Coverage and Healthcare Are Not the Same

By Ed Hoffman

Since it was overshadowed by the gay marriage decision made last Friday, let’s take some time to address the Supreme Court’s opinion on King vs. Burrell, a key challenge to Obamacare. The court’s decision upholds Affordable Care Act tax credits for people living in the 34 states that opted out of establishing a state exchange (i.e., our own Covered California or another state’s equivalent). What that means is Americans who have Obamacare in a federal exchange rather than a state marketplace are still entitled to tax subsidies – so yippee for the rule of law, right? Wrong, because that’s not what the law says.

Here’s how that part of the ACA was written: Tax credits are only to be distributed for marketplaces “established by the state.” Notice it does not say marketplaces established by the federal government. So now, the Supreme Court has decided it can interpret federal law to mean something it didn’t really mean. Special thanks to Chief Justice John Roberts, who was, as usual, the disappointing swing vote of the SCOTUS who appears willing to save Obamacare at any cost.

I agree with judicial scholar Elizabeth Slattery when she wrote, “In his majority opinion, Roberts looked for ways to obscure the plain meaning of the statutory text to repair a law that simply wouldn’t work.” He sure did, and he admitted as much by saying, “While the meaning of the phrase ‘an Exchange established by the State’ may seem plain when viewed in isolation, such a reading turns out to be untenable in light of the statute as a whole…Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them. If at all possible, we must interpret the Act in a way that is consistent with the former, and avoids the latter.” Never mind that the Obama administration re-wrote the statute, and it’s not the job of the Supreme Court to go back and make edits.

And for those of us taxpayers in California (along with 15 other states), we not only get to pay for our state exchange with our state tax dollars – but also, our federal tax dollars get to be used for the subsidies outlined in the ACA and the federal exchanges for the other 34 states that opted to just not pay for their own states.

On top of that, never mind that healthcare coverage remains unaffordable for many Americans – yes, Americans of all income levels. It’s not affordable for me, my employees and many of the home buyers who are my clients. Just a few of the dismal changes currently affecting people I care about include:

• Prescriptions can no longer be called in; they have to be written on paper, as if we don’t live in the digital age.
• Drugstores like CVS and Walgreens always seem to be mysteriously “out of stock” of pain management medications, because these are now classified as Schedule 2 Narcotics and are heavily regulated by Obamacare. That’s devastating to someone who is recovering from invasive surgery.
• My own PPO has risen in price from $873 a month to $1,900 a month, and it now costs more than ever to insure my hard-working employees and their families.

“But Ed, this law has helped so many people; didn’t you hear the President last week?” I sure did, and here’s what those people need to know: You may have insurance now, but you don’t have healthcare. Healthcare is when your health is actually being cared for – not just theoretically “covered.”

Ed Hoffman is host of The Main Event on AM590, which airs Saturday 9:30AM- 10:30AM and Sunday 4:00PM- 5:00PM. Follow him on Twitter @EdHoffman, and like him on Facebook by searching The Main Event 590.