More Verification That Americans Want To Keep Obamacare

All of the charts in this post were made from information provided in the new Kaiser Foundation Health Tracking Poll. The survey was done between March 11th and 17th of a nationwide sample of 1,504 adults, and has a margin of error of 3 points.

Last Monday I posted about a recent Pew Research Center Poll that showed while more Americans disapprove of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) than approve of it, a substantial majority don't want Obamacare to be repealed. They want it to be kept and improved. Now a Kaiser Foundation survey (usually pretty reliable on health care issues) has reached the same conclusion. Their survey shows that a plurality of the public (46%) still disapproves of Obamacare (see top chart).

But while many still disapprove, a clear majority (59%) of Americans want the program to be kept (and improved), while only 29% still want it to be repealed. That's a 30 point gap favoring keeping Obamacare in effect. And that is agreed to by both Democrats (89%) and Independents (52%). It is only the Republicans where a majority (58%) want it repealed (and 31% of Republicans want Obamacare to be kept -- nearly one out of every three).

Why do most people want Obamacare to be kept instead of repealed? The third chart above gives us a big clue to that. When you question people about whether they like certain aspects of Obamacare, you find that a majority approves of nearly every provision in Obamacare. The only provision not approved of by a majority of Americans is the individual mandate.

And I think most people don't really understand the individual mandate. They have heard the Republicans tell them lies about it -- like it will force Americans to buy insurance they can't afford, and will affect most Americans. That's not true. The people who really can't afford to buy private insurance will get help from the government in the form of a subsidy to help pay for it. In truth, the only people who must buy insurance without government help amount to less than 6% of the population -- everyone else will either get a subsidy, are covered through their employer, or are on Medicare or Medicaid.

But the falsehoods about the individual mandate are not the only lies the Republicans have been spreading about the Affordable Care Act. They have claimed the program will not work, will provide subsidies to undocumented immigrants, and creates "death panels" to make end-of-life decisions for those on Medicare. The first is being exposed by the millions who are now covered with health insurance under Obamacare (more than 12 million at last count, and still growing). But too many people still believe the other two lies. Only 32% know that undocumented immigrants will not get any government subsidy, and only 44% know that Obamacare did not create any kind of "death panels" (see bottom two charts).

The sad fact is that the Republicans have been more effective in spreading their lies than the government has been in explaining the truth about Obamacare to the nation. That's why the disapproval numbers still outweigh the approval numbers. But as the program takes effect, and millions of new people are covered with insurance (and most others are not adversely affected), that is changing. And that's why most Americans now want to keep Obamacare in effect.