Why the GOP can\u2019t win millennials with GIFs<\/a> by Alex Seitz-Wald in Salon.<\/p>\nThe Text:<\/strong> The Heritage Foundation\u2019s GIF-tastic listicle on BuzzFeed explaining why young people should hate Obamacare is coming in for mocking, thanks to its heavy-handed attempt to appeal to the youths much like, Tommy Christopher quips, \u201ca narc walking around a frat party asking \u2018fellow young people, where can I obtain an enjoyable reefer cigarette.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\nThe post is actually kind of funny and nails the BuzzFeed style. And it was probably even made by a real live young person, since Heritage has enough of them around to necessitate having a dorm next door for its interns. But just as a narc would still be a narc even if he blended in perfectly with the stoners, Heritage\u2019s message on Obamacare will never sell to young people as long as Obamacare helps young people. Just as with the social conservative plan to \u201cmake abortion funny,\u201d the medium only goes so far if the message is wrong.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s easy to see why conservatives need to enlist the youth in their fight against Obamcare. The fate of the law is dependent upon enough young adults enrolling in insurance programs to keep the costs down for everyone else. Since they\u2019re cheaper to insure, young and healthy people effectively subsidize older and sick people. If lots of young people leave the pool, premiums will go up, pushing more young people out, thus raising premiums once again, and so on in a premium \u201cdeath spiral.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
So, Heritage may be thinking, if we can keep enough young folks from buying health insurance, you could theoretically make Obamacare collapse under its own weight. That may also be the thinking at The National Review, FreedomWorks, Americans for Prosperity, conservative blogs, and others on the right who have been fighting so hard to make the case that Obamacare is bad for the Obama generation. Heritage\u2019s listicle is just the latest, weirdest, attempt to reach millennials.<\/p>\n
Fortunately for the White House, there\u2019s little chance Heritage\u2019s GIFs will destroy Obama\u2019s signature accomplishment. The message in Heritage\u2019s listicle, and all the other conservative programming directed to young people, is a slight tweak on the right\u2019s standard anti-Obamacare line: It will raise taxes, force you to change doctors and insurers, add to the deficit, increase health care costs, and by the way, implementation is a train wreck. But this is a message is for the haves, worried about the government taking away what they already possess, while many young people are still have nots, more concerned with getting decent jobs and health care in first place than government meddling with it.<\/p>\n
Young people disproportionately lack heath insurance, and visit doctors less often than older people, so they\u2019re less likely to be concerned about Obamacare forcing them to change doctors or insurance companies, and are less concerned about health care costs. If you visit your doctor once a year for a physical, and have few if any prescriptions, messing with the status quo isn\u2019t a big deal.<\/p>\n
But more importantly, Heritage completely ignores everything the law does for young people. For instance, about 90 percent of uninsured young adults will qualify for Obamacare subsidies. Nor does the listicle mention that the law lets kids stay on their parents\u2019 health insurance plan until the age of 26. Indeed, the number of young people lacking coverage has fallen since the law went into effect, though still remains higher than for older adults.<\/p>\n
\u201cGenerally, we think the Affordable Care Act is going to have a lot of positive outcomes for young people,\u201d Jen Mishory of the youth healthcare advocacy organization Young Invincibles told the Washington Post. Heritage has no response to this.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile the economic arguments also ring hollow. The unemployment rate for 18-29 year olds in June was 12.7 percent, way above the 7.6 percent national rate. And wages have stagnated for young people, who in 2010 made $5,000 less than in 20000. At an average salary of under $40,000 a year, most millennials pay little in taxes. As polls explain, keeping taxes down isn\u2019t exactly a big concern. And millenials consistently and overwhelmingly favor raising taxes on the wealthy, where most of the tax burden for the Affordable Care Act will fall.<\/p>\n
Ironically, the Heritage listicle completely misses the most compelling argument for why young people should oppose Obamacare \u2014 that it will increase their premiums as it caps older peoples\u2019 rates. There\u2019s debate about how much more young will have to pay, and whether they\u2019ll actually feel it with all the subsidies, but they probably will have to pay something.<\/p>\n
Still, polls show a large number of young people, including those who lack health insurance now, think having coverage is important and say they want it and will buy it if they can afford to.<\/p>\n
But perhaps the biggest program with efforts like Heritage\u2019s or FreedomWorks\u2019, is that its suggesting young people should go without health insurance. That\u2019s hardly a winning message.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Article: Why the GOP can\u2019t win millennials with GIFs by Alex Seitz-Wald in Salon. The Text: The Heritage Foundation\u2019s GIF-tastic listicle on BuzzFeed explaining why young people should hate Obamacare is coming in for mocking, thanks to its heavy-handed attempt to appeal to the youths much like, Tommy Christopher quips, \u201ca narc walking around […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[259],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n
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![\"Millennial](\"http:\/\/www.prosebeforehos.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/millennial-gop.jpg\")
<\/p>\n