Uninsured Penalties

In the article Premiums, Penalties and Political Costs written by David Herszenhorn and published in the New York Times on September 27th, 2009. Currently congress is not concerned of the affordability for the federal government with the proposed health care legislation. The current question being considered is whether the taxpayers can foot the health insurance bill.

The current bill will require almost all Americans to obtain health insurance. This is mandatory since most people will incur a penalty if they do not obtain coverage. Penalties for families not obtaining health insurance could run as high as $1,900. There are two very obvious ways to avoid the high cost of insurance falling on the tax-paying Americans. The first being broad improvements in efficiency of the health care system which cannot happen overnight. Its a final goal of course but not being addressed in this particular policy. The second option would be to unload the cost onto the government but Obama has already placed a limit in $900 billion dollars in ten years.

The penalty insures that Americans are pushed to have health insurance instead of allowing many people continuing without it. The problem comes when people start being penalized for not obtaining health insurance they cannot afford to begin with. Subsidies are being used to alleviate cost of the mandatory health insurance. The Congressional Budget Office estimates 29 million fewer uninsured people as a result of legislation.

Many senators have already suggested reforms and opinions to the current health proposal. Penalty waivers have been suggested to cost as low as 7 percent, 5 percent, or even as low as 3 percent of their income. The only concern about lowering the penalty will give Americans already without insurance less enticement to obtain the government insurance.