USA - Obama Care: Senate GOP fail again and abandon latest effort to kill Obama Care - by J. Eilperin and S.Sullivan

Senate Republicans decided Tuesday not to hold a vote on unwinding the Affordable Care Act, preserving the landmark 2010 law for the foreseeable future even as they suggested they may withhold crucial funding for it

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The move leaves the GOP — once again — short of fulfilling a signature promise, which some Republicans worried could inspire a backlash among their base heading into the 2018 midterm elections.

Several senators said they instead plan to move onto other issues now that the party’s latest proposal, authored by Republican Sens. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.) and Bill Cassidy (La.), had failed to garner sufficient support 

“Where we go from here is tax reform,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told reporters after holding a closed-door policy lunch with members of his caucus.

Meanwhile, Republican lawmakers voiced little interest in shoring up the existing ACA insurance market, sowing apprehension among insurers and state officials just weeks before consumers must start enrolling in plans for next year. 

Note EU-Digest: The US Republican Party is in deep trouble: division among party members, poor Congressional leadership, and the fact that their "Principal Leader", the President of the USA, is a "loose Canon", also is not helpful for their reputation and morale within the party.

 
Read more: Senate GOP abandons latest effort to unwind the Affordable Care Act - The Washington Post

USA - Health Insurance:World’s Greatest Healthcare Plan of 2017 is here to save us? by-Gary Legum

Kudos to whichever policy aide in the office of Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, came up with the idea of naming his Obamacare repeal bill “World’s Greatest Healthcare Plan of 2017.” Given the suffering and misery that would result from this or any other repeal, that person has an unparalleled sense of irony.

But what great branding! How could Donald Trump, our most brand-obsessed president ever, not go for a bill named “World’s Greatest Healthcare Plan of 2017?” Print it on gold-trimmed paper! Chisel it in marble tablets and set them on the National Mall as a monument to Republican greatness!

Sessions introduced this bill a week ago, though the media seems to have just noticed it on Wednesday. According to the Daily Beast, the amiable dimwit who chairs the House Rules Committee hoped the Republican caucus would base its repeal efforts off his work. Instead, the GOP modeled the American Health Care Act, the official name of the repeal bill unveiled this past Monday, on legislation written by Tom Price, the former Georgia congressman recently installed as Donald Trump’s secretary of Health and Human Services.

That’s too bad. Not because the World’s Greatest Healthcare Plan of 2017 is better than the nightmare of a bill that the GOP is pushing. Sessions’ bill is also garbage that fulfills every promise that Republicans have been making about Obamacare repeal for seven years, no matter how destructive and contradictory. It would keep the more popular features of the original Affordable Care Act, such as young people being able to stay on their parents’ insurance until the age of 26, while throwing away the mechanisms that made the ACA financially workable (the individual and employer mandates). Sessions might as well have called it the “Have Your Cake and Eat It Too Plan of 2017” but that might have been a little too on-the-nose.

Sessions’s bill may be a more pure repeal of Obamacare than the AHCA, which has been derided as “Obamacare Lite” by conservatives opposed to maintaining any of the reforms signed into law by President Obama. The AHCA seems to have been crafted in a half-serious fashion. That is, its authors were trying to pretend that they are serious policy wonks who genuinely care about reform. They tried to write a bill they hoped would please both moderates and conservatives. So far, they appear to have satisfied neither.

Read more: At last! The World’s Greatest Healthcare Plan of 2017 is here to save us! - Salon.com

USA: Supreme Court's Obamacare decision and 2016 -by Brett LoGiurato

The Supreme Court handed the Obama administration a significant victory on Thursday, when it upheld a key provision of the Affordable Care Act that allows the federal government to keep distributing subsidies to help low-income Americans buy health insurance.

But the decision's ramifications could be felt in the 2016 election and beyond, especially if a Republican wins the White House next year.

That's because the Supreme Court not only ruled the federal subsidies are legal under the Affordable Care Act, but it also did not leave any ambiguity that would allow a future administration to interpret the law differently.

The Supreme Court has definitively determined that the federal government can provide subsidies under the law.

 

Read more US Supreme Court's Obamacare decision and 2016 - Business Insider

USA: Insurance Industry Making Out Like Bandits On Obamacare-Premiums Worth More Than $90 Billion - by Value Penguin

The Affordable Care Act will push the over 45 million uninsured in the United States to find health care coverage. The largest portion of this group will find coverage through the health insurance marketplaces set up by the state and federal exchanges. Consumers purchasing through the exchanges will receive coverage through private insurance companies, with many receiving federal tax credits to help pay for policies. While the consumer may not be paying the full price of the policy, the insurance companies will still receive the full premium. 

Based on our estimates the uninsured are worth a potential $92+ billion in annual premiums to the insurance companies. The Affordable Care Act requires that 80% of the value of the premiums be used to service health care costs, leaving a little over $18.4 billion to be spread across employees, marketing, overhead and profits. Insurance companies we've looked at could expect anywhere from 2-4% of all premiums to come in the form of profits. This would amount to $1.8-$3.6 billion dollars annually.

Read more Obamacare Could Be Worth More Than $90 Billion to the Insurance Industry - DailyFinance