 (Andy Dean Photography/Bigstock) By Max Ehrenfreund Republicans are touting their new health-care bill as a long-promised repeal of President Obama's health care law that puts health care decisions in patients hands. It's also a mass transfer of wealth that cuts taxes for the wealthiest Americans while cutting federal benefits for the middle and working class. Just two provisions in the Republican plan would allow the richest households to pay an average of nearly $200,000 less under the Republican plan, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. For the lower-middle class, the plan would replace the current system of benefits based on income with a new system based on age. As a result, a young person making less money would get less help to buy insurance than an older person who is making more. The GOP measure unwinds many of the provisions of Obamacare, which offered health insurance subsidies to millions of middle-income households and funded them in part through new taxes on the wealthy. Republican proponents of the bill argue that by eliminating regulations on health insurance, their legislation will reduce the price of coverage for the middle class, making up for the financial pain of reduced government support. Some experts, however, are skeptical that the plan will work as intended. "If the plan is successful in theory at lowering health insurance premiums, that's particularly a powerful economic benefit for low income people who struggle to afford health insurance," said Avik Roy, a former adviser to Republican presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). But Roy added that those benefits will not make up for the reduced subsidies: "The regulatory changes are a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, they don't go far enough," he said. "That's going to cause problems for a number of people." Read the rest on Wonkblog.
Chart of the day Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) argued Tuesday that poor Americans would be able to afford health care if they stopped spending their money on iPhones. "Maybe rather than getting that new iPhone that they just love and they want to go spend hundreds of dollars on that, maybe they should invest it in their own health care," the congressman said. "They've got to make those decisions for themselves." Christopher Ingraham has more. | 
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