By Linda Gorman 

Originally posted at The Hill, August 2017

In Washington, the healthcare debate isn’t about rescuing the people in the individual insurance market from ObamaCare’s high premiums and poor coverage. Nor is it about improving patient welfare, or reducing medical costs. It’s about using the “coverage for all” mantra to suck huge sums of money out of the private sector with ObamaCare taxes, premiums, and regulations.

ObamaCare forces the purchase of health insurance without regard to its price, quality, or value. Federal policies that increase coverage increase the amount of money flowing to special interests. Federal policies that decrease coverage mean more money for private households. No wonder both ObamaCare supporters and Obamacare reformers evaluate proposed changes on whether they increase or decrease coverage.

Americans had plenty of “stable” health coverage before ObamaCare. From 1987 to 2012 the percentage of people with coverage fluctuated between 83.7 and 87.1 percent. Twenty to 30 percent of the uninsured were not U.S. citizens. Many of them had coverage in their home country. Roughly 30 percent of the uninsured were eligible for Medicaid but did not sign up because they didn’t think they needed medical care. MORE