I come from a -deeply- conservative family, a large one at that, and I still don't know a single person who supports our healthcare system. The memes you read about evil republicans against it just aren't true. So what's the real reason?
I suspect big companies also lobby against allowing individuals to purchase health insurance with pre tax dollars if you are employed by a small company that does not offer health insurance.
Similar to why an employee can save $20.5k of pre tax earnings per year if they work for an employer that offers 401k benefits, and an employee that works for an employer that does not offer 401k benefits can save $6k of pre tax earnings, IF they earn less than $68k per year.
And I have never heard either a Democrat or "small government" Republican address this glaring piece of corruption.
The cherry on top is that the legislation Democrats' are trying to push through right now gets rid of the backdoor Roth which allows people to save $6k in a tax advantaged Roth IRA if they are not eligible for IRAs, claiming that this is a benefit for the rich. But even the Democrats do not seem to want to touch the $20.5k (employee) or $61k (employer + employee) 401k limit, which benefits even richer people working for richer companies.
If you want actual representation, you first need to change the system.
This is what happens when we have out-of-touch elite class running Congress.
I wonder if that's a natural consequence of the giant part of the voter base that feels obligated to vote for one of the two parties for social/tribal reasons alone. Without these voters pressuring their parties to align more with them in economic terms too, the effect of corporate pressure may be felt more strongly by politicians, leading to a drift to corporatism.
Although the bigger issues is probably distribution of resources within American society. Lots of people were pissed that even the compromise that was ACA caused their healthcare costs to rise, even though it objectively lead to many more Americans getting access to healthcare. The country might say they want everyone to have everything, but no one will sign up to pay.
Whereas before, say the top 50% of the population got access to healthcare because they worked for government or large enough private companies to afford it, now that the bottom 50% had access to healthcare via subsidies and laws ensuring no one could be excluded from health insurance, the costs rose for the top 50%, and I hear endless whining about it, ignoring the fact that the bottom 50% can actually get an annual physical now.