This fall here in the United States, The Affordable Care Act (ACA) will ramp up efforts to re-enroll and enroll Americans in the Obama era plan to provide healthcare to all Americans.
As Americans may know, republicans have thrown several death blows at the program, none of which have put “Obamacare” in the grave. But this summer, the new presidential administration announced it would be cutting ACA advertising for the 2018 enrollment period by a whopping 90 percent.
That’s a lot of cost cutting.
Reading their justification through the CNN filter, it seems there might be some reason behind their cutbacks. Republicans insist ACA already is dead, even though the majority of Americans want the program. Several surveys released – ironically – at the same time the Trump administration announced their cuts, show that a tiny majority (just above 50 percent) of Americans like the ACA. Even while they acknowledge it has flaws that need fixing. Here’s a great analysis of the surveys.
I recently talked with a convicted felon and successful businessperson (a construction contractor) who said during an interview that “Obamacare killed my company”. It’s interesting when I hear that coming from people who believe in free enterprise, free markets and such. “Obamacare” didn’t kill this guy’s company. His unwillingness to go out and grow his company did. Any entrepreneur worth his salt realizes challenges are there to be overcome, not succumbed to. So to say a government program killed your entrepreneurial pursuit, in my opinion as an entrepreneur an admission of personal failure. Not an indictment of the government program.
Anyway, this circumstance wherein we see the right stridently trying every strategy possible to kill Americans’ increasing demand for healthcare for all, is playing in the favor of fundamental change. Can you smell it in the air? There are so many fundamental challenges facing humanity. It is not a coincidence that we see and feel all this churn. It’s because we are all asking for something more. Something different.
Something better.