The zombie has risen again.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), back in Washington following a brawl with his neighbor that left him with six broken ribs, announced Tuesday that he plans to introduce an amendment to the GOP tax reform bill that would repeal the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate.
Today I am announcing my intention to amend the Senate tax bill to repeal the individual mandate and provide bigger tax cuts for middle income taxpayers.
The mandate repeal is a promise we all made and we should keep. It also allows an additional $300 billion+ in tax cuts.
— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) November 14, 2017
Paul and the other Republicans who have been agitating for the mandate repeal—including Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Tom Cotton (R-AR) and President Trump—have cited studies by the Congressional Budget Office that found that axing the requirement that people buy health insurance or pay a tax penalty would save the government hundreds of billions of dollars. Less mentioned, however, is why.
The CBO reported in early November that repealing the individual mandate would lead to 13 million fewer people having health insurance over the next 10 years. Some of those people would be younger and healthier Americans who drop their health insurance voluntarily due to the mandate’s repeal, the CBO found. But skyrocketing premiums for everyone remaining in the market would price out and drive out older and sicker patients, leading to a “death spiral.”
There’s also a reason the mandate repeal is not in either the House or Senate’s version of the tax bill—the bill is politically dicey as it is, and GOP leadership fears adding in controversial health care policy that was already voted down in Congress this year could tank the effort entirely.
