Ohio Dems push affordability legislation; critics tout consequences

(The Center Square) – Ohio House Democrats House recently unveiled a series of legislative proposals on a major issue in this year’s elections both statewide and nationally – affordability.

The Democrats blamed 20 years of Republican rule in the Ohio House for the growing costs of housing, health care, childcare and other necessities.

“The time to act on this crisis is now,” State Rep. Anita Somani, D-Dublin, said at a news conference.

But critics say continued government handouts often leads to unintended consequences without intended benefits.

Somani, a physician, is sponsoring legislation to lower the cost of health insurance following expiration of federal subsidies under the Affordable Care Act. She proposes adding a 1% “assessment fee” on all health insurers in Ohio.

“Currently healthc are costs are the number one concern for most families,” she said. “This issue will only get worse as more and more Ohioans feel the effects of the expiration of the advanced Affordable Care Act tax credits due to Republicans giving billionaires tax cuts.”

State Rep. Phil Robinson, D-Solon, said Ohio is unaffordable because of longstanding Republican control of the state government.

“The fact that you cannot afford to buy your first home is because of choices made by people in power,” he said. “Your child care costs are the same as a starting salary. Think about that. The same as a starting salary. Gasoline is more than $4 a gallon and natural gas for heat “has gone through the roof.

“For almost two decades, the politicians in charge of Ohio have chosen the super wealthy over the people. With every tax break for millionaires, loopholes for corporations or school vouchers for millionaires, the economy has made less and less sense for regular Ohioans."

Republican House members disagreed, defending their record on the issue of affordability.

“The Ohio House Republican Caucus has continued to prioritize keeping more money in Ohioans’ pockets – championing historic property tax relief totaling $3 billion, leading on comprehensive energy reform, expanding access to affordable child care, and flattening the income tax, despite puzzling opposition by House Democrats,” Caucus spokeswoman Carolyn Cypret told The Center Square in a statement. “These are real, common-sense solutions that lower people’staxes, support Ohio families and promote economic development.”

Simply throwing money at programs is no guarantee of improvement, Greg Lawson, senior research fellow at The Buckeye Institute, told The Center Square.

“The one challenge when you subsidize things is that you tend to increase its cost without necessarily getting all the benefits that you want,” Lawson said. “When you just do something that is not tied to outcomes, you end up getting, in a lot of cases, more subpar kinds of outcomes than you do when you have some sort of a defined metric that you want.”