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Lawmakers Still Have Work To Do With Health Insurance Overhaul

Implacable critics of President Donald Trump dismissed his Tuesday speech to Congress as full of platitudes and short on substance. One can only wonder whether they dozed off during much of the address.

Trump offered a variety of policy prescriptions during the presentation. One of them involves the critical issue of what to do about Obamacare.

Conservatives in Congress reportedly had been divided over the crucial question of what to do about massive subsidies necessary to ensure millions of Americans have health insurance acceptable to the government.

In two ways, that affects as many as 28 million people. More than 16 million are those who were added to the Medicaid rolls by Obamacare. Another 12 million or so receive subsidies for private insurance coverage.

On Tuesday, Trump made his position clear:”We should help Americans purchase their own coverage, through the use of tax credits and expanded health savings accounts, but it must be the plan they want, not the plan forced on them by the government.”

With the devil always in the details, lawmakers still have to work out a plan that really helps Americans with health insurance, but at the least possible cost to taxpayers and those who can afford coverage on their own or through their employers.

But Trump has offered a design, if not a blueprint, for repealing the wreck that is Obamacare and replacing it with something better. Political realities dictate that Congress go along with the president’s outline for reform.

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