It blows my mind how much this bill seems to morph day by day. I expected some form of coverage for abortions - many plans do now cover it, where it is allowed. Our health plan is among those.
I’m also astonished that the federal government is suddenly subsidizing so much of the health plan premiums. I did not think that was on the table at all. To subsidize health insurance to some extent for families earning up to 400% of the poverty line, that covers a very large number of Americans who currently afford their health plans. Yeah, I’d love to be able to pay less, and I’m sure there are families who sacrifice more than mine does to afford a good health plan, but still that line seems set ludicrously high. According to this fact sheet:
dhcs.ca.gov/services/medi-cal/eligibility/Documents/FPL%20Chart%20for%20PE.pdf
That 400% level for a family of 4 in 2012 would be $7,450 per month, or just shy of $90k annually. I don’t believe it’s a good use of public funds, no matter how received, to subsidize health insurance for people making $90k annually.
So $1
separate premium as an accounting trick to avoid both allegations of using federal funds to subsidize abortions (which is illegal under U.S. Code), and to get around abortion coverage being mandatory. It’s still going to cause a furor, and line-iteming it will not help. The separate nature of the charge will, no matter what, lead people who are opposed to abortions to ask whether they can just ‘not pay’ the separate fee. Some will likely not pay it (if paying by check), lose their insurance and grumble. I’m sure many will forget (would you really remember to pay that Dollar More portion of your gas bill every month if it meant writing out and sending a separate $1 check to the gas company?), and many will express grief over having to pay for something they disagree with in order to obtain health insurance - it’s more immediate and more involving to explicitly write out a check that’s for the purpose of paying for another person’s abortion than if it’s just included in the pool of funds from your insurance plan.
The fact is that no matter how legal abortion is in the United States, a very large number of Americans - voters and non-voters, insured and uninsured, employed and unemployed, religious and non-religious - are not comfortable with it and want no part of it. This is why the pro-choice mantra of “safe, legal and rare” gets hung up whenever numbers are brought into the picture - that 1 million babies are aborted each year including 90% of all Down’s Syndrome babies. It’s just astonishing because it comes across as so monstruous, and rightly so.
If you’re reading my post and disagree with me you may very well say that pro-lifers won’t be happy until there’s no abortions in the United States. You’re right, we won’t. It’s incredibly difficult to justify the taking of innocent life, especially when the vast majority of abortions are performed electively, ie without the terrible circumstance of rape or incest or where the tragedy of having to choose between the life of the child and the life of the mother is not an issue. I’d prefer the pro-choice mantra to what we have now.
