The USC/L.A. Times health care poll released over the weekend could prove the oft-stated observation that a poll represents only a “snapshot in time.” The poll indicates that, unlike other regions of the country, Californians are in favor of the health care reforms recently signed into law by the president. By a 46%-29% margin poll respondents said they would vote for a congress member who voted for the bill.
However, from comments made by those polled it appears people like the “idea” of health care reform, even if they don’t know how this particular reform package will play out.
One respondent told the Times that he did not understand the mechanics of the bill but was positive toward it because: “I just know we have an issue with healthcare. To see something being done about it makes me happy.”
Some who have taken a closer look at the reform package have come to a different conclusion, but the question we are exploring here is will the favorable attitude represented in the poll hold?
The editorial writers of the Wall Street Journal this weekend compared the Obama health care plan with the “similar” Massachusetts health care plan passed under then Governor Mitt Romney. Warned the Journal editorial writers: “So the Massachusetts preview of ObamaCare is all the more instructive after this week’s imposition of de facto price controls on its remaining private insurers.”
It seems health care costs in Massachusetts have risen to the highest in the country since the passage of the Bay State health care bill passed, which was supposed to control costs. Now, the administration of Massachusetts’s governor Deval Patrick has decided to impose price controls on insurance premiums. These price controls fell generally on non-profit insurers, which are the biggest in the Bay State. The Journal indicates rate-setting may be in the cards for hospitals and health care providers as well.
Since the new national health care plan won’t be fully implemented before November’s election the health care issue will probably not have a great effect on California elections. But if the Journal analysis is correct, minds will change.
The point of the editorial is that if Obama Care follows the path set by the similar Massachusetts health care law, limits and caps are part of our health care future.
If that occurs, then those poll numbers “snapped” in the wake of the bill’s passage will be entirely different when the effects of the bill take hold.