A new Washington Post-ABC News poll "shows Americans deeply divided over the proposals under consideration and majorities predicting higher costs ahead." But, while overall support for the bill is essentially tied with overall disapproval--48 to 49 percent, a strong majority still supports the public option and employer mandates, and an even larger majority believes that abortion coverage needs to be maintained for women using their own money.
In the poll, 61 percent say they support barring coverage for abortions for those receiving public subsidies, but if private funds were used to pay for abortion expenses, the numbers flipped. With segregated private money used to cover abortion procedures, 56 percent say insurance offered to those using government assistance should be able to include such coverage....
Two-thirds of those surveyed support one of the basic tenets of the reform plan, a new requirement that all employers with payrolls of $500,000 or more provide health insurance coverage for their employees or face fines.
As in previous polls, a majority supports a government-sponsored heath insurance plan to compete with private insurers, although the percentage supporting the general idea has slipped slightly over the past month to 53 percent. Support for the scheme jumps to 72 percent when the public plan is limited to those who lack access to coverage through an employer or the Medicare or Medicaid systems.
Taking the fight to insurance companies is a clear winner. While about 60 percent see it as possible that some insurers could be forced out of business by competition from a public option, most of them seem just fine with that, continuing to support the public option. And perhaps the AARP endorsement has helped, with support from seniors (although still weak) increasing 13 points from September to 44 percent.
Some of the more interesting tidbits from the poll are here in graphical form:
Note that support for the proposal is much stronger among those who have been paying enough attention to think they have a "good basic understanding" of the changes being proposed. The more educated people feel about it, the less they fear it. Nonetheless, they still think costs are going to rise both for themselves, and for the nation as a whole. That could be a function of conditioning--healthcare costs have risen so consistently and so dramatically that people don't see that as ending any time soon. But it could also be that the public doesn't see enough in this bill to control costs.
The public option and employer mandates consistently poll as the strongest components of reform, no matter how cynical the public has gotten in watching this months-long sausage making process. Looking ahead to 2010, giving the people what they want now in healthcare reform is going to be the Democrats' best bet.
See charcharczar's diary for more discussion.