March 7, 2017

Watch This Squirrel Explain the GOP’s New “Age Tax”

The AARP has a hilarious new video defending Obamacare.


Republicans’ effort to reform health care is already pissing off one of their core constituencies: old people. The AARP, which lobbies on behalf older Americans, put out a brutal (and amusing!) web video Monday afternoon fighting back against Republicans’ plans to replace Obamacare. In the video, a wood-chopping older man in the forest explains that his squirrel friend told him about the GOP’s plans to change what are know as “age-bands.” The age-band policy, implemented by Obamacare, said that health insurers could not charger their older clients more than three times as much as the youngest consumers. The GOP’s plan would bump that ratio up to 5-to-1. (Older people are generally riskier to insure and spend more on health care.)

The AARP isn’t a fan of that change, calling it an “age tax” and describing it as a hand out to big insurance companies. “No, I don’t think that’s fair either, Charlie,” the man tells his squirrel friend. The ad closes with him encouraging people to call Congress and tell their representatives to vote against the bill.

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