It seems that our President faces a serious problem with the ACA, “Obamacare.” He needs to have thousands of young people buy health insurance to make the law viable. You’ve heard how the young and healthy are needed to pay for the older and sicker. The law provides financial penalties (call them “taxes” to make the whole thing “constitutional”) for anyone who doesn’t buy insurance. Unfortunately for the workability of this program, most young and healthy people would rather pay the penalty than buy the insurance. First of all, they say, the federal standards require that the available insurance cover things that don’t apply to all potential purchasers. For example, a young male probably will not willingly pay for maternity care. Furthermore, many young people under the ACA are allowed to stay on their parents’ insurance until they turn 26, a self contradictory provision of the law that common sense would have deleted from the original concept.
It seems to me that President Obama is overlooking the most obvious solution to his problem. The “taxes” to be levied on the non-compliant amount to 1% of their incomes or $95, whichever is higher. That doesn’t seem high enough. If he wants young people to buy health insurance, he should raise the “taxes” for not doing so. The news tells us that many young people who investigate available Healthcare Policies are seeing much higher premiums and deductibles. The relatively puny penalties for not buying insurance will hardly do the trick. Obama needs to step up and make the penalties more onerous than the potentially increased costs of insurance.
I know what you’re thinking, Obama doesn’t have the authority to do that. Don’t be silly. He’s already exempted groups from the law and delayed mandates. He’s treated the law as though it were his law and not ours. What authority exists to prevent him from changing the penalties? Step up, Mr. President. Don’t wimp out now. Show us what you’re made of.
TheMiddleofSomewhere 