The House is devolving into utter chaos over Trumpcare, over a proposed replacement that is so shoddy, this is what could happen.
Under the Republican plan, the government would give people who buy their own insurance money to help them pay for it. A 20-year-old who doesn’t get coverage from work or the government, for example, would get $2,000. If the essential health benefits go away, insurance companies would be allowed to sell health plans that don’t cover, say, hospital care. Federal money would help buy these plans. […]
Mark Pauly, a professor of health care management at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, who tends to favor market solutions in health care, said that while the Obamacare rules are "paternalistic," it would be problematic to offer subsidies without standards. "If they’re going to offer a tax credit for people who are buying insurance, well, what is insurance?" he said, noting that you might end up with the government paying for plans that covered aromatherapy but not hospital care. "You have to specify what’s included.”
A proliferation of $1,995 plans that covered mostly aromatherapy could end up costing the federal government a lot more money than the current G.O.P. plan, since far more people would take advantage of tax credits to buy cheap products, even if they weren’t very valuable.
Even a Republican should have a problem with doing that.
Help the fight. The House is still scheduled to vote on Trumpcare TODAY. Even if you already called your member of Congress, do it again by calling the Capitol Hill switchboard at (202) 224-3121. Jam the phone lines, urge them to vote NO.