As they gear up to repeal all or part of the ACA, Republicans in Congress are coming out with a new (or recycled) lie about the benefits they'll be taking away, with or without a replacement. The lie has some basis in truth, but it is a gross distortion.
Here's the ur-iteration as voiced by Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Georgia, to Politico's Jennifer Haberkorn, who asked Isakson what might become of the roughly 20 million people who have gained coverage through the ACA. His response:
Most of those 20 million got bronze policies with a great big deductible and not much insurance, so I don’t know that there’s going to be a big backlash,..There are some minefields out there but we can deal with them.In a note, Politico points out that "most people on the exchanges choose silver plans, which provide a higher level of benefits." But that only clears one level of the mendacity expressed here.
For starters, more than 60% of those who gained coverage through the ACA did so via the Medicaid expansion (though not in Isakson's Georgia, which has refused to implement it). Medicaid generally has no premium and covers all, or very close to all, out-of-pocket expenses. People who have obtained Medicaid coverage through the ACA express high levels of satisfaction -- 88% of new Medicaid enrollees were satisfied with their coverage, according to the Commonwealth Fund's 2016 tracking survey.
