One day after the House passed a measure that would delay its implementation President Barack Obama was touting the Affordable Care Act after the recent news that insurance companies will be sending out half a billion dollars in rebates, reports NBC News.
Part of the law caps the amount of profit that insurance companies can receive by requiring 80 cents on the dollar be spent directly on medical care.
"Generally speaking, what we've seen is that health care costs have slowed drastically in a lot of areas since we passed the Affordable Care Act," President Obama said to reporters at the White House. "We have a lot more work to do, but health care inflation isn't sky-rocketing the way it was."
The Affordable Care Act, derisively referred to as ObamaCare by those who oppose the act, was passed over three years ago yet most of it has yet to be implemented. The employer mandate, a requirement that all employers with over fifty full time employees must offer health insurance, was supposed to go into effect in 2014 but has been delayed for a year after businesses complained that they needed more time to understand the complexities of the regulation, according to CBS News.
The delay prompted the Republican controlled House to pass bills that would require a one year delay on the employer mandate as well as a one year delay on the law requiring almost all Americans to purchase health insurance by the first of the year. The bills passed mostly along party lines but the vote was more symbolic than anything, the Senate won't touch the bills and even if they did pass they would surely be vetoed by President Obama. It marks the 38th time that the Republican majority in the House has attempted to repeal all of or a portion of the Affordable Care Act, according to CBS News.
President Obama appeared to be irritated by the actions of the Republican controlled House, suggesting that he would be willing to hear their ideas for health care reform if they were to share any, reports the Associated Press.
"What I've heard is the same old song and dance," President Obama said. "We've just going to blow through that stuff and just keep on doing the right thing for the American people."
The president also took a shot at Republicans for wasting time with symbolic votes over health care instead of moving on.
"We're refighting these old battles," President Obama said. "Sometimes I just try to figure out why. Maybe they think it's good politics, but part of our job here is not to always think about politics."
Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., took issue with the president celebrating the insurance refunds when citizens will have to pay new health care taxes starting next year, according to the Associated Press.
"Jacking up our constituents' health care costs is bad enough, but to try to then convince them the opposite is happening - that they've actually won some Publisher's Clearinghouse sweepstakes, well, it's just as absurd as it sounds," McConnell said.
A poll by NBC News and the Wall Street Journal shows that only 37 percent of the public supports the health care reform bill while 49 percent believe it to be a bad idea. President Obama's remarks were aimed at changing people's minds about the law.
"I bet if you took a poll, most folks wouldn't know when that check comes in that this was because of ObamaCare that they got this extra money in their pockets," President Obama said.
