Affordable Heath Care
We believe: Affordable health care is a fundamental human right for all Americans.
We support:
📘 Define Affordable Health Care as a Right
🧭 Objective:
Codify affordable health care as a basic human right, not a privilege.
🔹 Key Actions:
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Pass federal legislation affirming the right to affordable health care for all citizens and legal residents.
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Set national affordability benchmarks: no household should spend more than 5% of income on health premiums, co-pays, or prescriptions.
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Establish a Health Equity Office within HHS to ensure that underserved populations have equal access.
📘 Reduce Costs Through Transparency and Competition
💲 Objective:
Drive down health care and prescription drug costs through transparency, negotiation, and anti-monopoly enforcement.
🔹 Key Actions:
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Drug Price Negotiation: Expand Medicare’s authority to negotiate prices for all high-cost drugs.
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Price Transparency: Require public posting of hospital, procedure, and drug prices (already partially implemented).
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Ban anti-competitive practices (e.g., “pay-for-delay” in pharmaceuticals).
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Increase funding for generic and biosimilar drug development.
📘 Expand and Strengthen Public Insurance Options
🏥 Objective:
Increase access and affordability through public insurance alternatives.
🔹 Key Actions:
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Create a Medicare Buy-In or Public Option available to all Americans regardless of age.
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Expand Medicaid eligibility in all 50 states (close the coverage gap in holdout states).
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Offer low- or no-cost insurance for families below 250% of the federal poverty line.
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Improve risk pooling across age and income groups to stabilize premium costs.
📘 Reform the Payment and Delivery System
🔧 Objective:
Improve outcomes and reduce inefficiencies in care delivery.
🔹 Key Actions:
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Move away from fee-for-service to value-based care models (like Accountable Care Organizations).
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Incentivize preventive care, chronic disease management, and telemedicine.
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Invest in primary care and mental health services as the foundation of affordable care.
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Streamline billing systems and administrative procedures (which account for up to 30% of costs in the U.S.).
📘 Fund the System Fairly and Sustainably
💼 Objective:
Ensure health care affordability without jeopardizing federal finances.
🔹 Key Actions:
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Introduce a progressive health care surtax on incomes above $500,000 annually.
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Raise the Medicare payroll tax slightly for high earners.
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Tax capital gains and investment income at equivalent rates as wages for high-income households.
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Audit and reduce wasteful federal health expenditures.
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Create a Federal Health Innovation Fund to pilot cost-saving technologies and delivery methods.
TAKE ACTION – Contact Congress
(How to contact Congress) click here
Congressional Committees That Oversee Health Care
Senate Committees
Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP)
- Jurisdiction: Public health, biomedical research (NIH, CDC, FDA), mental health, medical education, and insurance regulation.
- Key Programs: ACA, FDA, CDC, NIH, and health workforce policy.
Senate Committee on Finance
- Jurisdiction: Federal health insurance programs—Medicare, Medicaid, CHIP, ACA tax credits, and hospital payments.
- Key Role: Controls the financial underpinnings of U.S. health care.
House Committees
House Committee on Energy and Commerce
- Jurisdiction: Public health, food and drug safety, biomedical research (NIH, CDC), mental health, private insurance markets.
- Oversight Areas: ACA marketplaces, Medicare Advantage, FDA regulation, and public health emergencies.
- Subcommittees: Health; Oversight and Investigations.
House Committee on Ways and Means
- Jurisdiction: Medicare, tax-related provisions of health care (e.g., ACA subsidies), and Social Security.
- Oversight Areas: Health care financing, provider reimbursement, and senior care.
House Committee on Education and the Workforce
- Jurisdiction: Employer-sponsored insurance, ERISA, and health benefits for workers.
- Role: Addresses workforce health issues, wellness programs, and insurance regulation under employer plans.
🧩 Related Committees (With Partial Oversight)
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Appropriations Committees (House & Senate): Control annual funding for HHS, NIH, CDC, CMS.
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Veterans’ Affairs Committees: Oversee health services provided by the VA.
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Budget Committees: Review long-term fiscal impacts of health programs.