Obamacare’s Broken Promises

On October 1, the Obamacare exchanges opened, and suddenly “train wreck” seemed like a generous term for the new health care law. There have been site closures, glitches, and other complications. President Obama assured the public that these problems would quickly be fixed by a team of technical experts. But it’s hard to believe that a few weeks of troubleshooting can fix what wasn’t done correctly during three years of preparation.

Why is this problematic? For one thing, if you are an individual without health insurance, the individual mandate requires you to purchase coverage or pay a fine. That’s why I pushed so hard for the individual mandate to be repealed, defunded, or at the very least delayed. It’s not fair to enforce this mandate if millions of people are unable to access the Obamacare exchanges. But the Senate refused to negotiate on this point and forced a government shutdown, even as the evidence of the exchanges’ failure grew before their eyes. The problems with the exchanges are even more troubling because they’re just one symptom of the law’s larger flaws. Instead of lower costs, we’re getting higher premiums. Instead of getting to keep your insurance, thousands of people are being kicked off their plans. Instead of accurate coverage, we’re getting flawed data.

I know that many of you have your own stories about how Obamacare is affecting your health coverage. If you’d like to share those stories with me, you can email [email protected].