The Uninsured by Congressional District:
Congressional districts with the highest percentage of uninsured are in the Southwest and
tend to be in areas with a large Hispanic population. Massachusetts has the lowest percentage
of uninsured due to its state-run health insurance, which has been in place since 2006.
Click here for an interactive version of this map.
That interactive version of that map above is based on the Census Bureau’s annual American Community Survey. All 435 congressional districts are ranked by Michael Mellody at the
National Journal based on their share of uninsured residents. It comes as no surprise that Americans without health insurance are most heavily concentrated in minority districts represented by Democratic congresspeople.
But not only do many Republican districts in blue-collar and rural areas also contain high percentages of working-age citizens without health coverage, the overall difference between Democratic and Republican districts is also not great. The share of working-age people without insurance is 19.9 percent in Republican districts compared with 21.7 percent in Democratic ones.
This obviously makes no never-mind to Republicans willing to shut down the government in their vain and vainglorious efforts to stop Obamacare (as well as to squeeze more tens of billions of dollars out of an already hamstrung federal budget).
Ron Brownstein:
The big irony behind the scorched-earth Republican offensive against President Obama’s health care law is that its expansion of coverage to the uninsured would benefit House districts represented by Republicans nearly as much as those represented by Democrats. [...]
This dynamic underscores how thoroughly ideology is trumping interest as Republicans convert the budget and debt showdowns into their Thermopylae for blocking Obamacare. Because so many House Republicans represent districts with low coverage levels, these members are effectively seeking to prevent a substantial flow of federal dollars not only to uninsured individuals in their communities but also to hospitals, doctors, and other providers who now are delivering significant levels of uncompensated care. “This is really an ideological stand—and in American politics, it [eventually] tends to be more about economic self-interest,” says Robert Blendon, a Harvard School of Public Health professor who studies public opinion and health care.
While the shutdown spectacle continues with nothing but rumors regarding its possible end, Speaker John Boehner and the House Republicans who created the stand-off don't have much to say to constituents in their own districts who will benefit from the Affordable Care Act.
Except, of course, to declare that Obamacare is tyranny.
No word about the tyranny of their having no health coverage. Of having coverage but not for pre-existing conditions. Of living in the wealthiest nation on the planet, which spends more than any of the others per capita on medical care that reputedly is the best anywhere, yet remains outside the reach of so many tens of millions.
Instead, they keep ratcheting up their assault on the Affordable Care Act by deploying what they have shown themselves to be so very good at since the act passed in 2010: lying and fear-mongering. What they fear most is its success.