree with you. Joe Biden has done some good things while he was president. I voted for him. I wish he hadn't ran for a second term. He is too old. He is too old. He is too old. BUT since he has decided to run I will vote for him again because if the Republicans or Trump get in charge with the Congress and the supreme Court, our democracy will not survive. They already don't want people voting, and they don't want young people voting. They want a Christian Nation and rule us.