The DSA National Political Committee (NPC) welcomes the 5-4 Supreme Court decision upholding the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (“ACA”). The decision affirms the right of Congress to legislate in the interest of the general welfare of the American people.
We applaud the gains for ordinary American families that will come with the ACA. Over ten million members of moderate income families will gain coverage under Medicaid; millions of young Americans between the age of 21 and 26 will be able to stay on their parents’ insurance; children and adults with pre-existing conditions will now be covered by the same policies as those deemed by insurers to be “healthy”; and over one hundred million Americans will now be free of lifetime expenditure limits on their coverage.
DSA also recognizes, however, that the ACA will fail to curtail ever-rising health care costs driven by the profit-seeking of private insurers and private health-care providers. Only a single-payer or “Medicare for All” system would provide truly affordable universal coverage by granting a single public insurer bargaining leverage over private providers.
