Republicans Will Never Fix Healthcare. They Can't.
They can't because they don't understand that the only fix is a single-payer system that guarantees adequate healthcare for everyone and is funded by taxation.
That is the solution and it is the only solution that will finally provide equitable healthcare for all Americans. That has always been the case.
Until everyone recognizes that and stops trying to find some other way to handle it, we will have an unfair system that does not deliver healthcare to all. Nothing but a well-designed cradle-to-grave single payer system can ever do that.
When we finally realize that, it will be relatively easy to implement. We have a model for it in Medicare. All we have to do is expand that and set premiums for those who have not yet reached whatever age is deemed suitable for mostly-subsidized coverage. Right now, that age is 65. We oldsters still pay a premium for Part B 80% coverage, but it is not a high premium. Private insurers issue supplemental coverage to cover the other 20%. They love doing that. They fight over it. Let them fight over Medicare for All supplements, too, and get them off our backs.
Single Payer. Single Pool. Single, Profit-Free Administration. Simple, Equitable Healthcare for All.
Nothing less will work.
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That's why the GOP can't make it work. They can't think outside their restrictive free-market box, so they just keep moving the pieces around hoping somehow it will all come together - but it never will. Insurance, as originally conceived, is almost pure socialism. One of the earliest forms was invented in the 18th century or thereabouts by shippers who were losing a lot of money as a result of shipping accidents, shipwrecks and piracy. So they created a system whereby everybody would pay some amount of money into a pool, and anyone who lost their ship would be compensated out of the pool. If you never lost a ship you were still paying to compensate those who did. This kind of insurance works pretty well. Most other kinds of hazard insurance (car, homeowners, etc.) works pretty much the same way: lots of people pay premiums but only a relatively small percentage make claims, so the insurer can charge premiums that most people can afford. With life insurance eventually a claim will be made, but because premiums are paid over some period of time the insurer can invest the money and thus make enough to cover the eventual payout (which is why younger people pay lower premiums, determined by actuarial data).
Health insurance is different. Sooner or later everybody gets sick or injured, but it's impossible to predict when or how. Statistically, younger people are less likely to have to make claims, but they do get sick or injured, and they can end up with conditions that will require treatment for many years. And the ability to pay for health care isn't optional: You pay or maybe you die. Because medical treatment is very expensive and the need for it is not very predictable, if you are relying on private insurance a very large premium pool is necessary, which was the reason for the individual mandate. If everybody is paying into the pool, statistically, in any given year, not everybody will make claims and there will be enough to pay for those who do. But if the only people who pay premiums are the people who are more likely to need medical treatment (e.g., older people, the disabled, pregnant women) and need the coverage, there won't be enough money in the pool unless the premiums are extremely high or there are a whole lot of deductibles and exclusions. So the GOP is in an impenetrable box. Every version they come up with can make private health insurance "affordable" only if the coverage sucks. If it actually covers what most people need and doesn't have pre-existing condition exclusions and lifetime caps it's too expensive for many people. So lower income people will opt out entirely because they have no choice (the GOP is big on "choice"
, and then the pool becomes even smaller and the premiums go up some more.
There is no way to make "free market" private health insurance work. Either it's shit coverage or it's too expensive. There's no way around it, but McConnell, even using his super turtle powers, can't figure that out because his tiny reptile brain can't imagine anything that operates outside the myth of the free market.
If the GOP weren't so doggone crazy about their tax breaks, they'd finally realize that these are totally separate issues.
But yes single-payer is the solution that is proven to work in other countries and there's every reason to believe it would work here. The GOP could possibly adopt that program some day, except their problem is they've taken so many payoffs from the insurance industry. Insurance has to "go away" in order for the GOP to suddenly realize how blind they've been. (I don't know how we could make that happen.)
I believe it's going to take a lot of baby steps before we get to that point. But we have to start somewhere instead of constantly jumping backwards. The ACA was the first big step but there's still a long way to go.
As for the tax breaks for the richest 400 families, I don't understand why the GOP thinks it's even necessary to make all new laws just for them. They already get everything they want, just about. But that's another thread for another day.
....i wasn't blaming anyone for anything....but you chose to lecture me as though i did....i get it...everyone makes mistakes! 
the amazing collective brainpower of folks on DU.
So, let them not bother with government. We can handle that for them. 
